How Convenience is Ruining the Planet: An Underlying Truth of the Modern World

If you would have asked me a year ago where I thought I’d be, or what I thought I’d be doing right now, the picture I would have painted for you would have looked quite different than that of my current reality. It would have been colourful and exotic, exuding adventure with cultural experience seeping through its canvas.

It would have been all about me, looking out for number one, making sure I get the most out of life while I can, because everyone always said, “Do it now, before it’s too late.”

Yet here I am, sitting in a chair in my bedroom in LA, with no plans for world travel, my feet firmly planted on my navy blue carpet, but my head in the sky, and my sights set toward a different future. A future filled with learning about myself and others, and hopeful of having an impactful influence on the world, that truly inspires people to just be better.

That picture that I was referring to very much resembles the way I spent the last two years of my life, travelling and surfing. It was an incredible way to spend my time, but I often wonder, what was I really doing?

Was I searching for something? Waves, yes. But something else? Happiness? Love? Purpose? The keys to the universe? In a way, sure. I like the idea of all those things, but I know now that I was searching and trying to attain them in the wrong place, and going about it the wrong way.

Rather than in exotic locations like the South of France, or remote islands in the Indian Ocean, lately I’ve been searching inside myself for all of these things. And you know what the best part is? I’ve been finding them. Ironically, continuing to search for (and literally inside) myself, has resulted in me becoming more selfless.

Part of this selflessness is not only claiming that I care about our planet, but actually doing something about it. Hence, I decided to only go surfing by way of my bike for one year, to create awareness about our ability as individual surfers to lower our carbon emissions.

But it hasn’t been easy. Lowering my carbon footprint has become one of the great challenges of my life, and it is just the beginning. What has been so challenging about it, you ask?

Well, riding my bike around has not been all that difficult. Driving a LOT less, has not been all that difficult. In fact, it’s been pretty great. You want to know what’s really challenging about the beginning of this journey? It’s the mental part.

It’s the learning process and the awareness that comes along with understanding the past and present phenomenon that have taken and are taking place around the world. It’s the frustration of beginning to look around and see how lazy we as a whole have become.

This post was originally meant to be a list of things that I have been doing lately to live in a more eco-friendly way, if only on a small scale. I was going to tell you about how I stopped using straws and single use plastic water bottles, and how I always take my thermos to the coffee shop now, but that list has already been done. That one, and plenty of others just like it.

It wasn’t until I actually started writing that I realized this was going to be about something else. Information on how to lower our carbon footprints is out there, at the tip of our fingers, ready to be utilized, waiting to guide us all down a better path.

The question I ask myself is, why aren’t the majority of us using it to change our behaviour? The best thing I can come up with so far, the underlying truth of it all, is convenience.

For example, we constantly walk out of the store with plastic bags because they’re carrying our things, conveniently. Is it often possible to carry our things out of a store without a plastic bag? Sure, but it’s less convenient.

We insist on driving places, even when they are only a short distance away because it’s easier to hop in our cars, it’s faster and requires less energy. It’s more convenient.

We constantly use single use anything and everything because when we’re done with it, we can just throw it away. Less dishes, more convenient.

Are you seeing any themes here?

When I made the decision to bike to surf, it sparked a fuse. I realized that if I have time and energy to make room for this change in my life, then what’s stopping me from making other, similar changes?

The answer is nothing. I will slowly, but surely, be making my way toward a vastly more environmentally responsible lifestyle, that I plan on living for the rest of my days. Because although I too like convenience, I don’t need it, and I refuse to continue living a life that revolves around it.

Are there conveniences in your life that you know you could live without?