Based on our ongoing regeneration journey, we created the following guiding questions to help you think about the 7 R’s in your life.
Rethink:
What are the environmental consequences of what you eat, drink, purchase, and do? What effects do these activities have on yourself and the planet? Who are you working for and what is their intention?
What are you shopping for? Consider buying secondhand, borrowing from your neighbor, or dumpster diving. Where do you spend your resources?
Are you supporting local families and small business owners? Try and avoid mass consumerism and shop at local farmers’ markets. Set up trading circles with your friends and in your community for books, clothes, and other household items you are not utilizing.
Where does your food come from? Do you know its source? The source is not the
supermarket. It’s the soil and water that determine the quality of the food you buy.
Rethink your groceries and your diet. How much waste do you generate each week? What is it? How was your food produced? Our current agricultural model is extractive, while regenerative agriculture works to build topsoil, nourish the environment, draw down and sequester carbon, and bring back health and wealth to communities.
Refuse:
An easy action we can take is to refuse single-use plastic and refuse to shop firsthand or at big-box supermarkets. We can purchase from local farmers’ markets, make our own all-purpose cleaning products with vinegar and a few drops of peppermint essential oil, and make our own vinegar with fruit scraps (see recipe in Chapter 7). Consider using coconut oil in bulk for your skincare and cooking, and try not washing your hair every day to use less shampoo.
Reduce:
We can reduce our purchases of unnecessary products from large stores and instead grow our own gardens, trade for products or services, and exchange with our local community centers or colleagues.
Reuse:
Plastic can take around 450 years to decompose. Single-use plastic items are great—for the companies that produce them. Fortunately, there’s a reusable purpose for nearly every single-use thing out there! we prefer to refuse plastic, and we opt for purchasing specialty items in glass so that we can reuse the jars.
Repair:
Develop your handywoman skills and try to fix whatever breaks. Or if it’s out of your league, see if there is an easy solution online (i.e., Google it), or hire an expert to repair it. Things are designed to go obsolete so that we continue to be ravenous consumers. But there are regenerative alternatives. A lot of stuff can be repaired, patched, or fixed up to extend their lives. When you absolutely need to purchase “new,” do your homework and go for quality and repairability over price.
Recycle:
Recycle whatever is recyclable. Learn about your municipality’s recycling policy and systems. If they offer compost bins, awesome, but we highly recommend composting at home if you have even a tiny yard or bringing your compost to a local organic community garden. Consider composting as the most eco-friendly way to recycle food waste and nourish our earth—building better soil.
Repurpose:
Make your old clothes into rags, breathable coverings for fermentation, or vests. Or upcycle items you’re not using into art, turning trash into creations. Jean’s grandma, Fay Colmar, showed me how to make plastic into painted flower sculptures, for example.
Regenerate
Regenerate in all ways. We must take steps toward our dreams by contributing to the betterment of our ecosystems. We can be part of making our home planet better than we found it. Regenerate your love for yourself and your relationship with Mother Earth. Regenerate your grass into edible gardens, build soil health, and compost. Restore your health and peace of mind.
“If governments won’t solve the climate, hunger, health, and democracy crises, then the people will. Regenerative agriculture provides answers to the soil crisis, the food crisis, the health crisis, the climate crisis, and the crisis of democracy.”
—Dr. Vandana Shiva