“A nickel’s worth of goulash beats a five dollar can of vitamins.” Martin H. Fischer
GET SATISFIED: How Twenty People Like You Found the Satisfaction of Enough “presents inspiring case studies . . . The message: If they can do it, so can you. It’s about feeling satisfied, not deprived. About filling up, not emptying out.” –O, THE OPRAH MAGAZINE
© Photographer: Matthew Collingwood | Agency: Dreamstime.com
Did you know that June 18th is International Picnic Day? We’ve summed up some eco-friendly picnic tips before, but we thought that we’d take this opportunity to remind you of all of the good, healthy and stress-reducing reasons to take some time to get outside and eat. After all, what’s not to love about a holiday that celebrates doing something instead of buying something?
The Benefits of a Picnic
Do we really need to tell you that almost all Americans spend too much time indoors? We probably don’t. But more importantly, it’s a trend that is increasing instead of decreasing. According to one study, young people now spend an average of seven hours and thirty-eight minutes daily for indoor media use (video games, TV, computers). That’s almost fifty-three hours weekly – or over two full days of the week!
The downside of that is fairly epic if you add it all up. Not only does it mean that it’s likely people are getting less and less essential Vitamin-D, it also means less exercise and less healthy individuals. Those are the obvious drawbacks. Increased energy use to run all of those media items that you or others are using indoors is another. But a final, and potentially most important one, is an increasing lack of connection to nature or the planet. We can’t expect people to want to save the planet if they don’t feel a deep relationship to it.
Whether you’re concerned about too much time indoors yourself or whether you’re a parent trying to break a bad indoor habit with a child, incorporating picnics into your life is a great way to reduce indoor time and connect with nature. We all have to eat – so let’s get outside and do it.
“It’s difficult to think anything but pleasant thoughts while eating a homegrown tomato.” Lewis Grizzard
The Get Satisfied Book Can Change Your Life Directly from Your e-Reader.
GET SATISFIED: How Twenty People Like You Found the Satisfaction of Enough “presents inspiring case studies . . . The message: If they can do it, so can you. It’s about feeling satisfied, not deprived. About filling up, not emptying out.” –O, THE OPRAH MAGAZINE
© Photographer: Daniel Gilbey | Agency: Dreamstime.com
Summertime comes and we all tend to be a little more free-spirited and less diligent about things than we normally would be. That’s also true about making wise choices regarding consumption and being eco-friendly. While it’s true that summertime means better weather and more opportunities to spend time in nature, many of the activities that we’ve been socialized to do in the summer are the opposite of good for us or good for the planet. What should you avoid and what can you do instead? Here’s a list of four things to sidestep and our recommendations for what to substitute!
Avoid Summer Blockbuster Movies!
We don’t mean that, if everything in your heart is telling you that you need to see the new Tom Cruise movie, you should deny yourself. But don’t make heading to the Cineplex for every summer blockbuster a habit simply because it’s … become a habit. Huge blockbuster movies use tons of power to make, generate enormous amounts of waste and trap most people in a funneled cycle of blockbuster-related merchandise. The entire system is designed to make you spend and waste – and that’s just the movie itself. It doesn’t include all of the consumption at the movie theater. (We do have tips on how to reduce waste at the movies.)
What Can You Do Instead? Support your local theater, performing arts group or musicians by seeing live performances at actual physical venues!
Avoid Theme Parks
Another ingrained summer activity is a trip to a theme park. Again, we don’t want to tell you to never experience the thrill of a roller coaster again, but it’s important to keep perspective on how much energy, food packaging and overall waste and consumption happens at a theme park. If you are going to go to a theme park, consider visiting a smaller local one instead of adding the consumption of travel miles onto a trip to a major theme park.
What Can You Do Instead? Visit an actual park! Whether it’s a smaller local park or a larger National Park, chances are you have a green space nearby where you can get the natural thrills of sunshine and motion instead of the manufactured thrills of roller coasters and rides.
“Sex is good, but not as good as fresh, sweet corn.” Garrison Keillor
GET SATISFIED: How Twenty People Like You Found the Satisfaction of Enough “presents inspiring case studies . . . The message: If they can do it, so can you. It’s about feeling satisfied, not deprived. About filling up, not emptying out.” –O, THE OPRAH MAGAZINE
We do love beach and pool season at Postconsumers. The sun is one of the best things about Planet Earth (even if we’re not biologically programmed to take in too much of it without sunscreen). But the consumer machine loves the change of seasons because it can use those seasons to convince people to buy things that they may not actually need. What consumer traps might you fall into this summer? Here are five common summer consumer traps and how to avoid them.
The New Bathing Suit
As summer rolls around and the prospect of going to the beach or pool gets nearer, it’s common to begin thinking “What should my new bathing suit look like this year?” It’s possible that you spend so much time in the pool or ocean that you truly, truly need a new bathing suit every summer. If so, we applaud your level of physical activity (We’re giving you the benefit of the doubt that you’re not spending all of that time in a lounge chair!). The likelihood, though, is that your bathing suit (or suits) is/are just fine. Instead of getting rid of your bathing suit at the end of one swim season, hold on to it. You’ll build up a set of options, and before long you won’t need to even consider buying a new swimsuit each summer. Also, remember that there are many modifications that you can make to your existing swimsuits to make them “feel like new”. Add some bling or trim or change the straps. The options are endless.
Finally, there’s always the option of trading! Consider a beginning of summer New-to-You Party. You and your friends can trade your old (clean) bathing suits and everybody gets a new look!
