Energy Savings

During our recent winter, a few close friends of mine, where left very frustrated due to continuous – and life disrupting- power failures. Most often on the very cold nights, they had to eat cold food (as even the take away restaurants in their area were effected. The reason being that we are living in a culture where we have not learned the value of saving this very scarce natural commodity – ENERGY.

Often in my life I do exactly the same. I use my physical and emotional energy at times that I can least afford it. I waste my most precious resource. I spend my time and energy fighting and debating issues that at that moment seems life-important to me, yet often, and in hindsight are insignificant issues.

So how do I flip the energy saving switch? How do I replace the 60watt light bulb with a energy-saving devise? How do I get into the habit of rather snuggling into a blanket vs. pulling the heater closer?

This is by no means a solution, but somewhere in my design I found a pause button, to create a stop-and-think moment. A moment to consult, to analyse to strategically plan, and then only to decide on an action. Yip I heard you, the fixer, taking time before jumping in, the boots and all, fools rush in where angels fear to tread, - person??? A couple of emotional-energy overload evenings, leaving me with cold food in front of a dead TV in a dark room, forced me to re-evaluate my own self-righteous wisdom, and do what I am taught every year in our long term planning at work. REDIRECT, DO IT DIFFERENTLY, CHALLENGE YOURSELF, TAKE THE RISK.

And then I thought – if I don’t do it differently, I might just end up with the same results as before, with cold food, in front of a dead TV, in a cold room, without any energy to spare for the really important stuff – like living life.