Eco-Chic Lifestyle Change Week 5: Final Weekly Review & Overall Project Relfection

Weekly Review 

This week I was successful in achieving My SMART goal, which is turning off my lights every time I leave my bedroom.

I think I can safely say that my SMART goal has turned into a habit! I don't think about it as a chore, or an obstacle, instead it is something that I do on a regular basis. A piece of advice that was given to me a couple of weeks ago was to be patient as it takes 3 weeks for a change to become a habit. I took the advice of being patient, stuck with my goal, and I am now turning off my lights on a regular basis!

I am very excited and happy that over the last few weeks, what started out to be a challenge is now something that I have conquered and made a part of my daily routine. I never really thought that turning off my bedroom lights was going to be a challenge or that successfully completing the challenge was going to make me feel so good! What I learned this week is that if you stick to your goal and be patient, then changing a simple lifestyle can truly happen. 

A couple weeks ago, I added the challenge of turning off the power bar in my room whenever it is not being used. This week I did ok with the challenge but not great. I turned it off about 60% of the time. I noticed that when I leave for school and have to unplug something then I would remember to turn it off, but the challenge I faced was that I forgot to turn it off if I didn't need to unplug something from the power bar. Although I had a rough week with this challenge, I want to continue to challenge myself because power bars can really suck up energy.

Review of Entire Process 

My SMART goal remained the same over the last 5 weeks, but I did add a challenge as I was becoming more successful with my goal. I added this challenge at about the half way mark of this 5 week lifestyle change process. Although my SMART goal is something that I have successfully made a new habit, the challenge that I made for myself is not there yet. Turning off my power bar in my room whenever it is not being used is something that I will continue to try and make a habit, just like I did with my SMART goal of turning off my bedroom lights whenever I leave my room!!!!!

The challenges that I faced throughout this process was remembering to turn off my lights when I got busy or stressed. I noticed early on that whenever I was in a rush or my mind was preoccupied with who knows what, then that's when I would leave my lights on. Noticing the obstacle that got in my way of being successful allowed me to realize that I needed to slow down, think before leaving, and remind myself of what I was really supposed to be doing in that moment. Taking a few moments to just think and take a breath is a strategy that I will continue to use in the future.

Taking on a lifestyle challenge of turning off my bedroom lights had some rough patches along the way, but now reflecting back, I can see the benefits. The first benefit is that reducing the amount of electricity I use will help to lower our electricity bill. This is something that I can benefit from and so can my roommates, who I know love saving money anytime we can. Another benefit is that I have reduced my Ecological Footprint and have helped to make our world a better and cleaner place to live. This might not be something that I can literally see right now, but I know that these types of lifestyle changes can truly have a positive impact on our world. Behaviour change is not something that happens overnight, instead it takes practice and is something that can take up to 3 weeks to make a habit. Challenges can seem overwhelming at first, but I think that if you want to be successful you have to make a commitment to the challenge, be patient, and remember why you took the challenge in the first place.

My SMART goal has really turned into a new habit of mine, which is something I am absolutely going to keep on doing! It is something so simple, yet in the long run it is something that is huge when it comes to protecting our earth. We only have one beautiful earth and now seeing how I can make a lifestyle change, I want to challenge more behaviours of mine. One challenge at a time while taking steps towards a greener place to live!

Eco-Chic Lifestyle Change: Week 4 Update

My SMART goal is to turn of the lights in my bedroom every time I leave the room. This week I was successful 90% of the time. On Wednesday I was trying to pack, do laundry, and make dinner so for the two hours I was downstairs doing that, I left my light on.

This week I rarely had to think about turning off my lights, which means it is more of a habit for me now! My strategy has always been to just think before I leave my room. I'm sure unconsciously I still think about turning my lights off but it's awesome that I'm not having to remind myself about it all the time. The challenge that I faced this week was that when I got really busy and stressed, I forgot to turn off my lights. I think its natural to forget to do things when your stressed or running around but I'm going to try and slow things down, take a breath, and I hope that will help me remember everything I am supposed to be doing.

I felt successful again this week and happy that I was achieving my goal. When I forgot to turn of my light it made me feel more stressed. It was a feeling of like great, what else am I forgetting to do. Other then that one mishap I am excited that this is really turning into a habit!

What I learned this week is that even though I felt like it was a habit, I'm not quite there yet. During times when I am rushed and busy I need to just stop and think. I learned that it's ok to remind myself about my lights. I need to look at reminding myself as a positive instead of thinking about it as taking a step back.

Last week I challenged myself to turn off the power bar in my room whenever it is not being used. I had success with this, but I think it might be partly due to the fact that I was away from Thursday  to Sunday. On Monday when I was back home I left it on all day. Once I realized it was on, I turned it off and I was successful again on Tuesday.

