On Earth Day, we celebrate the one thing that every human has in common: we celebrate the earth that we all live on and share. It’s pretty challenging to find something every human has in common, so why is there only one day for this? We all need to make Earth Day an everyday celebration.

We’ve all heard this said before, but think of how amazing our society would be if we all celebrated the earth together every day. Our communities would be more connected, the planet would be so much healthier, and I believe that the well-being and happiness of every person would increase. Just think if every person took the time to consider their actions each day in honor of the earth they stand on. Here are some of the things I think would happen.

• The quality of life for those living in poverty would improve as wealthy people focused on healing the environment rather than making a profit.

• There would be much less plastic within just a few years or less.

• There would be way less pollution in our air and water.

• People would be outside a lot more, helping to restore natural habitats.

• We would have the largest-ever global movement that would force industries to change their fossil fuel usage.

• We would all live slower lifestyles with the understanding that we need to consume less and create less waste.

• Everyone would eat more plant-based diets, and the plants we eat would be healthier and have more nutrients.

• We would learn to reuse more.

• Our recycling systems would become way more advanced and effective.

At this point in time, getting everyone together on a global scale to love and respect the planet every day seems impossible. But I don’t think it’s as complex as it may seem. It just takes time.

Taking better care of our planet and reducing climate change is a slow process. We have all gotten so used to a lifestyle of being able to get things right when we want them, and that is not how an environmentally friendly lifestyle works. Most of the things we do right now to heal our planet don’t have immediate effects on us and are mostly done for the next generation. This slow process can be challenging for so many people because they are just trying to survive each day. So what can we do?

Normalizing Slower Living

Nature moves very slowly, so slow that we won’t even see many of its changes in our lifetime. Most humans live a fast-paced lifestyle (especially in our modern society). We don’t like taking our time to “smell the flowers,” and we are always looking for the next best thing. This type of lifestyle can be tough to break out of. It might seem silly, but I really think that normalizing slower living can help us reconnect with nature and live a more eco-friendly lifestyle. To me, slow living means that we pace ourselves better in our day-to-day lives. We learn to appreciate all the small things rather than constantly looking for the next big thing. Slow living is appreciating what we already own and knowing how to care for our things.

People like having possessions, but we need to get back to really understanding where our things come from and not take them for granted. The things we already have can make us happy, and we don’t need to count on the next new thing to fulfill us because it never will. Appreciation, patience, care, and love are what can make our lives more fulfilled in the long run. It’s not an easy transition, trust me, I know, but the outcome is so worth it. Whenever I begin to fall off the path of a more eco-friendly-based life, I always discover it's because I get caught up in a mainstream mindset, and I want things to make me happy rather than just the tiny moments of each day.

When I need to get back onto the path of living slower, I focus more on routines that distract me from wanting stuff. Here are some tips on how to do this yourself. Some of these may seem like a waste of time initially, but trust me when I say they make a big difference in the long run.

• Don’t let yourself go on social media for at least 4 hours daily.

• Practice yoga and stretching that focuses on breathing.

• Do mindfulness meditation at least once a day for 5-10 minutes.

• Have a cup of tea, light a candle, and just look out your window for a while.

• Get some plants to take care of and give them a lot of love.

• Make time to read each day.

• Make yourself a healthy snack.

• Declutter your space, even if it’s just putting a few things away. This can help to build your appreciation for what you have.

• Take time to look around your home and discover what you do and don’t need. Then, donate what you don’t want in your home anymore.

• Walk for at least 20 minutes outside each day (weather permitting, obviously).

Each moment seems a lot more precious to me when I begin to live slower. I become much more aware of my surroundings, my moods improve, my brain has less chatter going on and I feel more connected with the people in my life. And most importantly, I begin to reconnect with nature again.

Living slower is also a great introduction to a more minimalistic lifestyle. This doesn’t mean you have to empty out your home and live with just the bare necessities. For me, it’s just been a way to learn what makes me feel happy and comfortable in my home and what ends up being clutter. It’s always tempting to buy what others have, but living slower teaches us to step back and better analyze what we need. Even if you have the financial means to get whatever you want at that moment, it still doesn’t mean you should. Slow living will always look different for each person, depending on their life. A lot of people have very demanding jobs that they can’t just up and quit, and a lot of people have families to take care of, which is another very demanding job in itself. Finding small ways to slow down your day-to-day life just a little bit, no matter what your life may be like, will have more positive effects in the long run for you and those around you.

Overall, slower living leads to a more eco-friendly mindset by teaching us what fulfills us each day. The more each person lives like this, the more slowly, over time, it will become the norm within our society for future generations, but we have to start.

