Together We Can Save The World

Today whilst driving to my yoga lesson, I found myself held up by a slow-moving truck. As I looked up to process the truck in more detail, I saw countless chickens staring back at me. The cages were stacked on top of each other and side by side filling the whole truck. There were hundreds of the poor things sitting there, all squashed in with barely space for them to breathe.

As I continued behind this truck I found myself distracted, thinking about the chickens. At first I acknowledged that, at least the truck was driving slowly, taking care because chickens were on board. But then it dawned on me that these chickens were probably being taken to slaughter. My heart sank. The thought troubled me and I felt like I wanted to help the chickens. I wanted to stop the truck, open the cages and set them free. But instead, I sat there powerless. And as I came to a roundabout, the truck drove off in one direction and I in the other.

Thoughts of the chickens have stayed with me. Hundreds of thousands of chickens get slaughtered every day. They haven't done anything to deserve it. It just breaks my heart.

I don't eat chicken. Or any other meat. Or fish. It hasn't always been the case. Whilst I was a vegetarian as a teenager and should have stayed true to my intuition, I did return to eating meat for many years. But one day, I just couldn't do it anymore. One day I decided that nothing needs to die for me to live.

I've heard the arguments of evolution, nature's cycle of the food chain and was even fooled for a while believing we were doing them a favour by 'giving them life' because they wouldn't come here otherwise. But the conditions that most of these animals are kept in is appalling. It's not a life. They are not living. Some animals in animal agriculture never see sunlight. Some only get to live outside but have their heads stuck between bars and can barely move. It's all about cost saving at the animal’s expense.

Whilst I admit, I am wholeheartedly an animal lover and I don't believe they should be born into this world unless it is to live a fulfilled life, there are now many other reasons being revealed as to why eating both meat and fish everyday doesn't work! Consumption of meat has been linked to Cancer, the carbon footprint of animal agriculture is hugely responsible for destroying our planet and our oceans are emptying out, hugely impacting the ecosystem. 

For more info, please visit www.cowspiracy.com

There are also several documentaries that you can watch to better educate yourself such as Earthlings, Cowspiracy, Meat the Truth, Forks Over Knives, Food That Kills, The End of The Line, Sea The Truth, Shark Water and more.

You don't have to stop eating meat to make a difference. Whilst this is the ideal solution to the problem, there are a lot of meat lovers out there that cannot bare the thought of not eating meat. But, simply by reducing your meat consumption, you will make a difference to both your health and the health of the planet. One veggie day a week is all it takes. And, you can support projects such as Supermeat who are working to produce meat without killing animals! In addition, by eating Organic meat, you are supporting animals to live better quality lives.

Together, we are much louder, together, we are much stronger, together, we can change the world!

In honour of the beautiful chickens being slaughtered tonight, I'm so sorry I couldn't save you but I hope writing this post may help your cause. 💜

Celebrate Every Single Day

We often live for the future. And sometime we spend time thinking about the past. But how often do you find yourself living within the present? Reflect on your own life (visions of the past spring to mind) and consider if you have been and are living your life in the present and enjoying each passing moment.

The world is made up of many different characters with different viewpoints, perspectives and outlooks. And some I struggle to understand. I hear people around me pass comments such as "I don't want a fuss for my birthday" or "let's not bother with presents anymore", " Chrismas is off this year", "Holidays are a waste of money".

Now, it's true that our lives can become one long whirl of never-ending events. Birthdays, Anniversaries and Cultural Celebrations fill up the annual calendar and before we know it, the year has passed us by and we begin the same circuit all over again. It can get tiresome and sometimes seem pointless.

But stop for a minute and think about what you are doing here on this earth. I can guess your answer, because we're all in the same situation. We don't really know! However, what we do know is that one day it will end. So, I fail to understand why such people are not willing to make the very most of their lives. None of us know how much time we have left.

Every single day should be a celebration. I'm sure if you think about it, you can find something each and everyday that you can be happy about. Something to get excited about. And if you can't, then find something. I get excited everyday about my first cup of tea of the day. And that's just to start, but it's an example. I look forward to drinking my tea and I am grateful whilst drinking my tea. I live happily in my moment of tea drinking. What do you enjoy?

Every action you take is your choice and you don't have to enjoy the journey if you don't want to. It's your life! But what do you achieve out of not bothering? How fulfilled do you feel now and how fulfilled will you feel when you're knocking on heaven's door?

If today were your last day on this earth, would you have any regrets? Are there places you want to go? Goals you want to achieve? Have you been procrastinating?

We don't know if any of us are coming back to this earthship, so let's not waste our opportunity to make the most of our time here. Go everywhere, do everything, make it affordable, stop procrastinating, be present in every moment and celebrate every single day!

Embracing Change

Four months ago, we faced the challenge of an international move. I wasn't unhappy where we lived before. I loved our house, I loved the views and all things were in place so that our life moved along smoothly. We had favourite restaurants, classes we attended and local businesses we were loyal to because we liked the way they cut our hair or sold the products we like to buy.

So to give up a happy life was not particularly an easy thing to do. However, we are adventurous souls and the idea of exploring somewhere new was too tempting for us and so we chose to take on the challenge.

After arriving, we took on a property that was the best of a bad bunch available at the time. Then 2 days after moving in, the landladies (2 sisters) decided to increase the rent by an additional 25%! We had a contract but with being in an unfamiliar country and also finding out that the landladies lived one on top of the other in a building opposite the property, we felt we had no choice but to give in to their demands.

The property itself was in a concrete jungle. It had no views. The garden was an internal courtyard and not a bush could be seen in the street outside. My poor cats were devastated. Where would they roam?

Now, you're probably wondering how this negative background information could possibly empower you to embrace change. But I tell you all this so that you can have an understanding on where my mindset was heading. Our exciting adventure had turned into living in a concrete city with no good places to walk our dogs, nowhere for our cats to explore, no views and no idea about where to eat, where to buy things or who to trust.

I cried.

I needed to try to keep myself together, I had a young child who was looking up to me and who was also experiencing a whole world of change. But when she would head to bed at night and my husband returned from work, he would ask me how my day was and I would cry.

Now, I'm a fighter. I do not welcome bad luck. Bad things do not happen to me, they are merely challenges that need solutions. So, I kept myself and my little girl busy by signing us up for every type of class I could find and then gave myself a break by signing myself up for a weekly yoga class. We started to meet people and friendships began. And in the meantime, I searched and searched and searched every property I could find that might possibly make my family, myself and my furries all happy. And eventually we got there!

We have now moved into an amazing family home. I have my views back. My Pets are happy again. And we are learning our way around. Giving up wasn't an option. And accepting unhappiness wasn't an option either.

Change is daunting. But so too is the thought of a life that is exactly the same every-day, every-year. 

Our lives should always be moving forwards,

and never backwards.

If there was one thing in your life that you could change, what would it be? And what is it that you would need to do to implement that change? What solution can you come up with to fix this one particular challenge? 

I invite you to move your life forwards and embrace change.