Improving The Quality Of Your Life

Our only security is our ability to change.
— John Lilly

Whether you want a better car, a better paying job, a bigger house, or a fluffier cat, you will have to face one big ugly spiky scary thing:  change. It’s not that scary though.

As living beings, we are constantly changing in order to adapt to our environment and live good thriving lives in it. Some changes are massive and difficult to make, while others are small and simple. But no matter the size of the change, there is a common pool of factors affecting almost all individual changes: Read the rest of this entry »

There’s a lot of buzz around the word “green” these days. Green collar jobs, green cars, green industries, green buildings, green people from Mars, and so on. Obama has been talking a lot about green, and is investing a lot of money into it. But there are some ignored things about this green. Ignored at least in some public circles.

From an article published in Yale Environment 360:

For the new urbanists, building an eco-town is not a matter of building “green” buildings. For some, in fact, green buildings are non-starters, taking 25 to 65 years to recoup the energy used to build them; and once built, they can become quickly obsolete, saddled with already out-of-date technology.

“Everyone gets seduced by the ‘green bling,’” Stephen Platt of Cambridge Architectural Research told me. “Making the houses energy-efficient is the easy bit. The key problem is making this a long-term socially acceptable place where people will want to live and prosper.” More important is creating places that, like Vauban, encourage people to change their unsustainable behaviors and then enable them to do it.

Do you think we’re ready for green living? Do you think the green technologies are ready for us?

photo by: Claire7373

While we are scared that the global financial crisis is stealing our comfortable lifestyles, people in Zimbabwe have to pan for gold powder from the rivers to exchange for food at an exorbitant rate. So perhaps it isn’t that bad for us. : ) Maybe slightly less comfortable, but not nearly as dramatic. Read the rest of this entry »

For years and years, misinformed consumers were duped into paying through the nose for television, music, phone calls and information. NOW IT IS FREE. THIS IS THE FUTURE!

Isn’t it funny how with more and more free stuff around people have less and less money? Getting things for free should mean that you’re saving some money. But it just isn’t true. The opposite is. Free costs more.

Things are offered for free, yes. Free calls. Free music. Free television. Free books. Everything is free, but free is selling you something else. Something that isn’t sold to you directly and isn’t the main focus in the picture. Kind of like the current sidebar featured video (the one with the ball). You’re being told to look at the free stuff while your pockets are being picked (okay not really like that but you get the idea.

In the end, free is just another business model. A better one. You’re paying without being aware that you’re paying, and that makes everything in the sales process easier. Which means that you should be more careful who gives you candy. Yes, remember what your mom told you, “never take candy from strangers.” She was right.

Here are the 4 little known truths of free stuff. Read the rest of this entry »

Did you ever think about where all the stuff that you buy comes from, or where it goes after you’re done with it? Ever wondered if this system was efficient? Of course you did, you’re not a chimp! Who came up with this kind of introductory lines anyway… h/she should be forced to watch ‘Pledge This!‘ 100 times, with no breaks other than vital ones — watching that film is more painful than watching paint dry. (Paris Hilton stars in it, now do you believe me?)

OK, so you probably have a pretty good idea what the story of your stuff is, from resource extraction and production to consumption and disposal. What you may not know (not very well at least) are some of the facts and connections between the environmental and social issues that our planet is facing. And that is where “The Story of Stuff” kicks in to help you. Read the rest of this entry »