Eco-friendly, economical lifeThere are some trivial advice for eco-friendly and economical life: usage of renewable energy sources and other eco-friendly products, spending less on other things,
gathering waste selectively and selling some kinds of it,investing in environmentalism. These advice, however, might still not be enough to make our lifestyle more eco-friendly than that of the people living in Nature. New advice that is eco-friendly and economical at the same time, is always welcome. On the other hand, if we want to protect the environment even more, then we might go into a worse economic state - but this is not necessarily a problem.
There is something we can learn from gambling: the more money we want to win, the higher the risk is. Can we possibly choose a life strategy where luck is on our side? Yes, if our goal is right. If our goal is not too big, then we can usually reduce the risks, and thus we can reach our goals more easily. Therefore it is important to think about the most important goals in our lives, and if it is possible, concentrate on reaching those goals. In our age, the 21st century, perfect environmentalism counts as a very large goal, so here too, it can be worth selecting what parts of Nature are more important to save than the others.
Even if long-term projects do not give us enough joy, we can probably improve our real-life situation by little steps which do. Such little steps can be, for example, games which improve our mental or physical powers (like scientifically tested memory games, archery, or table tennis), or collecting free things, especially downloading free documents from the Internet which can help in our lives (for example, books about health and wealth, or about environmentalism and economy). Apart from owning an electronic library,
for the less busy peopleit is probably a good idea to own some houseplants, too (like Aloe Vera), and make them proliferate freely, creating value. The mould may cost some money, but the pot can be from a reused PET bottle too.
Writing and programming are such kinds of spiritual work that are not worth being done in too much time, because they do not move our body adequately, and they fill our minds with letters. If a programmer wants to read and write a lot, too, then some areas of his/her brain might be overstrained. That is why the people in similar professions had better consider to decrease the time spent on writing and coding, and substitute it with other works. With an adult mind, it is more easy to decide which art or craft is worth choosing for a poor person. It is not worth choosing a job where only the combined work of many people can be really successful, because it is not certain that the poor can find a job in it, or be a boss. On the other hand, it is not worth choosing a job which people can go without. Based on these principles, the following arts and crafts seem to be ideal, which may not even need too much money for the retraining: repair and fix different things (which is advantageous to environmentalism too, because there will be less waste), preserve different arts and crafts from the old times (which is probably doing good to the environment too), work in health care and alternative treatments (which are related to environmentalism too), and do jobs in connection with security and safeguarding (which might be useful in case of a complete collapse). Do-it-yourself (DIY) crafts might be even better than repairing things, because repair depends on things to repair. There are probably similar ones, especially for those who have less principles.
If we sort and get rid of our objects from time to time, we can win some empty space, we can be more mobile, and we can even take advantage of these objects by exchanging them for something else, or by giving them away and collect gratitude. Apart from that, getting rid of things has spiritual and secret-keeping significance too. During sorting, our memories come back once again, we evaluate them, we rediscover the valuable, and get rid of the useless, to make our spirit more easily get rid of it, too. If we forget about something in our lives, it is better if it is hidden from others as well. It is possible that the process of forgetting is like getting younger. It is worth of doing a similar cleanup to our files stored on the computer and messages stored on the Internet, with a special regard to those which are wrong. This way we can more easily find the important data, too, if necessary. Sorting and getting rid of things does good to the environment because there is less need for mining due to the recycled material.
Further readings(these were not necessarily read by the author):
Aristotle - Nichomachean Ethics (work of a famous ancient greek author)
P.T. Barnum - The Art of Money Getting (1880)
Talane Miedaner - Coach Yourself to Success: 101 tips from a personal coach for reaching your goals at work and in life (Contemporary Books, 2000)
Eco-friendly health (chapter left out)In a world where the good learners were richer, the free version of this book could have more chapters by this, too.