A How-To of Sustainable Living

What is Sustainable Living?

    Sustainable living means practicing a way of life which supports itself. Most people who practice sustainable living do not have a completely sustainable life. You must almost always have outside sources for everyday needs, but there are many things that you can do to help. You can make your home just a little more sustainable by having a compost heap, recycling, keeping a garden, and cutting down the amount of chemicals you use in your home. There are also many appliances that can help you live a more sustained life such as solar roof panels, windmills, distillers, and solar ovens. Sustainable living cuts down on energy and water usage and is extremely beneficial to the environment. It is our hope that human beings will, in the near future, all be able to live sustainably.

Why Choose Organic?
How I Live Sustainably
Uses of Baking Soda
Uses of Vinegar
Organic Gardening
Apartment Gardening
Chemicals in the Home
Recycling
A List of Things You Can Do
Frugal Natural Shopping
Wind and Solar Power
Composting Toilets
Small-Space Composting
Greenhouse Gardens
Chemical Free Lawn Care
Free Trade
Eco-Friendly Burial
Building Materials
Plastic Packaging

Sustainable Living Magazines:
Mother Earth News
Natural Home
Organic Gardening
Organic Style
E - Environmental Magazine
Natural Life
Wildlife Conservation

Links:

Organic Ideas

Why Choose Organic?
by Amber S.

     So, what is this organic hype all about, anyway? You hear about it in the news, you see it on labels in the grocery store. Many people think they know what organic means and are wrong. Others are not quite sure. In the past, there was no law governing what food could be labeled organic and what could not. This past year, however (2003) a new law was passed that required specific labeling of all organic foods in the US. Organic does not mean that the food is tasteless "health food." Organic is a term that means that the fruits, vegetables, and grains grown to make the food were grown without pesticides, antibiotics, hormones, genetic engineering, or chemical vitamins and fertilizers. Organic meat and dairy products are from animals that were not given antibiotics, hormones, chemical vitamins, and were not genetically engineered. Organic meats and dairy also come from animals that are fed only organic food and are free-range (cage-free). Organic food is processed without anything artificial. This includes colors, flavors, preservatives, or chemical meat tenderizers.
     So why is it important to eat only organic food? Think about this: billions of pounds of pesticides are dumped onto crops each year. These pesticides do not just go away. The majority of it goes down into the soil where it poisons groundwater which ultimately ends up as our drinking water. The amount of pesticides in the soil goes up every year. What stays in the soil is taken into the plants by their roots. You may think you are doing okay by washing the pesticides off of the outside of your food, but you don't realize that it has completely saturated the inside of the plant as well. You are literally eating poison with every single bite of food you take. It is not just fruit and veggies. Everything is grown with chemical pesticides. Every glass of milk, hamburger, cookie, raisin, pudding pop, and bowl of oatmeal you eat is loaded with the stuff and scientists are beginning to realize that it is having extreme effects on our bodies, not to mention the problems it is causing for developing children.
     Chemicals and antibiotics used in meat production can be dangerous as well. Everyone has heard of mad cow disease. This disease is a direct result of using chemical hormones in beef. It is not a bacteria or a virus. You cannot give a cow a shot for it and it does not matter how much you cook your meat. You cannot get rid of the disease if it is already there. There are no preventative measures to keep from getting anything from your meat. Dairy cows are also given large injections of hormones to keep them producing milk. These hormones are let off into the milk and we drink it every day. These artificial cow hormones have an effect on our bodies as well.
     Organic food tastes better - WAY better. Don't believe me? Try eating an organic tomato. Then take a bite out of a regular tomato. See what I mean? So why does organic food taste so much better? To understand this, we will need to research farming methods. Long ago, farmers learned that they could not grow the same crop in the same field two years in a row. The reason for this is that the plants suck all of the nutrients out of the soil. When there are no nutrients left, there is nothing to make the plants grow the next year. Today, we have chemical fertilizers. These do not provide any nutrients for the plant, they are just nitrogen, which makes plants grow big quickly. Farmers grow the same plants in the same field year after year after year. The nitrogen makes them grow, but there are no nutrients in the plants at all because the soil has been stripped. This nitrogen is in itself bad. It leeches into groundwater where it is taken to streams and lakes. The nitrogen causes algae in the water to grow like never before. The algae uses up all the oxygen in the water and all aquatic life dies. Scientists have found that many ecosystems have been completely destroyed because of farming and people fertilizing their lawns. Organic farming, however, adds nutrients back to the soil through compost. Compost is decayed plant matter. This rich soil adds vital nutrients to the soil which goes back into our food, making it highly nutritious and tasty. Putting compost on the soil also keeps the plant matter out of our dumps, so it is good for the earth. All in all, organic farming is good for everyone.

