No Impact Man

I first heard about Colin on the Colbert Report. He was getting the word out for his new book "No Impact Man: the adventures of a guilty liberal who attempts to save the planet, and the discoveries he makes about himself and our way of life in the process." He's also made a movie about his year of no impact living. And of course, he also has a blog, which I highly recommend. It's a bit spastic, but then again so are most blogs. He covers a wide range of living green issues.

Because let's face it, the first step to nurturing a green culture is transforming individual lifestyles. Social norms are powerful stuff. It's why my mom bought an organic turkey for thanksgiving this year and why both my parents have been eating more vegetarian suppers.

No Impact Man has also spearheaded the no impact project, a pdf how-to guide for a week of no impact living. Each day, participants in the project make one additional step to a no impact life. Day 1 focuses on consumption, Day 2 adds trash elimination, and so on with transportation, eating locally, reducing energy use, and reducing water use. The week rounds off with volunteering and an Eco-Sabbath-- make no impact all day long.

It's a radical week to be sure, and changing the usual routine is difficult. This experiment appeals to me for several reasons:

On a personal level, it advocates simplicity. I have less distractions. My life is more focused. Clutter is nonexistent. There's more dinero in my bank account.

No impact living is empowering. So what if our disposable culture pressures us to be wasteful? Live is possible without microwave dinners, television, and A/C. With the flip of a switch, I'm a bona fide responsible member of society, capable of ignoring the temptation of single-serving yogurt cups. Feel the power.

Life has more meaning. Every moment of my day is deliberate, since my every action's carbon footprint needs to be considered. I think we could all do with more mindfullness throughout the day.

The (few) items I own are imbued with significance. Like the ceramic bowl I bought 3 years ago from Goodwill. It has been my sole bowl through most of college and now my first year in the real world. I ate from that bowl when I lived in Iowa City, when I worked in Columbus Ohio, when I lived at a commune, and now in Grand Rapids. Then there's the hat my friend knitted for me at about the same time. I ran cross country with that hat, took skiing trips with my dad, lent it to friends. Most of my favorite clothes came from freebie tables and Goodwill racks.

Of course for many people in the world, there's no choice but no-impact living. I sometimes wonder how baffled they would be at the amount of websites dedicated to giving up all sorts of modern conveniences I've "sacrificed" in some sort of neo-esthetic dogma.

Then again, these same people live in areas of the world that are most affected by global warming, not to mention all the strange and wonderful creatures of nature who are harmed every day by our pollutants and waste.

What's so insidious about our disposable culture is the utter thoughtlessness of it all. We line our canned foods with toxins and use plastic bags for a 5 min errand run that'll outlast us for millions of years.

This isn't limited to environmental concerns. Consider our nation's eagerness to bomb Afghanistan's inhabitants, and the callous layoffs in corporations across the country. Under this system, razors are disposable, workers are disposable, entire nations are disposable.

What a waste of humanity's genius.