When someone dropped off this cut-up tube for TerraCycle the other week, I felt like pinning it up to the bulletin board with a gold star! Not because it's exceptionally artistic but because I think it has a couple things to teach us about the process of living a more sustainable lifestyle.
The first is: Use up what you've got.
We are not about suggesting you go buy a whole bunch of eco-friendly products all at once. If you have ziplock baggies around, you probably don't need to buy those silicone ones. Just wash and reuse instead of throwing them away. If you (like me) bought a whole bunch of deodorant before the pandemic, then switched to working from home and now own a decade's supply—keep using it if you still like it! But as you use up your old stuff—the cotton balls or paper towels or plastic plates or toothpaste—think about what you could use instead. And be prepared to make the switch when the old stuff is gone.
Which brings us to the second lesson from the cut-up tube: To figure out what to do next, look around to see what's possible. Rethink your habits, watch what others are doing, and take good ideas wherever you find them.
I grew up learning to squeeze the daylights out of the toothpaste tube to get as much out as possible. But it wasn't until I was an adult that I learned you could cut the thing in half and get out even more! I'm sure I didn't realize that on my own. I must have seen someone else do it or found the idea online. There are so many things we don't even think to do until we see that they can be done—which is one big theme here at Full Circle. Part of why we exist is to show people what's possible. People (and companies and governments) can't make changes until they know what alternatives exist!
So take a look at your habits or your products, see where you might want to make changes, then look around to find the alternatives. Ask your friends, ask the internet, ask someone born before the ubiquity of plastic, or ask us if you need inspiration! There's a community of others out there who wash, reuse, mend, repurpose, make do, cut their toothpaste tubes, and just generally think outside the box. Find them, befriend them, and take their ideas with you!
