“Life’s hard enough”

A conversation I had with a friend recently—actually it could be many conversations over the years—tells me we’re just lazy…

I mentioned how I encourage clients to opt for climate conscious options over more convenient ones, and his reply was “eh, just go with the easiest option, why make it harder right? Life’s hard enough as it is”.

Is it?

I think we’re pretty lucky actually.

What’s the hard stuff we’re complaining about, all the options we have to choose from? All the space we have in our homes that need to be filled with things? All the vehicles we own that are just “money pits”?

We can always find something to complain about… and certainly not denying that life is genuinely hard for many people. But for those of us with options and the ability to apply some perspective, it’s not hard to see that life really isn’t as hard as it could be.

The cheapest clothing option is almost always made by people in poor working conditions – I’d say their life is harder than mine.

The bank with the most money held, most presence on tv and in advertising, and that has ingrained itself into our minds since we were kids with dollarmite accounts, is also the biggest supporter of climate damaging projects in Australia. There are almost 100 banks in Australia, life’s not so hard that I can’t look for a better option to move my own money to.

New electronic device options are endless, and makers are only just starting to wake up to the idea of repairability instead of replacement. Whereas refurbished devices often come with comparable warranties to new devices and work just as well (speaking from years of experience, although I’m just one data point).

Climate positive options are certainly less convenient than others in many cases.

And life sure can be hard sometimes, not denying that.

But to use that as an excuse to be lazy is kind of… inexcusable, really.