Eco-Chic Lifestyle Change Week 5: Weekly Review and Final Reflection

Weekly Update: 

I must admit that I thought I did a really good job this past week on staying on track with my SMART goal which is: I will drink five or fewer bottled beverages (Gatorade, Vitamin Water, soda, etc.) per week and I will recycle all of them when finished drinking them. I stayed well under my target goal and only drank like one or two beverages from a plastic bottle this past week. The stainless steel water bottle that I bought has really helped me the past couple of weeks along with drinking a lot of things out of my coffee cup at home. I know you're all probably wondering what, coffee cup? Yes, I use my trusting old coffee cup to drink out of; I rinse it out of course after I drink my coffee, but I figure hey why not save on water and dirtying another dish and just re-use my cup and be more eco-friendly. So again like I stated above I felt I did a good job in following my SMART goal and to be honest it's almost becoming second nature now.

Review of Entire Process:

My SMART goal to start out with was as follows: I will drink three or fewer bottled beverages (Gatorade, Vitamin Water, soda, etc.) per week and I will recycle all of them when finished drinking them. My goal did change throughout the process. I tweaked my goal just a bit and changed it from three to five or fewer bottled beverages per week. By doing this it made my goal much more attainable. This goal was much harder than I first anticipated it to be simply because I never realized just how much I drink out of plastic bottles. Since I changed my goal from three to five I haven't gone over one time and I'm really proud of myself for doing so. I think it would have been much wiser to start out with five bottled beverages and scale it down from there because now I only drink like two or three bottled beverages per week. The things that helped me be successful in achieving my goal was the suggestions and advise from my fellow blog members along with some self-dedication and support from friends. My blog members gave me some really good suggestions which included purchasing Gatorade and Vitamin Water powdered packets and buying a water bottle. Some things that got in the way were: deer hunting season and I purchased two cases of Gatorade and Vitamin Water prior to starting my SMART goal. I say deer season because there's no running water or electricity where we hunt and we pretty much have to drink out of  plastic bottles which stinks, however I took all of the plastic bottles that accumulated over the weekends home with me and recycled them so there was a positive that came out of the situation. I can address these types of things in the future by being more aware and prepared of what's ahead and start early on possible goals to allow for miscues that may arise. 

I've benefited not only from this SMART goal process but also from this class in that I'm much more aware now of my environment and I'm being much more eco-friendly. I've learned a lot about myself during this process in that I now realize that I can in fact change my behavior if I really want to do so. I have the self-motivation and dedication inside me to change. I learned throughout this SMART goal process that behavior change is indeed not easy to accomplish due to various physical, mental, and environmental factors and temptations but is attainable if you put your mind and will power to it. Like Bear Grylls says, if you keep your psychological status clear, calm, and collected anything is possible and you can in fact do whatever it is you set out to do. The environment benefited from my behavior change in that I recycled all of my bottles and by not purchasing or using plastic bottles the less factories had to make them no matter how nominal just my change was. Others benefited in that my girlfriend is now much more eco-friendly and she has helped me follow my SMART goal along with partaking in other environmentally friendly things/changes with me. I will continue this behavior and will continue to be more eco-friendly in other various ways that I can. Recommendations that I have for others about making a behavior change is choose a behavior that is indeed attainable and fits for you along with self-motivation and dedication. This has been an awesome experience and has taught me a lot about myself.

Blogged for the Eco-Chic Lifestyle Change Week 5 and Final Reflection