Adventures in Sustainable Living

New things, the unexpected, circumstances out of our control and any sort of change are all things than can make us a bit uneasy. Perhaps it is nothing more than fear of the unknown. We feel as if we will lose something or maybe we will lose our present lifestyle all together.  One thing is certain. Change is always scary. World politics, the climate, price of energy, price of food are all things...

When we sit in a beautiful, quiet place to watch the sunrise most people are taking in the beauty and perhaps having a meditative moment and appreciating nature. Then we go about our day never really thinking much about the power of the sun. Maybe we’re just thankful it comes up everyday.  What we never stop to realize is that the sun provides a constant steady stream of energy that is not likely...

In today’s world most people want everything fast and convenient. That includes the food we eat and especially how we prepare it. Such a desire for convenience is exactly what gave rise to prepackaged and microwave foods. Unfortunately, most of these foods are highly processed and not exactly healthy.  However there are multiple healthy homemade alternatives for all of the convenience foods we so...

More and more frequently these days we are reaching for ways to reduce and reverse the effects of climate change. Perhaps this is because talks of climate change are becoming increasingly serious. Although we have known about this for over 100 years, the inevitable is finally getting our attention.  As citizen action becomes more frequent, I start to question whether or not we are actually focusin...

Certainly most of us have looked back on specific accomplishments in our lives and asked the question “If I had to do this all over again, how would I do it differently?, or Knowing what I know today, how would I have done this differently? Having the personality that I do, I am always questioning everything even if I keep it all to myself? But that is my process of re-evaluation, meaning checking...

Self sufficiency, tiny homes, sustainability, renewable energy, or simple self reliance, are all things we hear about more and more these days. Personally I am happy to see this level of interest in self reliant living because it is the focus of so much of my life.  While its exciting to talk about theses things, for so many people that is exactly where it stops. Nearly 80% of our population now l...

Certainly we all remember the time in our lives when we were kids and told our parents how we couldn’t wait until we were all grown up. We thought all about being independent, making our own decisions, going where we wanted when we wanted. We just couldn’t wait to be independent, self reliant, and make our own decisions.   But at that time we were not old enough to even know what we didn’t know. A...

Given the world we live in today, you may be having thoughts of living in some remote place to get away from it all. But as romantic as it may sound, running off into the wilderness and living off the land may not be the best option. You simply may not be able to sustain yourself long-term unless you are extremely creative.   But, if that is not an option where could you live and do the same thing...

How and where we live are some of the biggest and most important choices that we all have to make in our adult lives. When choosing a place to live we have to consider availability of amenities, how far we have to travel for work and school, entertainment options and even the availability of medical care.  While location is important for many reasons we also have to consider the impact of our choi...

Skipping the plastic straw may make you feel good about yourself, but its not enough. While every small change we make is truly a contribution to the big picture, we need to make substantial changes in how we live and what we do if we are going to truly reduce our personal impact on the planet.  While our individual choices for how and where we live is a deeply personal thing, we often take for gr...

There is no doubt that we often find ourselves swimming in a sea of information about the questionable future of our planet. Big business and big government, while suppling us with most of our basic resources, continue to destroy the planet. More and more people want to live sustainably but we are too often at a loss for ways to help the planet that are both meaningful and impactful.  At this poin...

Public opinion swings back and forth like a pendulum. That is why I never pay attention to it. But occasionally I see something that gets my attention because I get curious as to why people are suddenly so concerned about that one particular thing. This is the case with the plastic straw.  Depending on which study you look at, humanity produces approximately 350 to 430 million metric tons of plast...

The only chips I purchase on a regular basis is tortilla chips. It is because I make my own salsa. But when I go to the supermarket, there are literally 15 different brands of tortilla chips. But the same is true with so many other things that we deal with everyday.  From supermarket food choices, to menu options, to the clothes we wear, to what insurance to purchase, and even our health care opti...

Like it or not our lives are now a product of globalization. The cost of our fuel, the food on our tables, the clothes we wear, and even our household gadgets are subject to the conditions of the world market. It is now possible for a drought, a natural disaster, a financial crisis or even a conflict in some small country on the other side of the planet to affect our daily lives.  While globalizat...

Adventures in Sustainable Living Podcast Episode 210 Ten Ways to Grow Your Own Food As you well know one of my favorite topics is self sufficiency. Most likely this is because I am a strongly independent person and very motivated to take care of myself. I truly do not want to depend too heavily on any societal system to provide me with my personal needs. Additionally I grew up in a rural area wher...

Someone said to me once that you should never forget the power of a good conversation. Yet in our fast-paced hyper-connected world we are losing touch with this vital part of human communication. We are also losing our focus on the things that really matter because we are constantly distracted. We are so inundated with notifications, dings, and beeps that as we are driving to work we can’t even re...

In today’s culture, borrowing money and making purchases on credit is a way of life. It is the only way most of us are able to afford the “big ticket” items. In fact, many of us could not fathom how our lives would function if we were not able to utilize the credit system.  We borrow money, make payments with interest, pay off the loan and thus establish a sound financial history. This then become...

It can literally be overwhelming when you consider the concept and scope of our current global problems. The far reaching effects of our environmental changes and the challenges we face seem insurmountable. One of the biggest challenges we face of course is climate change.  While I do we believe we are beyond the point of easy, I also believe that our climate future has not yet been decided. But w...

Adventures in Sustainable Living Podcast Episode 206 How to Be the Best Version of Yourself There are many aspects to the concept of sustainability and having a regenerative lifestyle. As you could most likely guess, the planet would be just fine without people. But without people there is no culture and no economy.  However, our modern economy has largely lead us down the wrong path. Consumerism...

Adventures in Sustainable Living Podcast Episode 205 Rethinking Society: Are You a Consumer or a Citizen? All the head lines we hear and see these days are about disasters, wars, new diseases, climate change, ecological decline, and anything else that has to do with how the world is coming to an end. And guess what? They are all true.  Truly we are facing some rather complex global challenges. But...

Adventures in Sustainable Living Podcast Episode 204 What Can We Do to Phase Out Fossil Fuels?  We already know that our planet is in trouble due to the indiscriminate burning of fossil fuels. Climate change is obvious. Extreme weather events are becoming more frequent. Due to warming temperatures Arctic regions are now greening. Shifts in rainfall is even greening massive areas of the Sahara Dess...

Under normal circumstances, life can be over whelming at times. Managing time, money, family, work, the daily commute, and the mortgage, all takes its toll. And on top of that the world seems to be falling apart around us.  But how can we possibly worry about that when the roof needs to be fixed?  It is a nice concept to think of working out everyday, taking a walk in the woods on a regular basis,...

Adventures in Sustainable Living Podcast Episode 202 Change Yourself and Change the World By now it should be no surprise that our world is facing significant challenges. Climate change, widespread pollution, forever chemicals, biodiversity loss and ecosystem decline is just the tip of our melting icebergs.  Numerous people from scientists to scholars and even individuals have been sounding the al...

Despite the fact that it’s been years since I’ve watched network television, I pursue the new once a week. It is the only way I keep track of what is going on in the world.  Over the last year, whenever I sit to review world events, there seems to be yet another food recall in the news. And all of these recalls span a wide variety of products. From Salmonella to E. Coli to Listeria, there seems to...

Adventures in Sustainable Living Podcast Episode 200 Sustainability Summit 102 After covering quite a variety of topics over the last 100 episodes there are several things that clearly stand out. Sustainability is about people, planet and profits. It  has a lot to do with being mindful about how you live as well as having the right mindset.  I truly think we humans have a moral obligation to treat...