Persuading Others to Go Green

Ever tried to tell someone how easy it is to recycle just to be brushed off, or in some instances be called a hippie?  These days people take it as if you are trying to spread a political message when you are trying to teach people how to be green and eco-friendly.  I am writing this post not to convince people to shove "going green" down peoples throats, but instead help people understand why we all should be green.

One of the arguments business owners use to explain why they continue to pollute is because many are convinced that there is no such thing as global warming and that it's simply a natural phenomenon not at all impacted by human behavior.  To them this nullifies the idea that humans are able to make a sizable impact on the earth through their pollutants and eco-friendly ways equally.  Even if this is your view, I completely respect your ability to decide for yourself what you agree with or disagree with.  However, you don't need to be convinced of global warming to go green just as people don't need to be convinced they are fat to get healthy. Just in case that you are wrong, or just by realizing that we have technologies that allow you to do the same job without polluting wouldn't you want to do that instead?  Isn't it nicer to breathe fresh air instead of smog, not just for future generations but for yourself as well?

Another one of the common arguments for not making a change is that one action by one person isn't going to save the world.  While that is true, this argument is invalid since there are already many people making the efforts needed to reduce the pressure on the environment.  Each and every other helping hand will start to make a bigger and bigger impact upon our polluting ways.  If they are able to get their entire company involved this means that not only are they themselves reducing their carbon footprint but they are reducing their consumers carbon footprints as well.  Our actions don't just follow a straight line to their consequence, everything is interlinked and by making one change many other elements are affected as well.  Thus if you take a mug instead of a disposable cup for your coffee every day not only are you saving many pieces of plastic from being thrown out, you are also slowing down the demand for their production, saving an animals life, reducing the need to drill oil, creating jobs for mug vendors, and so much more.

Going green is easy if you take small steps.  Many people believe that its expensive and you need to buy heavy duty equipment such as solar panels to even make a dent.  Although those products do help, you are doing just as much good by recycling, purchasing bio products, and spreading awareness.  Businesses are afraid that high numbers on their sustainability reports are going to make them look bad in comparison to other businesses and thus they completely give up on going green.  Instead I suggest making small cheap changes until you are ready to make the larger changes to get better numbers.  This should not be considered a competition - being good to mother nature is good no matter how much or how little you do as long as you are trying to make a difference.

I am no stranger to people opposing my ways, these are just some of the arguments that I use to convince people otherwise to understand being green from my perspective.  Unfortunately there will always be certain groups of people that don't want to hear any of our "nonsense" because they have better things to do than protect the planet, they have other places to consume consume consume, they are above going green.  They are not the reason to give up, they are the reason to continue to be green because you know not only are you making up for your waste but you are making up for theirs too.  In a perfect world everyone would come together to start making changes because they realize the gravity of the situation but until we find the solution for  a perfect world keep progressing through the difficulty and be the one to stand up and do the right thing.

If you are struggling to find supporters to your green movement, or you are trying to convince your business partners to go green... don't forget if it doesn't work now sooner or later the laws will catch  up to them and that's when real change will start happening globally; when its no longer down to choice but up to necessity.

What exactly are you spending? Money? Think again...

The other night I was watching a very interesting video recommended by a friend called Human Extended Version Volume 1. Although this is a very powerful video and had many important messages and questions for us as human beings, there was one line that struck me the hardest.  Near the end of the video there was a man who really got me thinking about life and society in itself.  He was speaking generally about the economy but the human condition in itself.  He ever so thoughtfully posed the question: What exactly is money itself?  A seemingly basic question when you were brought up in a society who never questioned its origin - however I wanted to dive deeper.

He explained that money is not just a device we use to purchase materials, it was not simply a valuable stone, coin, or gold backed piece of paper.  In fact he realized that money was nothing more than a quantity of time.  This takes the idea of money back to the source - work.  When you work you are spending time helping others (bosses, managers, customers), and in compensation for your time they give you something called money that you can exchange with others who share their time to help you.  It seems simple, and not very important as it is just the "middle man" so to speak.  That basically by buying certain products we are giving parts of our lives away to obtain them.

