It appears it’s almost unthinkable to think that starting my car and letting it run for 5 minutes to get the heat or air conditioning going has any impact on the earth’s pulse, but if you exponentially increase that millions of times, there’s certainly no question as to its serious effect.

Those simple things that you do, or don’t do, have an impact on our planet’s invaluable atmosphere. How many times in a week do you visit your favorite coffeehouse and get your coffee in a paper or cardboard cup? You’ve most likely thought about the number or years it takes for cup to decompose, but have you thought about the energy that went to the production and transportation of the cup? Multiplied by…?

Do you reduce, re-use and recycle? Make it your goal to reduce the volume of waste you produced by recycling and composting. Your town office or city hall will give you a list of how to segregate your waste for recycling. Every item you could re-use or recycle is one less item that finally ends up in the landfill.

One of the simplest ways to help is to purchase and use cloth shopping bags. The hard part is remembering to take them out of the car and into the store, but once you get into the habit, it becomes second nature. Resolve to not accept plastic bags in a store.

Driving a gas-powered vehicle as less as you can, is a terrific way to conserve. Walk or bike whenever and wherever can; it’ll help the planet and even your health. If you live in the city, use public transportation. Likewise, if you are living in the country, carpool to work and rather than making several trips a week to run errands, save them for just one trip.

If you take the time to think about your daily activities, and how you can do them a little differently, you may find yourself not only helping the environment, but helping your wallet. Do only full loads of laundry and dishes; cut your shower by two minutes; switch to energy-saving light bulbs; turn your refrigerator and air conditioner up a single degree and turning off your electronic devices at night are all painless ways to help.

Challenge yourself to think before you act for a few days and you will surprised at how easy it is to begin the process of going green.

To learn want more about living green visit our website about Green Living where you will find additional information and content.