Is it time for you to say ‘Enough!’?

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Find your passion and say 'Enough!'

Welcome to the Earth Day Blog Carnival

This post is part of the Earth Day Blog Carnival hosted by Child of the Nature Isle and Monkey Butt Junction. Each participant has shared their practices and insights of earth friendly, environmentally conscious, eco-living. This carnival is our way to share positive information and inspiration that can create healing for our planet. Please read to the end of this post to find a list of links to the other carnival participants. Happy Earth Day!

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One of the greatest setbacks to humans achieving their full potential is lack of belief.

Back in January 2008, when I announced to Mr Green I wanted us to recycle more he said “what difference can we make? We’re just one family’.

He had a point, right?

What IS the point of putting yourself through something difficult when your work is undone by your neighbours dumping 3 bins of rubbish each week?

What is the point making careful purchasing choices when other people don’t bother?

What is the point of voting with your money and ‘going without’ when a huge corporation doesn’t even notice the drop in sales you have created?

What’s the point of going to the effort of reducing your waste when households are only responsible for a small fraction of the overall waste created in this country?

What is the point of separating your recycling when you see collectors dump it all in the same receptacle?

These are the questions we get asked all the time and the very ones Mr Green presented me with at the beginning of our challenge.

Don't let your neighbours actions dictate yours

The thing is, humans are also capable of doing great things. We’ve put man on the moon. I can stand in a field in the middle of nowhere and send an email to someone on the other side of the world from my telephone. We can get into cases of steel, take off into the air to arrive on the other side of the world in a few hours…

One of the things I repeat ad nauseum to journalists is that if every one on the UK recycled just one more tin can per week, that would be 60 million tin cans being kept out of landfill. So my point here is that collective impact can be phenomenal. No one person has all the answers, but if we work together we can achieve things we once thought impossible.

We’ve got women the vote, abolished slavery in some parts of the world and fought against apartheid; all because enough of us stood up and said ‘Enough!’ Imagine how different the world would look if we said ‘Enough!’ to wasteful practises.

If we voted with our money, realised the power we hold and refused to buy excessively packaged items – we could change the world overnight…

But we have to have Will.

A man who stood up and said "Enough!" to racism and Apartheid

We have to be prepared to go through some inconvenience, to change some of our comfortable habits, to maybe even go without a few of our favourite items, to be an advocate for change, to do things that might seem a bit ‘weird’ – and going against the herd presents us with deep psychological challenges for very good reason. If we go back to our cave-dwelling days, being ousted from the herd was a dangerous place to be because our survival depended on us being part of the clan. Those instincts, despite no longer being necessary for our survival as such, still run deep within us. The majority of us care about what others think of us and want approval from others before standing up for what they believe to be right.

Sometimes though, we have to put aside these feelings and listen to our conscience. We have to do what we know in our hearts to be right, no matter how difficult our choices might be. Sometimes we have to walk away from the herd and go alone. We have to be the pioneer (and being a pioneer is never easy), we have to walk through the jungle of consumerism with a machete and clear the way for others.

Sometimes, we have to stand up and say ‘Enough!’

It is time to clear the path towards what you know is right?

3 years ago we were like the average UK consumer – we threw 2 bins of waste away per week, we recycled nothing and we didn’t give any thought to what we put into our bin. As long as we got up in time to get the bin to the kerbside, that was all we cared about.

I believed I cared about the environment, but I guess I didn’t care enough to do something about it.

Then we found ourselves in a a traumatic situation and found an article and photo that changed our lives forever.

The situation was being caught in flash flooding where I thought I’d never see my husband again. The article was about marine life dying from eating plastic. An albatross was found dead with plastic toothbrushes, broken toys and bottle caps in its stomach – the things we were using as a family on a daily basis.

A turtle was choking on an carrier bag; that bag belonged to a consumer at some point in its short life – maybe that was OUR bag!

This, coupled with the fact we now have a child who we need to leave a beautiful and healthy planet to was our ‘Enough!’ moment.

Recognise anything you've thrown away recently?

We realised we had to say ‘Enough!’ to doing harm to the environment, plants and animals.

We realised we had to say ‘Enough!’ to big corporations that continue to harm the environment.

We realised we had to say ‘Enough’ to reliance on manufacturers to make things for us which we can make ourselves.

We realised we had to say ‘Enough!’ to throwing things away and buying new, when it was good enough to repair.

We realised we had to say ‘Enough!’ to aggressive marketing that lures us into buying things we don’t need.

We realised we had to say ‘Enough!’ to accepting we were without power to make informed and conscious decisions.

We realised we had to say ‘Enough!’ to believing things were not our responsibility and that it was time to take action, no matter how small.

We realised we had to say ‘Enough!’ to believing anything other than we all have the power to change the world.

Today is Earth Day – could you use it as a platform to rise up and say ‘Enough!’ about something you feel passionate about?

Or will you absolve responsibility and risk ending up leaving this as your legacy?

Visit Monkey Butt Junction and Child of the Nature Isle to read all about the Earth Day Blog Carnival.
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Going Green in 2011 – Jennifer at Hybrid Rasta Mama discusses the way she and her family are going “greener” in 2011.

Our Greatest Teacher – Amanda at Let’s Take the Metro shares her experiences with her children and nature, their greatest teacher.

Dreaming of Spring Gardening – Erin of the Waterloons talks about the ultimate in local food, her backyard garden.

Earth Conscious Minimalism – Nada at miniMOMist thinks minimalism can help you save the world — as long as you don’t just toss everything in the trash! Check out Her list of places to donate (bet you haven’t thought of them all!).

Blessings to the Earth – Amy at Anktangle believes that a simple act, such as being intentionally grateful for our food, is just the catalyst we need to bring about large-scale change.

Eight Movies to Inspire Change – Mrs Green at Little Green Blog shares her top 8 movies that have inspired her to take action to make the world a better place. She’d love to hear your suggestions to add to her viewing list!

Can I Have a Green Period Too? Kelly at Becoming Crunchy shares the environmental impact of switching to sustainable menstrual products, along with offering a great Mama Cloth giveaway for anyone interested in making the switch (and for those who already have and want to increase their stash!).

An Eden to Call Our Own – Lucy at Dreaming Aloud shares how learning to care for the Earth starts in her own garden.

Elimination Communication – Melissa at the New Mommy Files discusses the environmental impact of diapering, and why elimination communication was the best choice for her family.

The Living Earth: A Meditation in Science and Reverence – Seonaid at The Practical Dilettante asks you to pause to wonder at the blessing of the fact that our living planet is here at all.

Earth Day Anthem – Amanda at Let’s Take the Metro created a poem in honor of Mother Earth, women and nurturers everywhere.

The Plasticity of Compromise – Zoie at TouchstoneZ shares how she is working to compromise on healthy family living and avoiding plastics whenever possible.

Earth Day Resolutions – Charise at I Thought I Knew Mama shares why she has decided to make Earth Day resolutions, what those resolutions are, and how they are a step up from her current efforts at green living.

Is it time for you to say “Enough!”? Mrs Green at My Zero Waste asks you to rise up and say ‘Enough!’ on Earth Day.

Homeschooling with the Earth – Terri at Child of the Nature Isle shares her desires and dreams for Earth-based learning and the ways her two young children have already started a natural curriculum.

Beyond the Green Sheen – Jenn at Monkey Butt Junction offers some advice on how to avoid greenwashing and make purchasing choices that really have a positive impact.