Category: Personal

There’s something I have been struggling with the past few months. I have more thoughts about it than I usually do. It’s social media. It’s a constant struggle. I have two strong opinions about social media and they clash. One side of me hates social media and wants to delete it all right now. The other side wants to benefit from it in the right way. Every time, it’s about finding a good balance between the two. Today I am going to tell you all about this love-hate relationship with social media that I have.

As you all know, I moved to Amsterdam recently. It’s been three weeks now and I think I already learned a lot about this new situation to do an evaluation. I went from living with my boyfriend in a modern apartment (where I finally managed to live within the earth’s capacity for the first time!) to living in an old student flat with 13 others. It’s been a real adventure and I’ve been loving the student life again so far. However, this change also has some consequences for my sustainable lifestyle. I have already come across challenges for this new life. Today I want to share those with you. 

The moment of truth has arrived! Again! It’s time to measure the impact I’ve made the past year. My goal is to live within the earth’s capacity. Meaning that if everybody lived like me, we’d need 1 earth or less (as we have). I started calculating this score for the first time 4 years ago. I started with a score of 2.5 earths (while I was already a vegetarian, so before I started measuring it must have been like 4 earths or something. I was a disaster for our planet). The second year I went down to 1.7 earths and last year I had a score of 1.1 earths. If I go down this year, I will finally come to 1 earth or less. I am very excited for it and curious to see how I’ve done. I really think I have improved. Let’s find out!

Today I’m not writing anything practical or theoretical about sustainability or compassion. It’s more a philosophical thing I guess. A few months ago I re-watched one of my favorite trilogies; The Hunger Games Trilogy. I watched all films in two days, I just love them. The books are also my favorite, even though they’re fiction and I rarely read fiction. Anyway, the second time I watched this trilogy it got me thinking. That’s why I am writing about it today. My thoughts were: are The Hunger Games based on reality?

I started this blog 5 years ago. That’s because I then started taking steps to make my lifestyle sustainable. Over these 5 years I have learned a lot. And so, my mindset and behavior has changed. I dare to say that I am a completely different human now than when I was at age 16/17. In a good way if you ask me! At first my sustainability behavior was very random but I’ve evolved. Today I want to discuss how I’ve gone from focussing on the details to focussing the big picture.