EnviroHumanImpact

Recurring themes found in many articles here on EnviroHumanImpact include improving one’s envirohuman impact and seeing improvements in one’s health, having fun, and saving money. Obviously, those are great benefits for a little bit of effort. Often, the time and effort spent on being greener is not added to your life, but rather moved from one aspect to another. As you green your life, as I have found, you’ll find yourself in social settings due to being green and it just becomes part of you lifestyle.

We have not discussed very much the psychological effects of living a greener life. I am no psychologist (psychology was my supporting coursework for my degree in political science–as if you care) and I won’t search for the technical term for this phenomenon — I have long forgotten many of the names psychologists attach to these different feelings. In fact, there may not be a name yet for this phenomenon.

We can actually make our own term here and call it “envirophoria,” a state of well-being or happiness due to one’s improvement of the environment directly or improving one’s envirohuman impact as a means of reducing negative impact on the environment at large.

Great! I like naming phenomena like this. I truly feel better about my life when I do something positive for the environment. When I do something that I know harms the environment, I experience a feeling of eco-sin, a desire to improve my personal envirohuman impact.

And now, I have a name for that good feeling I have when I pollute less. Feeling cheesy? It’s okay. EHI needs a little cheese on top.

Beside the improvement of one’s health, saving money, you can add to the list of life improvement due to a greener lifestyle, envirophoria, that good, green feeling you get for doing what’s right. Soon we’ll talk about why we experience envirophoria and how to share that with others. Only a little bit more cheese, I promise.

So get started today! Want to feel better about your daily life? Need a little envirophoria? Take a look at the Greener Under Twenty Series.

Show us your inner Mr. Rogers: Tell us how you feel when you do something green. What did you change to be greener and how does it make you feel?

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