Eat Less Meat and Dairy

If everyone ate only small amounts of meat and dairy each week, this would help our planet in numerous ways. The large meat and dairy industries are terrible for our planet, and they don’t produce healthy quality food. Meat and dairy need to be seen as a delicacy, not a staple in every meal. When we treat these two food groups as special occasion types of meals, then we can better appreciate where they come from and pay more attention to who we buy them from.

I’ve spent the last 5 years studying how producing meat and dairy harms the planet and our bodies. We do not need to eat meat daily to get protein, and we don’t need milk to be strong. Eating more vegetables and drinking more water each day is so much healthier for us. Also, researching what happens to cows, pigs, chickens, lambs, fish, and other animals in large food industries is devastating, heartbreaking, and disgusting.

Here is just a small handful of some fantastic resources to become better educated on this topic:

• The Game Changer (On Netflix)

• Cow-Spiracy (On Netflix)

• What the Meat Industry Doesn't Want You to Know About Farm Animals

• How big government helps big dairy sell milk

• Why beef is the worst food for the climate

• How could veganism change the world? | The Economist

People need to go back to small-scale farming for meat and dairy. Also, there are so many amazing vegetarian and vegan foods out there! Eating less meat and dairy does not make your life boring in any way, and honestly, I have found that through experimenting with different types of food, I have become way more connected to what I put into my body.

It took me quite a few years to really change up my diet. I’ve been drinking plant-based milk for 4 years and have reduced meat consumption quite a bit. I still have a long way to go for what I want my diet to look like, but I’m very proud of where I’ve gotten thus far. And if everyone could make more plant-based meals each week, then maybe within the next ten years, the large meat and dairy industries would disappear. This would benefit our local farmers and reduce carbon emissions immensely.

Use More Sustainable Products

There are so many single-use items in our life that we really don’t need. Also, we don’t always have to buy brand new things either; sometimes, what you already own is good enough. Here are some examples:

-Instead of using plastic or paper bags at the store, bring your own, and you don’t have to buy brand new cotton bags either. Re-using old plastic bags work, thrifting for bags, using your summer beach bags or coolers. I also recently saw a video of someone who keeps bins in the back of their car and avoids bags entirely.

-Don’t buy single-use water bottles; get a reusable one. Plenty of these are at thrift stores, or you can keep using the last bottle you purchased. One plastic bottle I got at a gas station lasted a year until I lost it. Bottled water should be mainly used by people who live in places with polluted water or water shortages.

-Don’t fall for trends. Buy what you need and will continue to use, and if what you already have still works, don’t throw it out to switch to something more sustainable. You’re sustainable by reusing.

-Also, don’t fall for green-washing. Take your time to study brands and find out which ones are making the best decisions for the planet.

-Try making more of your cleaning products or switching to brands that create much less waste.

Most importantly, you should keep using what you already have for as long as possible. When it’s time to replace something, look into more eco-friendly solutions. There are a lot of brands out there that I love that haven’t made as many sustainable changes as I would like, but if we all keep purchasing more and more eco-friendly products, then more companies will follow. The best thing we can all do is to be more mindful of our purchases because they send out a big message every time we make a transaction.

Enjoy and Study Nature More

If we don’t create a bond with nature, then how can we possibly care about it? Get outside and start to notice things about your own community that you never did before, and learn how the trees, soil, insects, birds, grass, and other animals are just as important to the community as the humans are. All of us have taken so much from nature without giving hardly anything back, and this way of living isn’t going to work for much longer.

After hundreds of years, we must begin once again to understand nature better so that the next generations will know how to live harmoniously with their natural surroundings in ways we never imagined possible. If we don’t take the time to learn how all of nature works together to sustain life on this planet, then I have nothing but grim news for the future of the human race. It’s harsh but true.

Here are a few great books I recommend reading to learn more about the environment.

• Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

• The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben

• The Inner Life of Animals by Peter Wohlleben

• The Secret Wisdom of Nature by Peter Wohlleben

• In Winters Kitchen by Beth Dooley

I still have so many more environmental books on my TBR shelf that I plan on reading.

These four steps may not seem like much, but if individuals and families made these practices part of their everyday lives, we would see major changes worldwide in just a few short years.

Maybe I’ll never see the positive side effects in my lifetime for everything I’ve done to help slow down climate change, but I’ve learned that it isn’t about me. It’s about the future of humanity and trying to make it better for someone else. I’ve learned that small changes don’t have big impacts for a long time, but that doesn’t mean I’m giving up or it isn’t worth it.