Week 7 - Final Reflections

 November 15, 2024

Week 7

    I decided to start minimizing my food waste in an attempt to remind myself how fortunate I am and to hold myself accountable for appreciating these fortunes. I implemented this change to remind myself also that world hunger is such a pressing issue. Recently, I have become opinionated on many political, social, and environmental issues. Before that, I had never changed it because I was not self-aware in the fact that it was an issue. However, since then, I have yet to change it because I have been concerned with issues that affected me directly. This project was the perfect opportunity for me to make a direct impact and think more selflessly. My main motivation for changing this behavior, outside of the project, would be the new levels of empathy that I now have after being more involved in these issues. They have given me new depths of compassion and helped me find it in myself to be passionate about issues that do not directly affect me, which is a feeling that this project contributed to heavily. 

    This experience inevitably came with many difficulties but also gave me many rewards. Oftentimes, I would struggle to look forward to certain meals because I was eating them solely to prevent their unblemished existence when their expiration date rolled around. Along with this, I also had to stop myself from getting some of my favorite foods because I know, in the past, I often have to dispose of them because they go bad so quickly. Some of the rewards of this project include finding new food items that I would not have otherwise, shedding myself of the guilt that came with wasting food, and the warm feeling of making a difference...no matter how small. Overall, I can say with confidence that the pros outweighed the cons of this project, and I do not intend to stop simply because it is over.

    This project has helped me understand the behavior change in the context of sustainability by experiencing it through my own eyes. I can say, with complete and utter confidence, that I have wasted significantly less food over the last six weeks. However, it also showed me that, for behavior change to be truly impactful, it has to be done in large bunches. Encouraging others to also change their behaviors is just as important, if not more important, than me doing it myself. 








Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Week 1 - Background & Observations

Image
Week 1 October 6, 2024   My topic: Food Waste My Behavior Change: I am trying to waste less food. Why it is important: This topic is very important because wasting food is such a big issue in the United States. We take for granted how blessed we are that we can readily access any type of food we want. With that, we tend to throw away our food without giving them a second thought. World hunger has always been an issue and will continue to be an issue. While this will not necessarily fix anything, it will help me hold myself accountable for wasting food and taking for granted the number of blessings I have in my life. Nearly 10% of the world lives in starvation, which is why I want to do my best to make sure I never forget how fortunate I am. What I have done so far: So far I have just been in an observation phase. I have been taking note of my wasteful habits. The biggest reason I waste food is because I tend to let it expire before eating it. For example, this week I poured out and...
Read more

Week 3 - A New Aspect

Image
  Week 3 October 20, 2024     This post is going to focus a little bit more on a new aspect of how I will be attempting to waste less food. I briefly touched on it in my last post, but it is going to be the focus of this one. That new aspect is ensuring that my food purchases, for the most part, will be items that will stay good for a long time. This is important because, as long as the majority of my pantry and refrigerator stay good for a while, I am not as pressured to eat them right away. With that, it allows me to comfortably prioritize items that may not be good for as much time because I know that the rest of my options will still be available to me for months to come. As a whole, this will make the experience much less stressful and, therefore, make it a lot more enjoyable. This is extremely important because it will make the experience much more effective. The two items I am showcasing today are Bagel Bites and Spaghetti, both of which were items I purchased this...
Read more