Living Green is Healthy!

I think it’s time that we draw a parallel between living a “healthy” life and living a “green life.” The fact of the matter is that the two kind of go hand-in-hand. Making greener choices in your everyday life has some positive health benefits, which I’d like to discuss here.

First, let’s look at one of the more common eco-friendly products: the reusable shopping bag. How could using reusable bags possible benefit our personal health? Believe it or not, it can. The more reusable bags that we use, the fewer plastic bags that we will need to manufacture. The manufacture of plastic and paper bags produces a number of toxins that work their ways in to our bodies as “free radicals.” Free radicals can build up in our bodies and can contribute to the onset of some serious health issues like cardiovascular disease, cancer, and a weakened immune system. So, the more reusable bags we use, the fewer free radicals that are produced and, as a result, work their way in to our bodies.

Plastic bags also have a negative impact on marine ecosystems, which can then impact other ecosystems, such as ours. Further, trees that could be used to produce oxygen and absorb greenhouse gasses are cut down to make paper bags instead.

Moving on, consider another popular green item: organic foods and products. Simply put, organic foods are much, much healthier for us to eat. Organically grown foods have been proven to contain more minerals and nutrients that our bodies need than conventionally grown foods. Non-organic foods are grown with pesticides, herbicides, growth hormones, and other chemicals that we then ingest when we eat the foods. These chemicals are not good for us. Further, the constant use of these chemicals on the soil breaks the soil down over time, rendering it useless after several years of farming.

A growing number of people are beginning to use eco-friendly household cleaners because of their environmental appeal. However, consider that these cleaners are also much better for your health – harsh chemicals commonly used contain free radicals that harm our bodies. These free radicals can be so harmful to our bodies that studies have proven that women who stay at home instead of work have a lower life expectancy.

One of the more obvious healthy-living and eco-friendly things that we can all begin doing is to rike our bike or walk instead of driving all the time. Although this is much more difficult for those of us that drive 40 miles a day, if you’re one of the many that works a mile or two from your house, you should consider walking a few days a week, at least.

The sedentary lives that most of us live contributes to the growing obesity problem in America. Walking or biking to school and/or work will go a long way in improving your personal health and breaking the sedentary lifestyle cycle. Additionally, it will reduce the amount of pollution that you generate, helping our planet at the same time.

So, you can see that green living and healthy living are not necessarily two different things. These facts and ideas only add to the allure of adopting an eco-friendly lifestyle (or a healthier lifestyle, or both) as we can now see that you can kill many birds with one stone by making some simple changes in your life.