Sustainable Life for Humans

Humans are on a crash course with our destiny. If we don’t find a way to live sustainable life, our species could become extinct. Over the next five-hundred, the extinction of our species will looms above us, as it has in the past. Will we fall into the oblivion of our over-consumption and completely destroy our eco-system? Or can humanity persevere into sustainable life and even become something greater than we have ever imagined? Could humanity bring life to new worlds and expand into a universe of global consciousness? Anything seems possible with human ingenuity.

There is no doubt that there are major issues that threaten the survival of the human species, namely our consumption patterns. There are five major actions you can take today for humanity’s future.

1. Stop eating meat; move to a vegetarian or largely vegan diet. Cavemen were opportunistic carnivores; we will discuss these implications for your diet and for planet Earth. This is something you will almost never hear about, but has the biggest implications for our planet.
2. Make your own things. If you need to buy something, understand the product life-cycle before buying (especially cars!). This is called “ethical consumerism“. We’ll come back to this.
3. Try to drive less on a daily basis, but enjoy traveling long distances a few times a year. Your oil consumption matters, but there are other things that you consume that matter more. (hint: go back to #1)
4. Stay away from authority. (police, judges, courts, politicians, bosses, anyone with a gun, or that thinks they can tell you to do something; teachers often also fall under this category when you a young). The idea is to limit your encounters with these types of people as much as possible to avoid conflict and destructive behavior.
5. Enjoy a nice meditation, stretch, or even some yoga. Spend more time away from TV, screens, and stimulation/electronic radiation. Walk, run, hike, be outside, find outdoor activities. You’ll look better for it. Remember to enjoy the present moment whenever you can. It’s all that we really have.

These are just a few principles to help you live a simpler, more economized, sustainable, and efficient lifestyle.

Now, let’s talk about sustainability.

You want your life to be sustainable. You want your children to enjoy what you have enjoyed in your life. And through your life, you’ve realized what is important and it is surely not things! If so, you are living excessively! When there is excess, there is stagnation, we see it in all kinds of royal families throughout history and now in the wealthy corporation owner families like Wal-Mart. They always get slaughtered and killed in revolutions and replaced with leaner governments with more representation from citizens. This might happen soon in this county, but there are actions you can take to stop your over-consumption and to be a lean consumer.

The truth is that no one really values sustainability. Everyone wants more because they think that it will make them happier. Corporations want you to believe this! But this type of consumption couldn’t be further from the truth.

You do not value things. You can lie to yourself all you want, but if there is a bigger TV out there, you are going to want it! This means that anytime you buy a TV, this will inevitably lead to dissatisfaction, whether it is because a larger/more inexpensive TV is being produced, or the TV that you have breaks. Understand the tricks that your mind plays on you. You want things that will last, especially when you invest lots of money into these things.

The First Steps

Your meat consumption will have the largest effect on your world. Consider this: animals are living breathing beings just like you and they need to be taken care of. This includes water, food, warmth, medicine, and social interaction. Right now, we can’t even give the animals social interaction because they are too numerous. We over-medicate them because they are too numerous. The whole system is completely unmanageable because everyone wants to eat meat.

A human diet optimally contains mostly vegetables, fruits, legumes, and nuts for health. Most people don’t need meat and can subsist on a completely vegan diet. However, some people do need meat in their diets. These people can absolutely live on chicken and bug proteins (just like our ancestors). Human beings are absolutely not meant to eat red meat in large quantities. We simply do not have the stomach acid to break it down, which results in acid reflux, compacted digestive systems(think about old men with huge “beer bellies”; meat is the real culprit here), and slowed metabolism and digestion because of nutrients that are too densely packed for a human stomach to efficiently digest. Advancements in science are also helping to improve this, making fake meat tastier and closer in texture to real meat, but really our ancestors had very limited access to meat. You only need it occasionally.

Be Aware of your Water Consumption

We Americans use the most water of anyone in the world by at least 2x. Japan is the only country very close to us. How do we use so much water? Beef. Cows drink enormous amounts of water and they are an extremely inefficient converter of energy. Cows are the biggest reason why we Americans consume so much water.

We also take long showers, wash our cars, water our lawns too much and waste water on completely unproductive plants and animals. The key here is unproductive land. We need to use our land to cultivate healthy and nutritious food for ourselves and stop relying so heavily on mass farmers so they can be reasonable about their crops. We undervalue food in this country. I’m not talking about fancy restaurants; I’m talking about produce aisles at the grocery store.

Vegetables require far fewer nutrients, water, care, and money than cows do. That’s why you’ll never hear about this in the news, or on T.V. People have literally been killed over it. There are billions of dollars in beef and the beef companies want to keep it that way.

Showering for shorter times helps. Doing laundry only when clothes are really dirty also helps. Not watering your lawn is also a huge contribution. But rest assured, beef is the #1 culprit for water loss in this country.

Stop Being a Mindless Consumer

This is really all that you have to do. This falls under what we talked about earlier in the second point about ethical consumerism. Understand that all of the products in target and Wal-mart are made in China, basically in labor camps forced by the Chinese Communist government. They would do the same to Americans if they could and they do get away with quite a bit already! That is what you are supporting when you want to save money at those stores. All of fast-food comes from factory farms. They are the worst ones! I’m sure that McDonald’s cow’s aren’t loving anything that is being done to them. Neither are the pigs or chickens from all of the other fast-food chains. Deli meats are no better, don’t try to kid yourself. You wanna look lean, sexy, and be healthy? Stop eating meat altogether. Give it a try, don’t try to kid yourself that you need it after a week. You could survive without food for something close to 3 weeks. I’ve gone 5 days myself and didn’t lose too much weight, but I was also very thin and already living in India.

If you want high-quality, long-lasting products, then we have to invest in the art and craftsmanship of the people around us. The paintings that no one knows about have the highest mark-up anyways. Products with character and durability are getting harder and harder to find and its a shame. It’s an art to create beautiful crafts and we need to remember to value that and support the people who make it.

So it’s simple. Sustainable life is all about your decisions. Your existential power in this universe. Consider where your money goes, how it is funneled into the economy. Be serious about understanding your own patterns of consumption, and then you can run on next to nothing, or sustain yourself completely.

You can do it!