When you think about caring for the environment in your own life, perhaps sacrifice and drudgery are some things you associate with that. Appeals to care for the environment can often seem like, “Don’t do the things you want, but instead be good for the sake of the planet.” If that is what caring for the environment is like, I probably wouldn’t be first in line for that myself! I think there is some good news however, and which seems to be at least somewhat of a secret: caring for the environment can make your own life better (not to mention that of others too).

In some ways, caring for the environment is perhaps a bit like exercise—it can take more effort than doing nothing, but you’ll probably be happier and healthier for it. Also, while there is a place for being an extreme athlete, as with exercise, you and the planet can probably get much of the benefit by doing just a moderate amount. Here are a few examples of how caring for the environment can be better for you:

• Getting food from a local farmer or your own garden is often fresher and tastes better, it may have been exposed to less chemicals, and it can be cheaper than the grocery store. Also, while more expensive, grass-fed or pasture-raised dairy, meat, and eggs usually taste better (at least to me), can be more nutritious, have probably been more humanely produced, and likely have a smaller environmental footprint.
• Making your house energy efficient can save you money on utilities while also making it more comfortable, such as by having good insulation that helps keep things warm or cold. 
• Not just personally, but even more broadly, businesses that evaluate and reduce their environmental footprint can actually do better (and be better to invest in). By improving their environmental performance, businesses can save money by becoming more efficient, they can better manage their risks connected to the environment, they can become more resilient by avoiding using unstable natural resources, and be better corporate citizens. For example, for a business that operates in a drought-prone region, evaluating and being efficient with its water use can help it save money and be more resilient if a drought occurs.    

Along with this notion that reducing your impact on the environment can be better for you, I’ve found a principle to help guide doing that in my own life: focus on easy things that have a larger impact over difficult ones with a small benefit. In other words, rather than straining out a gnat while swallowing a camel, first focus on the camels. (Or, for fans of economics, you could call this keeping marginal costs low and marginal benefits high.) Not only do these easy things help the planet, in my experience I’ve found they seem to always have more personal benefits than costs too. For example, there was a period when it was easy for me to commute by bike instead of car which was better for the planet but also was actually quicker, kept me from paying for parking, gave me some exercise, and reduced my car expenses. In contrast, while I could swear off driving entirely to not burn any gasoline, doing so would have a high personal cost but the benefit to the environment would probably be incommensurately small. 

If everyone did things that were easy for themselves but helpful to the planet, my hunch is most environmental problems in our world would become much more manageable while we and our neighbors would live better lives. Along these lines, up next, I hope to talk about one of the most important things you can do for the environment—and which also happens to be relatively easy!