Take for instance if I was working a minimum wage job at around 8 dollars an hour.  When I needed to buy a new shirt which on average from a typical shop is around 20 dollars - that means this shirt is worth around 3.8 hours of my life.  How much did you spend on your closet?  Time is not something you can earn or get back like money, so why do we treat employees as if they are only worth 2 or 3 shirts per day?

Using time to buy products makes me ask why certain people's time is worth much more than others.  If this is how we are to value each other in society how is it that someone who scrubs the floor all day is worth exponentially less than the boss who manages all of the housekeepers?  I do understand that certain positions need more or less experience, education, and skill to obtain and thus should be compensated greater amounts, but how many times more is too much?

When it comes to being socially responsible I want to ensure equality among those who spend their lives working for what seems to be very unequal wages and thus also must unequally spend their lives continually working for the basics instead of the luxuries.  For instance in a relatively moderate company such as a hotel the general manager typically makes over 2 times more than their hourly employees such as front desk workers or bellboys.  If you were to take this to a larger extreme such as a large shopping outlet like JCPenny, the CEO was making more than 1795 times more money than their workers for the same amount of time (David Herris Gershon, retrieved from  http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/10/27/1251041/-JC-Penney-CEO-Makes-1-795-More-Than-Workers-Largest-Gap-in-U-S-as-Company-Loses-73-Value).

Overall, to be socially responsible one must think of what money really represents before deciding what employees deserve to earn.  Of course different jobs require different amounts of compensation but the effects of a wage 1000 times higher than employees can send not only the wrong message to the customers but it undervalues the lives of the employees since to earn this money they are giving up their time.  Awareness is always the start to making changes.

Be Inspirational

Being part of this responsibility pact is not about sitting back and being quiet about what you believe.  You need to step out there and deliver your points, and hopefully inspire some like-minded souls to travel down a similar path of social responsibility.  I am still on my journey of working towards being inspirational in terms of the responsibility pledge. However, I am glad to have found inspiration to blog about it from one fellow colleague of mine, a blogger named Caterina Solang.

We speak different languages, we have different backgrounds, we don't even write about the same topics.  The only similarity between us is that we are both inspired by HER passion for blogging.  Yes, you read correctly - she has the ability to inspire herself through passion as well.

After talking with her for a few hours I was starting to feel more and more enthusiasm for blogging - even though I had never even tried before.  Just the way she goes about her blogging and talks about it to different people sparks intense interest in each of us willing to lend an ear.  I was so interested into why she was tremendously excited all the time about the blogging world that I even decided it was a good idea to join myself - and I am very thankful for that.  She has inspired me and I am sure many others while she was simply just being herself and doing what she loves.

We need more people to inspire in the world, and more people who we can look up to.  That is why I have compiled a list of how to be  inspirational - especially when spreading the message of being socially responsible and green.  The more people who have this spark ignited within them will cause a greater trend of positive change.  So, without further adieu:

How to Be Inspirational

Follow your own path.

1. Be yourself - the thing that truly inspires people is the fact that we notice that you are actually a real person.  The fact that "it" really can be done!  Its very motivating to know that others who have gone before you have succeeded.
2. Speak up - Although you might be doing everything right, you aren't being heard.  Unless you speak up about what you are doing and why it is worthwhile no one will have the opportunity to be inspired by your story.
3. Do the right thing - This doesn't mean do what people tell you is right, but instead do what you know is right.  Change is almost always greeted with opposition - so don't be afraid to face the critics.

Overall, although the main aim is to inspire others to follow your new responsible lead - the main thing I want from this small list is that you all learn to be inspired by yourself.  Just as Caterina has been able to keep up her amazing blog not for others nor for praise, but for her true love of literature; I hope that you can inspire yourself to keep on being green and socially responsible no matter the criticism or difficulty.  Take your own path - and see how far it goes, and if all else fails you can still look back and inspire yourself to continue and who knows who will want to tag along on the way.