Tag Archives: balanced life

6 Ways to Answer “What can I do to make a difference?”

It’s easy to look around and feel that there is little you can do to make a difference, and affect real change. There are so many BIG issues I am passionate about; but it’s easy to wonder what I can possibly do to make a difference. Do you feel that way too?

Yet, every day in small, unobservable ways we are making a difference — either in support of our beliefs or often in direct opposition to the things we care about.

How we spend money, where we spend money, and what we invest in are all ways of voting for the causes we hold dear. Sometimes they actually are even more powerful than our votes during election time.

Here are just a few ways you could make a difference in your daily choices:

  1. Buy local food where possible from farmer’s markets and CSA’s (Community Supported Agriculture). It will improve the lives of real people growing our food rather than factory farms that not only have poor practices that may be hurting your health but also often unfair treatment of the people doing the work at these farms and factories.
  2. Buy clothing and accessories from companies that ethically source their products and commit to not using abusive practices or child labor to create your fashion. More and more options abound for these choices through companies like Etsy who creates a market for independent artisans and Raven & Lily who create stellar designs for women in 3rd world countries to produce and then bring these women’s efforts to our market for us to buy.
  3. Look for and support emerging entrepreneurial companies in your community or online at places like The Grommet where new consumer ideas have a chance to be seen and supported by average people, rather than letting large retailers decide what you have to choose from.
  4. Move your investments from companies and funds that have money in things you do not approve of to things you are passionate about — healthy food supply, energy resources, child labor, environmental issues, education, or anything you deem critical to future generations.
  5. Ask about and investigate the companies that you do the most business with, rather than assume they value the same things you do.
  6. Look for ways to find solutions that improve your contribution to the world that do not break your bank or your back by thinking outside the box. When my first child was born, I was appalled by the amount of diapers going into our landfills. But I was a corporate executive with no time and no inclination to wash cloth diapers. Then, a friend gave me a present of one month of diaper service. I did not even know something like that existed. But once I started using them, I was hooked. It was clean, easy and no more expensive than the mountains of paper diapers I might have thrown in my trash over his baby years. When my third child was a baby we lived in the Dominican Republic. A box of 5 paper diapers cost about the same as a box of 100 stateside and the local women actually showed me that cleaning diapers was really not as hard as I had come to believe in my modern western civilized life. When I returned home, I returned to my diaper service – -but no longer out of fear that cleaning diapers was as bad as I imagined. It was a choice, and it was available.

What things might you be unaware of that could change your actions to be more aligned with your beliefs? Western women spend 85% of the purchasing dollars. What message are you sending with the dollars you spend?

Achieving Balance During Life’s Biggest Transitions

On Mother’s Day, I watched one of my daughter’s graduate college, and in a few weeks, my youngest will graduate high school. Within full of appreciation for their achievements and excitement for their futures, I am sometimes caught by surprise by the deep effect their transitions have on me.

As a mom, my children’s transitions actually constitute transitions for my life, too. Will they be living at home anymore? What level of support will being their mom mean in their next phase of life? how much influence do I actually have on their choices?

I remember distinctly the day my son (and oldest child) first drove away at 16 years of age with his newly acquired license. I knew I had to trust that the job I had done would guide him to make good choices, because as much as I didn’t want to admit it—once out of the driveway, he could do and go as he pleased. It also meant I would no longer be driving him everywhere — a significant convenience, yet a loss of one-on-one talk time with him that I loved.

Have you experienced some of these transitions, too?

The tricky part with these relationships we cherish is investing our hearts in them, while still maintaining our own center of gravity. We require our own dreams and inspirations so that as our children become less dependent on us we are not left with a black hole in our lives. It is even true of our spouses, friends and work. Our center of gravity must remain in us, while we nurture, love and put our all into the things we care about.

I have not always been good at this balance — often being far more invested in others than myself. However, what has changed all this for me is having a BIG goal of my own! Even if I am fully investing most of my time in my children or my work, if I have identified my BIG personal goal and invest just a little time towards it regularly it establishes my own center of gravity, my own destination, and feeds my inner light. And ironically, I have found I am a better mother, friend and worker when my inner light and center of gravity is strong!

It has also made these transitions smoother and more joyful, even if I do still cringe that the part of my parenting journey where my children are living at home is coming to a close — I have more energy invested in my future than grieving what is past.

Here is to gloriously smooth and joyful transitions for your life!