Of course, this consumer trap isn’t a trap if you have a growing child who needs a new size!
All New Sunscreen! All New Tanning Lotion! All New Summer Makeup!
It’s okay to want to be “on trend” with summer colors, but chances are that you don’t really need to replace all of your health, beauty and makeup products just because it’s summer. This is especially true if you’re responsible about packing products away when they’re only partially used instead of throwing them out. Before you run out and buy all new sunscreen, make sure that your sunscreen from last year isn’t sitting around, half-full (or half-empty, depending on your mindset!). And before you rush out to buy the latest makeup colors for summer, be sure to check your existing makeup to see if you don’t already have that color.
A tip to help you succeed at this is to pack up your summer colors and products like sunscreen at the end of the summer along with your summer clothing. That way, when you do your seasonal reorganization, you’ll have a complete view of what you do – and don’t – have.
“We are living in a world today where lemonade is made from artificial flavors and furniture polish is made from real lemons.” Alfred E. Newman
GET SATISFIED: How Twenty People Like You Found the Satisfaction of Enough “presents inspiring case studies . . . The message: If they can do it, so can you. It’s about feeling satisfied, not deprived. About filling up, not emptying out.” –O, THE OPRAH MAGAZINE
© Photographer: Ryan Pike | Agency: Dreamstime.com
Summer is here, and that means that beach and pool season are here. Of course, that also means that sunscreen season is here. We know you know that there is absolutely no excuse at all to be out in the sun without a sunscreen product on. But there are some more – and some less – environmentally wise decisions that you should consider when choosing a sunscreen. What are they? Of course we’ve laid them out below!
Sunscreen Can Damage Already Endangered Coral Reefs
We all know that the world’s coral reefs are endangered due to the ocean acidification caused by climate change and global warming. But did you know that sunscreen is also playing a role in the destruction of coral reefs? According to a study by National Geographic, over 6000 tons of sunscreen washes into the ocean each year. There’s some debate among scientists about exactly how harmful that sunscreen is, but there’s no shortage of scientific evidence that proves at least four of the common chemicals found in sunscreen awaken viruses that are in the algae that live within coral reefs. Those viruses, not surprisingly, lead to a destruction of the algae. Algae are the primary food source within a reef’s eco-system, so when the algae goes away, so does the reef, turning white and dying.
What can you do? Look for sunscreens that are formulated without the chemicals that we know to be harmful for starters. We personally like Tropical Seas. Not only do they have their products FDA approved, but they also have a secondary team of testers at an ecology laboratory who test to see that their products really do biodegrade.
It’s unrealistic to think that you will (or should) go into the oceans without sunscreen on. Just be sure to try to choose a sunscreen that doesn’t damage the fragile and decaying coral reefs of the world.
Consider Mineral Sunscreens
There are a number of factors to consider when you choose a sunscreen, such as the inclusion of nanoparticles as well as the look and feel of them, but mineral sunscreens that include the natural sun protection minerals zinc and titanium can be a much more environmentally friendly option. You might feel like you’re a kid living in the 1960’s, but you’ll be both protecting your skin and the planet as well!
“The act of putting into your mouth what the earth has grown is perhaps your most direct interaction with the earth.” Frances Moore Lappe
The Get Satisfied Book Can Change Your Life Directly from Your e-Reader.
GET SATISFIED: How Twenty People Like You Found the Satisfaction of Enough “presents inspiring case studies . . . The message: If they can do it, so can you. It’s about feeling satisfied, not deprived. About filling up, not emptying out.” –O, THE OPRAH MAGAZINE
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© Photographer: Ann Schorr | Agency: Dreamstime.com
Summer means beach season. We all love the peace, serenity and blue skies of the ocean, but we all also know that ocean acidification is a very real global problem. Do you truly understand what ocean acidification is and how, over time, it’s changed the entire chemical makeup of the world’s ocean waters? Today, we’ll explain the process.
Ocean Acidification Is About Greenhouse Gasses
Like most of the effects associated with global climate change, the changes in ocean acidity can almost directly be linked to the impact of greenhouse gasses. You may recall from your environmental education (which you almost certainly had to handle on your own since it’s not typically taught in schools), that greenhouse gasses are the result of the increased human habit of releasing excess CO2 into the air as a result of industrial and agricultural activities. What you may not know is that the ocean actually absorbs about twenty-five percent of all of the CO2 that goes into the atmosphere.
And, believe it or not, for a long time, it was considered a good thing that the ocean absorbed all of this CO2. After all, if the ocean absorbed the CO2, then it was keeping the harmful greenhouse gasses out of the atmosphere and slowing down the process of heating up the planet.
But, like most things that appear too good to be true, simply dumping excess CO2 into the water instead of the air wasn’t really a solution to the problem. In fact, it may have caused a greater problem. The CO2 is fundamentally changing the chemical makeup of the ocean’s waters in a way that is referred to as Ocean Acidification.
When the CO2 that’s absorbed into the ocean combines with the H2O that’s already in the ocean, it creates a chemical reaction that produces carbonic acid. If this sounds like an experiment that you did in high school science lab, that’s entirely possible. What you need to keep in mind is that, when carbonic acid is formed, it lowers the overall pH balance of the ocean and makes it have a higher acid property. While it’s unlikely (though not impossible) that the ocean would ever become purely acidic (it would need a pH level lower than 7.0), the increased acidity of the world’s ocean waters definitely has consequences.
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