While perusing Luther College's sustainability house blog a few weeks back, I came across a post called "A Week of Living Bravely" that caught my attention. Residents of the house had each chosen one thing they wanted to do to live more intentionally for the week. After talking about the idea, members of EcoHouse decided we wanted to try this experiment out for ourselves. So we did.
From Sunday, November 3rd to Sunday, November 10th, residents of EcoHouse embarked on our own "Be Brave Week," supporting each other throughout the week as we tried to minimize our impact on the environment, be more aware of ourselves and those around us, or just generally live more intentionally.
For residents of EcoHouse, Be Brave Week projects included taking one-minute showers, paying more attention to the news and politics, making more of an effort to connect with people on a daily basis, turning off cell phones, eating more intentionally (i.e. not eating dessert every day, just because it's there), and staying off the internet when inside the house.
The final idea on this list -- staying off the internet inside the house -- was my personal project. It definitely took some getting used to, and required some major lifestyle adjustments. I could no longer do most of my homework at home, since it required being online, so I'd have to get my work done earlier in the day. Likewise, I couldn't just wake up and do my online reading for class while curled up in bed, so I had to get up a little earlier, walk across campus, and do my reading in the library. In the end, the lifestyle adjustments (doing homework earlier on, waking up earlier, etc.) were totally worth it. I realized how much I had depended on my computer before and suddenly felt very free. I was no longer staring at a screen (bad for my eyes and my mental state) right before going to sleep and right when I woke up. Finally, I spent much less time on social media and really realized how much better my life is without it (and how much more free time I have!).
On Sunday the 10th, one week after we started our project, we met to share our experiences with one another. Every single person, to some extent, had faced some challenges throughout the project, but ultimately, everyone expressed that they appreciated taking time to reflect on (and reconsider) how they live their lives from day to day.
The week not only made us more aware of how our actions affect ourselves, others, and the environment, but brought us closer together as a community. I was asked several times throughout the week how my Be Brave Week project was going, which always started an interesting dialogue. We encouraged each other every day, and some people even decided to pick up on other people's projects. By the end of the week, I think it's safe to say we had all learned to live a bit more intentionally, in one small way or another.
-Adriana
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