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Mother Earth Awareness Day

2 minute beach clean current affairs ghandi green issues litter mother earth niyama - santosha nottingham yoga blog Apr 22, 2018

MOTHER EARTH AWARENESS DAY

Image credit ~ Miriam Espacio

Image credit ~ Miriam Espacio

Big shout going out to Mother Earth, today, on the United Nations Mother Earth Awareness Day.

There are SO many things to discuss!

We only have to loom around to see how lucky we are to have such a beautiful place to live and grow and evolve. Nature is indeed magical, renewing and replenishing with this amazing circle of life thing we all have going on. If by any chance, you look around and have something to grumble about, ask yourself, is this a nature thing or a man-made thing I’m complaining about? Sure, the weather can sometimes give us plenty of griping material but everything is there for a reason; flooding waters to blistering heat to driving snow or rain, but the planet needs the variance of weather patterns and we have found a way with different technologies to use these things to our advantage and growth. Life will find a way.

If it’s a man-made gripe, there will absolutely be something that we can do about it. If it’s a grubby environment (I’m sorry, Oceans, Rivers and Marine Life, for all the single-use plastic and chemical and toxic waste that we churn out every day. It makes my heart hurt and I promise I’m doing my bit to try make it better), there are things we can do, like spending just ten minutes regularly picking up litter and disposing of it correctly, recycling where appropriate. Think how much of a difference if everyone spent a few minutes doing this regularly. It would also makes people think twice about littering, fly-tipping and about the kind of packaging they buy their products in. Mahatma Ghandi told us that the best thing we can do for the planet is to “be the change we wish to see in the world”. If you want to live in a loving, kind community - be loving and kind. Don’t want for the other person to say hello or offer a smile.

Perhaps we can even help declining numbers of a species by finding out about the environment that live in, the foods they eat and being aware of products that are on our everyday shopping list that contribute to the destruction of habitats. What can People do to make these things better? Change your brands? Re-think the whole ‘ethically sourced’ tag line? I was really sad to learn of the demise of he last known male white rhinoceros recently. Extinction is not just for dinosaurs, folks. When they’re gone, they’re gone. So sad.

Glitter. Oh, how glitter makes me so sad because I love, love, LOVE a sparkle or two but all these tiny pieces of cosmetic loveliness always find their way through the soil of the landfill sites into the trickles of puddles and into the streams, rivers and oceans where ultimately it ends up in the digestion system of all manner of fish and sea life. Possible back into our own physical systems because of how the food chain works. Is it really that important to have the glittery balloons on a birthday card? Fortunately, there are great minds out there who have Mother Earth a bit closer to their hearts than the mass-producers. (Check out Eco Glitter & 2 Minute Beach Clean).

Balloons. Does my assault on these modern simple things of joy know no bounds? When we release balloons into the air, remember what goes up, must come down. Some of these pieces of plastic end up looking like a tasty meal for one of our wildlife or aquatic neighbours. Do we need the balloon that much?

We all have choices and it would be super dooper scrumdiddlyumptious if everyone made just one small change for the greater good of this beautiful home we all share.

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I wrote this blog post a good few weeks ago but....  * * * LAST MINUTE EDIT * * *

YAY! High fives to the UK government this week who have announced that they are taking positive steps to reduce single-use plastics such as drinking straws, cotton buds and glitter. Oh, hoorah!!! This is such great news! Check out these BBC articles here and here. Comment below or jump onto my facebook page to tell me what you think.