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A few months after moving to Los Angeles I started to develop healthier habits. I drank less, ate better and became less wasteful. I also started to be more conscious of how wasteful I was doing things like constantly buying small bottles of water, not reusing plastic bags (when the supermarkets still had those) and taking longs showers while jamming to music.

This is why I was excited to take some challenges in order to help me continue to live a more conscious and renewable lifestyle. The challenges that I did were related to my shopping, shower, commuting and my coffee addiction!



I'll start with walking. I don't drive. I refuse to drive. The New Yorker in my prefers walking, mass transit or cabbing it whenever I'm heading somewhere so the walking challenge didn't really apply to me. I live in a great area with everything that I need within walking distance and heading to the supermarket--the farthest place I walk--only takes 10 minutes each way. That's cake. I know tons of people that can benefit from walking a little instead of wasting gas just to hit the drive through. I think it'll benefit people that are stressed out in a good way because when you're walking, even if you're listening to music, you have a chance to focus on your thoughts.

When it comes to grocery shopping I generally buy fresh or frozen veggies because I'm not a fan of packaged foods anymore. This usually means that I'm creating less waste because I mostly end up with the little plastic veggie bags that I always find ways to reuse. Sometimes I do get lazy though and want to get something I can cook fast like soup. I like that my favorite tomato soups come in renewable cartons because it means I can take what I want at the time and put the rest away for later. If I were to use canned soup I wouldn't want to leave it half opened in the fridge or be forced to put it in a tupperware container. I like these cartons because they're space savers and the packaging is renewable. Turns out that before I even heard of Tetra Pak I was already purchasing soup by Pacific that came in their packaging. Their packages help protect our planet's limited supply of natural resources because they're mainly made from paper which as you should all know by now, is a renewable resource that can be naturally replenished.

I'm a music fanatic and I can't really do anything without it. Cooking, cleaning, and showering always require music. I even have a special play list called Shower Time that lets me jam out to tunes while I'm showering and/or washing my hair. This of course means that my showers are a lot longer than they need to be. I decided to take my iHome out of my bathroom and force myself to take shorter showers. Because I live in SoCal I have to be mindful of the water that I waste and putting my iHome away for that reason helped me cut my shower time in half. I totally recommend this challenge to people because hey, who wants to look like a prune after getting all nice and clean?


Lastly, I changed the way I drank my coffee everyday. Or rather, I changed the vessel in which I drank it from! At work we have these tiny styrofoam coffee cups that don't carry more than 8 oz so imagine how many times a caffeine addict like me gets up to refill her cup--or to get a new one. I probably wasted about 7 cups a day, 5 times a week, so the challenge to bring my own mug to work is something I should have done on my own years ago. Not only did bringing my own mug to work let me have more coffee, but it reduced the amount of waste I was creating. In addition to that, my coworkers started doing the same thing after a few days.

I love to shop, eat tasty food, travel and drink good champagne but I also hate being wasteful. It totally makes me feel like a hippie saying this but I get a kick out of being 'green'. It's really amazing how changing even one thing every day, like taking shorter showers, can have a huge impact on things down the line that we can't even see. I also took Tetra Pak's Happiness Quiz and it gave me some insight how how the things I like to do positively affect me. You can take the quiz and see how your habits positively affect you as well.

Now that I did these challenges I'm hoping to keep them up as well as encourage people around me to do the same. I've spent so much time being wasteful with my time, energy and so many other things that surround me that I'm finally at a place where I want it to stop. And you should totally join me!




I was selected for this opportunity as a member of Clever Girls and the content and opinions expressed here are all my own.