 

How I Live Sustainably:

I have gotten questions on ways that I live sustainably. There are many changes I have made in my life in order to stay healthy and prepare my body to give birth to healthy children. None of these changes have made my life more difficult. I just use different products than the regular chemical products.
1. I eat only organic food and as much raw food as possible. I try to eat plenty of raw nuts, milk, cheese, vegetables, fruit, and eggs. I do eat meat, but I try to eat only fish or sometimes chicken. I very rarely eat pork or beef. I buy all of my groceries at Whole Foods grocery here in Dallas. All of their food is either all-natural or organic.
2. All of the products I use on my body are organic or all-natural. My deodorant is a Thai Crystal stone. It is made only of mineral salt and lasts a year! The smell from your underarms does not come from the sweat at all, but from the bacteria that live there. Rubbing the salt under your arms kills the bacteria and they cannot grow so there is no smell. I apply it once a day. If I am sweating profusely, I apply it more often but this is very rare. It is very bad to clog your pores with chemicals to prevent  yourself from sweating. Not only that, but chemical deodorant contains aluminum which may be the leading cause of Alzheimer's disease. I use Tom's of Maine natural toothpaste. My favorite is the natural anti-plaque plus whitening clear gel toothpaste in spearmint. It is just like regular toothpaste but it does not taste sugary and leaves my mouth feeling super-clean! Plus, it is one of the cheapest toothpastes the store carries :)  Fluoride is a poison and I will not allow it in my toothpaste. I use Whole Foods brand natural shampoos. For lotions and other body care products, I enjoy JASON products which are also quite affordable.
3. I drink and cook with distilled water. Tap water still contains about 4% sewage plus toxic poisons such as fluoride, chlorine, and heavy metals. Yes, it looks clear, but if you were to buy a distiller for yourself, you would be disgusted. My distiller cost about $100 and it sits in the garage. It distills one gallon of water in about seven hours. The inside is stainless steel. After distilling just one gallon of water, there is a thick film of brown putrid-smelling sewage along the bottom of the distiller. I have since sworn off tap water. Distilled water tastes a little strange at first because it is pure water with nothing in it. You get used to it quickly. The sewage, minerals, and chemicals are what give water its taste.
 

The Clean Distiller .

After Distilling five Gallons of tap water.

4. I recycle everything: aluminum, tin, steel, paper. I used to recycle plastic, but then I read that plastic recycling and manufacturing plants are the number one cause of a toxin that causes breast cancer. This toxin is released into the air during plastic manufacturing. Besides, plastic can only be recycled once and then goes to the landfill anyway. Other than plastic, if it is recyclable, it gets recycled. I tear the plastic windows out of envelopes and recycle the paper. Junk mail, magazines, and boxes all get recycled at our house. Very little actually goes into the trash can.
5. I do not use chemical cleaners or insecticides. Researchers believe that cleaners and insecticides in the home may be the leading cause of childhood leukemia and brain cancer. Little is known about the effects of these toxins, but if a product is labeled as poison or with a warning label, I will NOT use it. Instead, I clean with vinegar (distilled white, all-natural, and undiluted), baking soda, and lemon juice. These clean wonderfully and in many cases, better than their chemical counterparts. I also use some non-toxic all-natural cleaners from Whole Foods. For wood, I wipe it with vinegar, let it dry, and then polish it with extra virgin olive oil. It makes furniture shine like new and nourishes the wood rather than drying it out and destroying it like synthetic furniture polishes do. To kill insects, I use DE (diatomaceous earth) or an all-natural bug spray we have here made from mint oil. It smells great and kills roaches instantly. They only stagger about three inches before they die, unlike those chemical ones where the roaches run around the floors and up the walls for an hour before keeling over. Vinegar works best for cleaning glass. Add some baking soda for scrubbing bathtubs and removing stains from counters. Instead of bleach, I use hydrogen peroxide. It is safe, has no smell, and will not destroy fabric like bleach will. For laundry, I use natural laundry detergent (Seventh Generation is my favorite) or Borax. I use Seventh Gen. fabric softener in the bottle. These are great for my husband since he has extremely sensitive skin.