We all know what to do to live a healthier lifestyle. Drink water, eat more veggies and exercise, right? The same is true for taking care of the earth. We all know what to do. If you sit down with a group of people and do some brainstorming you will come up with a long list of things we have been taught for decades about how to reduce our ecological footprint and live more lightly on the earth. (Interestingly, it actually includes drinking water, eating more veggies and using more human power to get around – making caring for our bodies one of the best ways to care for the earth….but I digress). 

So if we know what to do, why don’t we do it? The answer is probably as varied as the people reading this and I am not here to diagnose your stumbling blocks. But one thing I do know is that if you are experiencing a stumbling block, staying on track is easier with friends. 

This is one of the reasons why the A Rocha Canada project in Northern BC started regular gatherings called Living Lightly. We are better together. Meeting together inspires us, gives us courage to try things we might not on our own, motivates us to actually do it (how often have you saved a reel or video and then not actually done it?), and helps us see that we are not alone. We gather to learn and share and find that we are not so different after all. 

It is also a great way to showcase all of the many talents of people in our small town. With so much knowledge in the community of Houston, it has been easy to find amazing people to share about everything from how to make Kombucha and yogurt, to using household ingredients for deodorant and hand lotion bars. After an event, our Facebook chat group is often a flurry of “look what I did” pictures of things like sourdough successes (and failures) or sprouting seedlings in our winter milk jug gardens. 

Living Lightly (originally Sustainable-ish Living) was originally funded in part by a grant from Canadian National Railway (CN). We had so much fun, we’ve just kept going!