Beth Terry: 8 Reasons Why Personal Changes Matter

Blogger Beth Terry over at Fake Plastic Fish recently did a great post called 8 Reasons Why Personal Changes Matter. We at IHE encourage others to work toward both personal and systemic changes, so we were glad to read Beth's list. Although she's speaking through the lens of looking at plastics use, her 8 reasons are relevant to all of us:

1. Personal change matters because when we realize our intimate connection to and impact on the rest of life on the planet, we simply cannot continue to live in a way that causes needless harm. We have no choice but to change.
2. Personal changes are important for our own health and the health of those we love.
3. Personal changes allow us to vote with our wallets and support small, alternative businesses that are doing the right thing.
4. Personal changes help us develop our own ingenuity and creativity and teach us how to be more self-sufficient.
5. Personal changes help us to examine our lives and evaluate what is helpful to our physical and spiritual well being and what is not.
6. Personal changes help us to see the limits to personal change. These limits represent the places where we need to put our energies in asking companies to change.
7. Personal changes help us to realize that personal change is not enough. We see that as hard as we work to green our own lives, the problem is systemic. We must work to change the system. But until we make our own personal changes, we may not have enough investment in the outcome to push for the bigger steps that are necessary.
8. Personal changes set an example for others to follow and to realize that life can be different.

Read her complete post.


~ Marsha

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