10 Tips For Slow Living This September
The end of summer is looming, and with it bring promises of back to school, back to work, and back to ‘normal.’ Anxiety is high, whether you’re already back in a pre-pandemic routine or you’re trying to figure out what that even looks like for you and your family, but it doesn’t have to be overwhelming. Check out my tips below to bring the slow living lessons we’ve learned in the last year and a half with us into the Fall.
1. Be selective.
Change your ‘Yes!’ to an ‘I’ll get back to you.’ Essentially, don’t try and take it all on (even when you love all the things!). Saying yes to every event, activity and invite invariably means you’re not able to give 100% to anything, or you might have to bail out on things last minute. Instead, start pausing before committing and asking yourself what you’ll be giving up if you say ‘Yes’ this time. Involve others (like your family) in your decision making if it affects them, and don’t feel like you need to respond to invites immediately. Just because we have the technology to respond instantaneously doesn’t mean we should, and soon enough your social circle will get used to your response timeline!
2. Make time for yourself every single day.
I don’t mean basic hygiene like taking a bath or going grocery shopping alone - that should be a given! I mean real selfcare time where you’re checking in with yourself and giving your body and mind your complete attention. Journaling, meditation, fresh air, just being - whatever floats your boat and brings you peace and balance - make time for it every single day. Take this as your reminder of the importance of being alone with yourself and learning to enjoy silence and solitude.
3. Make grocery shopping a conscious experience.
Seeking out specialty stores, local growers that produce year round, and bulk grocers that offer zero waste packaging and ethical practices means that you have to actively consider what you and your family are eating (and wasting). When you choose to ditch your usual Big Box supermarket and make time to shop more frequently in a local and sustainable way, you’re making the choice to fuel your body and your life consciously, rather than on autopilot. This doesn’t mean you should be paying more either! Many people assume shopping locally is more expensive, but if you’re giving the planning, attention and care to food that it deserves as your body’s fuel, you’re going to waste less, eat better, and spend less on health-related issues in the long term. Plus, you’re adding dollars directly back into the community you live in, instead of giving them to a distant corporation. Keeping value in local communities is a whole other blog post for another time, but suffice to say that when your local farmers, makers, and harvesters are doing well, the whole community benefits. Go organic and pesticide-free as much as possible, and if your whole basket can’t be organic, focus on at least keeping the Dirty Dozen chemical-free. Where possible, find alternatives for your oats, flour, veggies, fruit, and look for antibiotic-free meat. Growing your own food is even better, if possible, and gives you a whole new appreciation for our largely invisible food system - plus letting a carrot rot in the fridge becomes much more heartbreaking when you’ve watered that same carrot in your garden all summer! Finally - don’t forget your reusable grocery bags. It really does add up!
4. Skip the take out.
Or at the very least, seek out restaurants using reusable, recyclable, or compostable container options. Some even have programs where you can bring in your own reusable containers (glass and metal are great options) and have them plate your food directly into them. If they don’t already offer this, ask if it’s possible! Supporting our local businesses has never been more important but the huge increase in single use take out packaging has been absolutely devastating for our environment. This summer Lytton, a small town here in BC broke national temperature records three days in a row, and then burned to the ground. If that isn’t a clear indication of the dangerous direction our planet is headed, I don’t know what is.
5. Forego fast fashion.
Millions of tonnes of completely wearable clothing hit the landfill every year, some worn only once or thrown out when a button comes off. Last year I challenged myself to not buy new and I loved it - and I’ve never felt more fashionable! In-person clothing swaps have temporarily been sidelined while we navigate this crazy time but it doesn’t mean there aren’t alternatives to buying new clothes. Check your area for awesome consignment and thrift stores. Do a quick Google or Facebook search for your local Buy Nothing or Freecycle group. Host a socially-distanced clothing swap by passing around a bag of clothes with friends - all you have to do is get a group of people to participate and take turns going through and filling up a bin or bag of clothes, then passing it along. It can be a really fun way of getting some new-to-you items, and passing on things you’ve outgrown - physically or emotionally! Once the bag has made a couple rounds, anything left can be donated to charity or passed along to someone who upcycles fabric.
