My Footprint

When it comes to being ecologically friendly, I generally think of my-self as an environmentally friendly person. This was, of course, until I actually took a little test that confirmed my beliefs to be otherwise. As I received my results from myfootpring.org, I learned that if everyone lived the same lifestyle as me, we would need FOUR plants. That’s a lot! Considering how many people are on the Earth, my way of life is not the greatest lifestyle to live. This made me get to thinking, how can I be more environmentally friendly? Lots of things, actually. But before I move onto that, I would also like to add that after checking out my footprint, I surfed on over to another site that would, theoretically, let me know in a different way what my lifestyle footprint looks like. As I received my results from the second site, I learned that I have a “low growth” lifestyle. So, which is the correct site? I would like to believe that both are correct. At this point in time, I may not have the most environmentally friendly lifestyle, but who is to say that I don’t want to change that. I would also like to add that, although it would take four planets to sustain my type of lifestyle, there are many things that I am now learning about that can reduce that number – these are things that I completely intend on taking full advantage of. For example, a few things I can do to increase sustainability, and decrease my careless and potentially environmentally detrimental way of life are:

• Walk to school, instead of drive
• Buy locally grown organic food
• Not water the lawn
• Take shorter showers
• Turn the tap off while I brush my teeth
• Make others aware of the detrimental effects of careless lifestyles
• Use tap water instead of throw-away bottles

So, in conclusion, I would like to make it known that although it may take four planets to sustain by current lifestyle, who is to say that I don't want to change that? As I keep living life, I am going to live it in an environmentally friendly way, and hopefully decrease the amount of planets it would take to sustain my current lifestyle.