This week I am going to stick with my SMART goal and I am going to keep the same challenge. I will be home this weekend which will allow me to really see how I do with turning off my power bar.

Eco-Chic Lifestyle Change:Week 3 Update

This week I did a much better job with my Eco-Chic lifestyle change goal. YAA!! My SMART goal is that over the next ten weeks, everyday I will turn off all the lights in my bedroom whenever it is not being used. Last week, as you read I had a few challenges and bumps along the way. This week I was perfect! Every time I left my room, the lights were turned off. I even got into such a routine of turning them off that even when I just went to the bathroom, which is only 5 steps away, I still turned them off!

This week my success outweighs my challenges. Although I was "perfect" there were still times when I left my room only to realize I left my light on. This week I realized I left it on just shortly after leaving my room (literally like 5 steps)! I would then just turn around and simply turn it off before leaving my room for an extended period of time. I think what helped me be successful this week was making it a habit. I didn't really PRACTICE turning my light off but repeatedly turning it off every time I left my room helped me make turning my lights off a a new habit of mine!

Even though turning off your lights might seem like a small accomplishment, I still felt like I was achieving something and it made me feel good! Last week I felt a bit of anger when I forgot to turn my lights off, but this week the anger was gone and I felt successful and happy every time I pulled the cord to turn off my lights. I didn't think that every time I left my room I would feel like I was succeeding because I had turned off my lights, but I did!

What I have learned this week is that doing something over and over again can really help make a life-style change a new habit. I also realized that this is something that I don't just want to change over the next ten weeks, but I want to make it something that I do for the rest of my life. Something so simple yet it has such great rewards with both saving money on the electrical bill and becoming more environmentally friendly.

Looking at my SMART goal and the success I had this week I want to continue to work on this goal and hopefully one day I won't even think of turning off my light as achieving a goal and get to the point where I don't even have to think about it. I also want to challenge myself more this week. I have a power bar in my room where I plug in my computer, cell phone, and table light. This week I want to turn off my power bar whenever it is not being used! Although sometimes my light isn't on, computer or cell phone isn't charging, the power bar is still on and is therefore still using electricity. This week I will continue to turn off my light whenever I leave my room, but will also turn off my power bar when it is not being used!

Eco-Chic Lifestyle Change: My SMART Goal

My Eco-Chic lifestyle change is going to focus on limiting my use of electricity. Being a college student we sometimes forget to turn things off, or don't realize how much energy some items use. There is also the  money issue that college students face, so why not save a few dollars while at the same time making the environment a cleaner place to live. 

My SMART goal is: Over the next ten weeks, everyday I will turn off all the lights in my bedroom whenever it is not being used.

This lifestyle change is eco-chic because turning off my lights can help save energy. When you leave your lights on when you are not in the room, energy is being wasted and this is harming our environment. The energy we use comes from somewhere like a power plant which releases large amounts of greenhouse gases. This small change can reduce your electric bill, energy usage, and shrink your carbon footprint! 

I chose this lifestyle change because I think it is something very attainable. When I started to think about what lifestyle change I was going to do, I realized I was sitting in my living room and almost every light in the house was on. It is a very small change and I think it can become a habit of mine... with some practice of course! If I can limit a small percentage of energy I use everyday, then I can reduce the amount of greenhouse gases that are released everyday into our environment. That reduction will brighten my day! 

Welcome to Adventures with Haley

Ryan's Falls in Switzerland

Hi, my name is Haley Irwin and I am a Community Health major at the University of Minnesota Duluth. I have created this blog to share some of the things I will learn in my environmental health class, but will also be focusing on saving energy! I will discuss different ways to save energy, lower your electric bill, and how this can affect our environment.

There are five possible types of posts on my blog. They include:

1. Advocacy Project
2. Eye Openers
3. Reflections
4. Eco-Chic Lifestyle Change
5. Share and Voice

If you notice at the bottom of this post, the categories will be listed as labels. This post has been labeled with all five kinds of posts. You will also see the number of each kind of post in my Labels Gadget at the top of the page. All post titles from now on will begin with one of the categories above. 

Here are the members of my web group: 

1. Nicole@Exploring The Environment
2. Alex@The Geyser of Johnson
3. Dr.V/Kristen@Enviro-surfing with Amy and Kristen 
4. Alina@Splashing Along the Shores with Alina

You can also follow my blog my clicking "Follow this Blog" in the gadget column. You can see my complete profile and all the blogs I am following by clicking on "See Complete Profile."

I hope you will enjoy my blog and learn about eco-friendly ideas as we go on this adventure together. The environment is ours to take care of and we can make a difference one light at a time!