Leading a sustainable lifestyle is a way of saying thank you to the planet that has been your home from birth. It’s a way of ensuring that you’ll never be left wanting if natural resources are ever limited. It’s a way of protecting both your future and the future of others.
When you choose to go sustainable, the benefits are endless. To do so you have to live your life in a certain way that promotes sustainability and not giving up on it. Below are a few ways you can not only go sustainable with your lifestyle, but how you can sustain it.
A great way to keep yourself motivated, especially over the first few months of your sustainable venture, is to work alongside others. When you do so you will be able to receive help and advice on how you can keep going with your sustainability. This might be very useful if you do in fact find yourself struggling initially with the initiative.
A good piece of advice is become a member of a community green space. In this kind of venture like minded people work together to make a garden area sustainable. They do so by not getting rid of any garden waste but by reusing it as compost and soil fertilizer.
In working with others in a green space you can not only pick up tips on how to reduce the carbon footprint of your own garden, but you can also work towards reducing your area’s. So not only will you be helping yourself but you’ll be able to help others too. And this fits perfectly with the mantra of sustainable living: helping others is a good and worthwhile thing to do.
However, it’s not all about the things you do outside. You have to make a sustainable impact on the inside of your home too, and there are plenty of ways to do so. A good first port of call is to practice the way of the minimalist. No, this isn’t a cult nor is it a particularly hard lifestyle to lead. It simply means clearing your home of everything you do not need and making use of your space better.
When you start practicing this way of living you will soon find that recycling comes as second nature, and recycling is at the heart of sustainability. But you cannot live a sustainable lifestyle by just recycling. If you’re serious about this venture then you will need to make adjustments to your home.
Home energy use is a very big part of sustainable living, and there are many options to do so. One such option is geothermal heating and cooling. By having specialist pipes fitted under your home and connected to a heat pump in it you can have the perfect temperature control. By making use of the geothermal heat that is generated under ground you can have heat circulate your home on cold days and cool air circulate it on hot days. So, not only is this a way to sustain a sustainable living but it is also a way to control temperature effortlessly.
Make sure to check this complete guide to geothermal heating and cooling before you take the plunge and give your home a geothermal makeover. If you are serious about sustainability then this is the kind of option you need to go for.
Recycling is key to sustainability
But this isn’t the only option you have. No, there are also solar power options too. By going green in the way you generate your electricity you are most certainly living a sustainable lifestyle. A hugely popular way to do this is to have solar panel electricity systems built onto your roof. In doing so you are making use of one of the only natural resources that will never run out: the sun. The sun will always be shining, and when it isn’t there won’t be life anyway, so there’s no harm in harnessing its powers. By having a solar panel on your roof you also stand to save a huge 50% on your electricity bill. If that’s not encouragement enough to take this venture, then what is? Also, because houses with solar panels are in high demand you will always have them to show off if you ever come to selling your home.
There are other ways to lead a sustainable life that don’t include making huge changes to your home. You can simply become more efficient with your everyday errands. For instance, by switching to an electric car, cycling or carpooling you are instantly cutting down on consumption of fossil fuels and natural resources.
But you don’t just have to change your motor or your traveling habits to do this. You can also simply switch to using natural cleaners. By using a combination of vinegar and water you are able to clean most surfaces and, importantly, you are reducing plastic waste.
And the changes in your lifestyle that are needed when you choose to go sustainable run deeper still. If you are serious about the venture then you have to cut down on using the lighting in your house. The best way to do so? Well, the best way to do so is to completely change your sleeping pattern. You can reduce your reliance on electric lighting by becoming more attuned to a natural sleeping pattern, i.e. waking up when the sun rises and going to sleep when it sets.
Now, understandably in this day and age this is a very hard thing to do considering all the good shows that are on at night. But why not try switching your lights off, and your TV at that, at a reasonable time just once or twice a week? You never know, you might just get used to it. But if this is just too much of an ask for you then there other ways still to reduce on your electric habits. One way is to just unplug devices when they are not in use. It can be as simple and as easy as that.
So, it really is dependent on what you are and what you are not willing to sacrifice when it comes to sustainability. But even if you don’t go full pelt and its lights out by 8 o’clock on the evening you are still making a difference. Even the smallest of sustainable changes are changes for the better.
