After giving up the consumer lifestyle, Tafline reflects on how her Christmas list has evolved. It might not be what you’d expect.
In four years, I turned my habits around completely: instead of buying the newest, snazziest jeans, I’ve been wearing the same clothes for nearly two years. And if I must get more, I buy groovy secondhand clothes or have a seamstress or tailor whip up something local. It used to be that I’d buy another fancy bottle of shampoo or lotion, not even the chemical-free variety, before finishing what was clogging up the cupboard. Not anymore. Now I scrape the toothpaste tube before buying another.
For two years, I drove more than 150 miles almost every day, sending all kinds of carbon into the atmosphere, but these days I walk or take a bus. Meat no longer features in my diet at all. And the truth is, I’m happier. My friends have more respect for me, my self-worth comes from my relationships with people rather than things, and the daily guilt surrounding my wasteful choices has vanished. Based on what I have learned, here is my Christmas wish list for all of humanity.
The concept is Hollywood-esque: An unknown event has devastated Earth’s biosphere, causing a radiation storm that is rapidly driving all biological life on the planet to extinction. 
Environmental factors can change the genes of a fetus, leading to illness later in childhood. 
The Arava Institue works with Palestinians and Israelis to cooperatively solve the region’s environmental challenges
