{"id":156333,"date":"2010-01-08T18:49:59","date_gmt":"2010-01-08T23:49:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.blisstree.com\/?p=138495"},"modified":"2010-01-08T18:49:59","modified_gmt":"2010-01-08T23:49:59","slug":"are-you-a-guilty-green-woman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/156333","title":{"rendered":"Are you a guilty green woman?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>According to some research women are more inclined to <a href=\"http:\/\/content.usatoday.com\/communities\/greenhouse\/post\/2009\/12\/going-green-women-show-more-eco-guilt-in-new-years-resolutions\/1\">feel guilt<\/a> when they fail at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.blisstree.com\/articles\/ten-steps-to-green-living\/\">green living<\/a> than their male counterparts. It&#8217;s not a huge surprise. Women pop up all the time in studies about guilt. Women seem to feel guilty about everything at a stronger level than men; baby raising, parenting in general, weight issues, childcare while working, keeping a clean house, and more. Research and the people around me point to women being super guilt ridden, or at least more so than the fellas.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-138501\" src=\"http:\/\/images1.blisstree.com\/files\/2010\/01\/feeling-green-guilt.jpg\" alt=\"feeling green guilt\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" \/><\/p>\n<p>But should you be guilty? I think not, and here&#8217;s why&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>Research also shows that women are more likely to make <a href=\"http:\/\/3blmedia.com\/theCSRfeed\/Nationwide-Survey-Finds-Americans-Committed-Greening-New-Year\">green living resolutions<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.treehugger.com\/files\/2009\/11\/women-greener-than-men.php\">women are greener<\/a> in general with the choices they make so it&#8217;s not like we&#8217;re doing too shabby.<\/p>\n<p>More importantly, green guilt accomplishes nothing. In fact, I&#8217;d wager that green guilt hampers vs. helps you when it comes to living green. Too much guilt over things you can&#8217;t change or guilt over the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.focusonthefamily.com\/lifechallenges\/emotional_health\/living_without_constant_guilt\/healthy_guilt_vs_false_and_harmful_guilt.aspx\">fear of disapproval<\/a> is not healthy. People who continually feel guilt <a href=\"http:\/\/www.webmd.com\/balance\/features\/is-guilt-getting-best-of-you\">also feel more stress<\/a> which makes focusing on green actions harder not easier.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Do I have green guilt? <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Not really, mainly because I&#8217;m not up for the stress. I know I&#8217;m bad with some <a href=\"http:\/\/www.blisstree.com\/treehuggingfamily\/seven-evil-ways-i-harm-the-planet\/\">green living issues<\/a> &#8211; I&#8217;ll admit it. However, one, I can&#8217;t do everything. No one can accomplish 100% perfect green living &#8211; not unless you&#8217;re living in some cave far away from everyone and everything and even then, simply by being born you mess with the structure and resources of the planet, so it&#8217;s literally impossible. Secondly, I know I&#8217;m very skilled with some green living skills, as I&#8217;m sure you are. Thirdly, I realistically add new green goals to my life periodically with the plan that if they work out cool but if not I can always try again.<\/p>\n<p><strong>How to banish green guilt: <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Focus on what you are doing well &#8211; even the small stuff. If you recycle all the time then you&#8217;re already doing a lot more than tons of other people. If you carry a reusable water bag or reusable grocery bags that&#8217;s a huge step over one lifetime that saves untold resources.<\/p>\n<p>Ignore the perfect tree huggers you meet. As noted above there is no such thing as living perfectly green, but to hear some people talk you&#8217;d think so. I&#8217;ve met my fair share of holier than thou green folks and they&#8217;re obnoxious for sure, but not perfect. Don&#8217;t let other people make you feel bad. In reality they likely feel guilty themselves and putting you down makes them feel more adequate.<\/p>\n<p>Make reasonable green goals. If you&#8217;re new to green living then goals like &#8220;<em>I&#8217;m going to bike everywhere, eat 100% organic, and build my own solar panels<\/em>&#8221; are way overambitious, and not even necessary. Better, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.blisstree.com\/articles\/simple-green-steps-for-the-new-year\/\">smaller green goals<\/a> would be, &#8220;<em>I&#8217;m always going to buy at least milk and apples in organic form<\/em>&#8221; or &#8220;<em>I&#8217;ll try to buy less prepackaged foods<\/em>&#8221; or even, &#8220;<em>I&#8217;ll start cleaning with green cleaners<\/em>.&#8221; These are doable, and as you accomplish easy goals you&#8217;ll feel better prepared to manage the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.blisstree.com\/articles\/three-big-green-new-years-resolutions\/\">large goals<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Do you feel green guilt? What about?<\/p>\n<p>[image via stock.xchng]<\/p>\n<p>Post from: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.blisstree.com\">Blisstree<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.blisstree.com\/articles\/are-you-a-guilty-green-woman\/\">Are you a guilty green woman?<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>According to some research women are more inclined to feel guilt when they fail at green living than their male counterparts. It&#8217;s not a huge surprise. Women pop up all the time in studies about guilt. Women seem to feel guilty about everything at a stronger level than men; baby raising, parenting in general, weight [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":141,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-156333","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156333","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/141"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=156333"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156333\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=156333"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=156333"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=156333"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}