Since coming to Penn State, I have tried very hard to decrease my impact upon the environment, especially the amount of trash I throw away. In many ways it was more difficult to reduce my waste at school, because I found myself buying more packaged food for eating on the go, but in many ways it became easier. I found that I had much more control over my waste because there were so many options for recycling and composting. I began to wonder if I could keep better track of what I was throwing away. I then remembered watching a video on YouTube probably a year ago about a woman who hadn’t thrown anything away in four years. By collecting all of her trash in a mason jar and recycling, composting, and not buying what she couldn’t, Lauren Singer was able to live a zero-waste lifestyle. Here is the video in which she goes through the contents of her jar:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OuABgFsv5pw
I figured that I might as well try the same thing, if not permanently then as a sort of experiment. I had two small glass jars that I got from my mom and was determined to try my hardest to throw nothing into the landfill-bound trash can. In reality, attempting to go zero-waste was more of a challenge than simply an experiment.
I found some of the biggest challenges to be centered around food. It was easy to buy items and use a reusable bag to carry them, but some of the food I bought was not packaged in recyclable materials. This was both good and bad. Bad, because I would have to take up room in my jar to dispose of the packaging, but good because I was less inclined to eat the packaged food, which was usually heavily processed. I found myself eating more and more at the dining hall too, rather than taking my food to-go, in which case it would come packaged in Styrofoam which is not recyclable. Eating out was also difficult because not finishing my food meant that it was likely going in the trash, not the compost. However, most of the trash I did have that was unable to be recycled was small enough to fit in my jar.
I made it an entire month. For one month I obsessed over what I consumed and what I got rid of, and I learned a lot from it. One negative outcome of my experiment was that afterwards, though I was letting myself throw away trash, I felt really bad about it. It often gave me anxiety to actually throw something away for a while. It did, however, teach me how to be mindful of what I bought, used, and threw away. Though I am no longer restricting my waste as much as I did, I have been able to reduce my waste just from paying attention to it. I highly recommend challenging yourself to being zero-waste for awhile to see your own impact on the earth.
Here is my jar!