‘We don't need a handful of people doing zero waste perfectly. We need millions of people doing it imperfectly’ - Anne-Marie Bonneau
On World Environment Day, this is a quote that often resonates more than most.
After all, it is all too easy to fall into that ‘all or nothing’ trap where the importance of those small, everyday sustainability efforts, gets lost amid the noise of ‘zero waste.’
As a consequence, Environmental Guilt Syndrome is becoming increasingly common, with the burden of all our environmental shortcomings often serving to overshadow those accomplishments we HAVE made, in an effort to live more sustainably!
We might have switched to reusable straws, bamboo sunglasses, be recycling our clothes, shopping package-free and rocking the reusables, but the ‘zero waste’ stick continues to be one with which it’s easy to beat ourselves.
The problem is, ‘zero waste’ leaves little wiggle room for those unavoidable missteps that come with navigating the modern world, where so many of our daily decisions involve plastic, pollution, or both.
To this end, the idea of perfection is not only impossible to achieve, but can actually paralyse progress where it counts.
The message, therefore, is DO WHAT YOU CAN.
Strive for ‘low waste’ or ‘low impact’ over ‘ZERO waste’...and recognise the value in small efforts, repeated often.
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