"We don't need anymore hero's, we just need someone to take out the recycling" Banksy

Heros, Eco-Warrior, Tree Huggers, Environmental fascists, we salute and applaud you.  Your demonstration of sustainability, ‘Off Grid’ living and freedom from constrains of our oppressive, suffocating, consumerist society, are a positive inspiration for us all.

Want to make a difference? But not wanting to play Tarzan and Jane in the jungle?

If running to the wilderness, using only what nature provides to survive is the ultimate act of extremism, does that mean having a 9-5 office job, mortgage and a retirement plan, is the ultimate in conformity? 

Are our only choices rebellion or submission?

No! Our world isn’t coloured only black and white, just as choices are far more expansive then ‘comply’ or ‘opt out’.  Swinging through the tress in a loin cloth might not be your style, but it doesn’t mean you need to feel like an ant; powerless to the ‘System’.  We can all do our bit. Start by taking out the recycling!!

As with every other living organism we are designed to work within a system, an Eco-System!  We come equipped with the capacity to take responsibility for ourselves and environment.  We are fundamentally designed within a system where all needs are met and all waste feeds another need within that system completing the cycle.  

In the last hundred years a versatile material commonly known as plastic, entered the market.  If we look at nature in terms of a cycle; plastic represents the antithesis of our natural cycle. Plastic is a line! 

Most global nations have some form of recycling.  Despite this re-education taking time in its effect, at least the word and concept is becoming broadly understood.  Understanding isn’t necessarily the same as acting.  In the hectic lives we lead where can we find time to separate the garbage?  My theory is ‘Prevention is better then Cure!’ In having LESS garbage there is LESS maintenance of that garbage.

Ta-da!

*Rethink – The most important thing we can do is to question purchases and acquisitions’!  Do I really need this? Is there an alternative? What will happen to it when it no longer serves me?  A few simple questions, but totally effective!

*Reduce – ‘We are excessively multiplying, mindlessly consuming, generating waste with little or no regards for our host, Planet Earth.”

Connect with your actions, asking ourselves simple questions can result in conscious decision making and consideration of alternatives.  Take a cloth bag shopping with you, choose products with less or no packaging and plan ahead to minimize unnecessary use of ‘conveniences.’

*ReUse (Up-Cycle) – ‘Everything has more than one use.’  Instead of buying 5 bottles of water buy 1 and refill it 4 times.  Or be inventive, it’s amazing how long you can occupy a 3 year old with a toilet roll and milk carton.

The sweeping trend of ‘Up-Cycle’ is a great way of bringing old clothes and furniture up to date.  Fun, cheap and quirky! 

*ReClaim – ‘One mans junk is another mans treasure’

Flea Markets, Charity Shops, Antique Fayres, Scrap Yards, they are all treasure chests of wonder.  Not only do these places have a wild assortment of just about anything and everything, you never know what you are going to get and what stories may be imbedded in it…..

Then we find ourselves back at Recycle!  It is a short term solution to a larger problem.  To take a plastic bottle, melt it down, reform it and transport it to the several different locations required to do this is an extensive, oil laden process. 

So we don’t need to be heroes, we don’t even need to take out the recycling. What we need is to be more creative and responsible with the resources we have.

Lilly x