My Philosophy

I live in Australia and in today’s rushed society I greatly admire the people who can make do without a car. I am not one of those people and may never be one of those people. I also admire people who can grow their own veggies, sew their own clothes and home bake every birthday cake. Again, I am not one of those people yet – maybe I could be but for now this is not my world.

I am a busy working mother with a lot of balls in the air. Children to transport, jobs to get to, hobbies to participate in, meals to cook and blogs to write. I like some home comforts, enjoy travelling and often have too much to fit into any day to queue for the bus.

I guess that what I am is part of an average Australian family of 4 with an average amount of daily stress and an average reliance on my carbon producing stuff.  That, I think is important as only around 10% of the population at this point in time is truly green, the rest are on a sliding scale of environmental awareness.  The fact that I sit in the middle of the scale is probably not a bad thing. Mrs Average!

So, what is my philosophy?

As I have mentioned I am a scientist – a chemist really with a background in consumer chemistry (cosmetics, cleaning products and a bit of water treatment /paint / surface coatings). I have read and understand most of the global warming argument and have participated in discussions about how much CO2 is enough politically, socially and economically. All of that, in my mind is an academic argument.

 We, in the western world have been living beyond our sustainable needs for a long time now. We have been accumulating more stuff, living in bigger houses, driving bigger cars, travelling further on holiday and eating food from the four corners of the earth.  This does not need to be all bad, we are allowed to have some fun, treat ourselves and live in comfort after all we all work hard for it. But the time has come to evaluate the true cost of doing this.

My philosophy is not a unique one but it is a practical one.  It really doesn’t matter how much Carbon is enough, it doesn’t matter if carbon is or isn’t to blame for global warming, it doesn’t even matter if global warming is an urban myth. What does matter is that we have too much and value too little.

My philosophy is that we need to put the right foot forward and walk to a sustainable future step by step. We need to think through and establish our values again and make the small but significant changes needed to ensure everyone’s future.   We need to talk, have fun, co-operate, solve problems and enjoy the challenges that face us.

Let’s eat this elephant piece by piece!