Waste

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There is an ever growing awareness on waste. How much we are wasting; what we are wasting ~ and its effect on our environment and the earth.

Pretty much the first thing that happened as we became aware of the negative effects our wasteful culture has, were a great number of recycling programs. Literally taking that which we throw away and making new products out of it. When you look around ~ at least where I live ~ you can recycle plastics, glass, metal, anything ‘green’ as in the little bits of vegetables we don’t want, up to the clippings from our gardens after having pruned the plants. And then there is any wood ~ trees or even wood from a remodel of our houses; bricks and other rest materials can be recycled. Even the corks from wine bottles can be recycled…
And this is a good thing!

However, the question remains why we have so much waste that we need these programs to recycle it?
Or perhaps an even bigger question; why are we okay with an attitude that says that if we no longer like what we have, we just throw it away?

It seems that the need to be ‘fashionable’ has never been greater. Having the right clothes, the right phones, the right furniture, the right car even are all more and more important. And when the fashion changes, our need to keep fitting in dictates us to throw out the old ~ even though the old is still very useable ~ and to bring in the new.
As this then becomes a pattern, we refuse to pay for quality items as we know that as soon as the fashion changes we will change with it ~ and hence the cycle of creating waste has started…

Ultimately, it is not the waste itself that may harm us in the long run; but rather the attitude that lies behind it. After all, if we are careful we can recycle and reuse a lot of the products we no longer want for whatever the reason.
Yet when we adopt an attitude that says that fitting in, becoming more like other people ~ for instance through wearing the same fashionable clothes etcetera ~  is more important than appreciating our own individuality; we may find ourselves on a slippery slope that can lead us to waste our uniqueness. And with that our distinct potentials may be left untapped ~ simply because they would set us apart from others rather than allowing us to fit in.

Now, that would definitely be a waste…
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