6. Dial back the activities.
We tend to be creatures of habit, and as things start opening up and registration alerts hit our inboxes, we will naturally start signing up for a huge rush of sports, camps, workshops, and other activities! Kids' activities especially can get overwhelming quickly. I always choose activities for my girls that are a) close to home, b) I won’t be disappointed if we have to miss, and c) I have actually talked to my child or thought through myself first! For example, a couple years ago my daughter was enrolled in gymnastics and was quickly recruited into the competitive program. Not only did the cost increase significantly, but so did our time commitment and her stress level! I was paying so much for the classes and was frustrated when she didn’t want to go on certain days. It caused more and more stress until finally she refused to participate one day. It happened on the same day that I broke my foot - that’s right, I literally had to break my foot before I realized that maybe my constant running from one activity to the next was unnecessary and unhealthy, for me and my family.
7. Switch to safer.
If you haven’t already, you’ve got to start looking at labels and buying your products from sources you can trust! If you want to live an all around healthier lifestyle, being toxin-free is key! We are exposed to so many toxins daily and most of them are completely avoidable, especially the ones in our food, as well as our household and personal care products. Disease, cancer, infertility, and allergies are often preventable in many cases, yet we aren’t given any education on how to make the right choices. Health Canada has only “hot listed” 400 ingredients, yet the European Union has banned over 1,500 and some clean beauty companies have banned upwards of 2,000. Makeup, skincare, hand soap, dish soap, laundry detergent and household cleaners all come in contact with our skin (which is our largest organ so absorbs everything, good and bad) and can cause serious endocrine disruption, organ toxicity, and cancer. This is an area where we can make ourselves aware and find better options, which are, thankfully, becoming more easily available.
8. Try to be plastic free.
This doesn’t mean 100% no plastic, it just means being conscious about your plastic usage and making small changes wherever you can. For example, swapping out plastic wrap for reusable cloth wraps, choosing glass packaging over plastic (even cans have a plastic liner), repurposing plastic to extend its usefulness, or getting creative! At the refillery we try and help as many families as possible by offering a huge variety of home and personal care products in bulk, so that you can bring your reusable containers and fill up on safe, non-toxic products, or choose from our packaging-free products like bath bombs, all-natural handmade soap, and more. You can also shop all our products online if you can’t make it to one of our pop-ups.
9. Streamline sustainable lunches
Easy and sustainable kids’ (and adult, let’s be real) lunches can feel really overwhelming, but when you’ve decided to dial back everything else in your life it starts to get easier (promise!) and it’s so worth it. Making time to whip up some homemade granola bars, banana bread, or cookies will remove the need for easy plastic-packaged snacks that tend to be filled with nasty ingredients and a decided lack of nutrition. Fruit is key, as it usually comes in its own all-natural, plastic-free peel packaging, and getting your kids’ help in washing and prepping veggies is good bonding and teaching time! You could also try getting a small group of friends on board to do a Snack Swap. Basically, everyone makes enough of one snack for each family for a week, which saves on the headache of making multiple recipes, saves on a huge amount of plastic, allows you to try food or combinations you never would have thought of, and stocks your cupboard with a variety of unwrapped snacks that are easy to grab when packing your kids’ lunches. Win, win, win and win!
10. Foster slow living.
The number one thing you can do to to go back to a new, and more sustainable normal this September is to take the time to set up your home and most-frequently-used spaces in a way that fosters a slower paced lifestyle. We adapt to our environment, so if our home is chaotic, our behaviour and thought patterns will be in chaos too. Evaluate your spaces for organization, flow, comfort, serenity, and happiness. Plants are good for the soul, windows should be able to be opened easily, and ‘the good china’ doesn’t need to be hidden away if it makes you happy. Don’t be afraid to bring in new-to-you items that work better for the space and ditch the stuff that no longer serves you. I recently joined my local Buy Nothing group and it has made getting rid of things so much easier as I often get emotionally attached to items. Knowing they’re going somewhere they will be loved and used makes all the difference! Finally, remember these are just things - take a page Marie Kondo’s book and only hold onto only items that truly spark joy!
Summer is racing by - take the time to enjoy the journey my friends! Get to the lake, ocean, or river at least one more time before the weather cools down. Play in a sprinkler. Eat some watermelon. Listen to a song that makes you smile and maybe even dance. September will be here soon and we will once again yearn for days that seem timeless. As always please reach out if you have a topic you’d like me to address or leave a comment below!