Matt Golden

Moving onto the third week of the eco-challenge, I wanted to move away from challenges that put me outside and focus on educating myself about environmental challenges and making myself a better person to those around me. For this week, I selected helping others and reduce single use disposables for my daily actions. Helping Others I found to be quite easy once you wrap your mind around the concept of trying to find a friend in need. While some of my helping includes driving my friends downhill or giving them advice, I do have one example that I'm more proud of. One of my friends was having a rough evening and needed someone to talk to. It was after 3 am and I was really exhausted, but I knew that she could really use my advice, so I decided to stay up and talk it out. We wound up having a great conversation that I never would've initiated if my intention was not to help her through her dilemma, So having this challenge in mind really helped me get the most out of the moment, and do all I could to make sure she was feeling ok. Reducing single use disposables has been a fun one for me, as there's so many items I use in my daily routine that only gets used once before going into the garbage. While it's easy to avoid obvious items like packaging, doing this challenge has made me think of all the little things we use with no disdain for the environment. In fact, starting up this challenge inspired me to get a recyclable toothbrush and composter for my room at college. Also this challenge has also demonstrated to me the inefficiencies of recycling, as much of what we hope to be recycled never makes it. Finally, my one time action for the week was learn about trans, femme and nonbinary experiences. For me, I knew it was a topic I needed to inform myself better on, as its something I can't relate to the experience. I watched this one documentary on youtube that discussed the non-binary spectrum and what it means to not identify as either gender. Watching the documentary, I was put in my feels for a moment, when it brought up this one young kid who ended their life after being bullied for wearing a dress to a school field trip. I think it is such a tragedy when our children have to suffer from the ignorance of generations past. So I'm glad I took the time this week to educate myself more on this topic, and hope to one day break the generational curse permanently on gender & sexuality for my children's generation. 

For my daily challenges for this week, I wanted to expand on the notion of me spending more time in nature and wanted to choose challenges that stimulated me to become a better person. The two challenges I went with this week were watch the sunrise/sunset and keeping a journal and writing down 3 things that made you happy over the course of a day. I also included walking 1 mile every day and spending time outdoors as options to help balance out my week as a whole. With regard to watching the sunrise/sunset, this is one of my favorite things I've started this year and I feel its regimented my sleep schedule and motivates me to do my very best work while I can. Beyond just that, experiencing the sunrise and seeing the sky turn from pure black into an array of color is an experience that I never would've made part of my daily routine if it weren't for this challenge. Although consistency with this one is tricky, it is a challenge I am so grateful I started doing this week. The second challenge has been a lot easier and has made me frame things in a much more optimistic light. I've noticed that not only writing down the 3 things has not only made me feel better about my daily accomplishments, it really has put in perspective what I value most about myself and given me a sense of my growth on a interpersonal level. Like I find it really fascinating what each individual puts their value on, and having a daily log of my 3 daily accomplishments really puts your values in check and on display. For example, I never would've said I'm a fitness buff or anything off the top of my head to someone, but to see the common theme of my daily workouts making the top 3 shows me that I put great value into staying in shape. Finally, my new one time challenges for this week were Ride Share and Support Pollution Reduction. These two seemed like no-brainers to me, as they are both ideals I already try to follow. For ride share, I have carpooled extensively this week to and from my classes and avoided going on the road whenever possible. It isn't the most conducive of campuses to start this challenge, but I wanted to implement this routine into my mindset, as I believe ride share can really add up over a lifetime. For Support Pollution Reduction, I actually wanted to get the opinion of a peer on climate action, so I talked to my friend from Penn State who is a bio major currently working on a thesis paper for using algae as a renewable energy. We talked for 25 min over zoom, where I basically got to ask her about the work she was doing, the current state of the environment in PA specifically and what more I can do on campus to help. While our talk gave me a lot of anxiety for the future of our planet, it gave me a lot of hope in the sense that at least our generation is fully aware of the strife laying ahead for us. Speaking with her has gotten me inspired to help preserve wildlife in PA and try to find new & creative ways to volunteer. 

For the first week of our eco-challenge, I decided to go with two daily challenges that I’ve been personally meaning to get around to: Meditate and Power down my Computer. The first one I chose because it is something that I do practice but not in routine daily, but more as when I feel I’m in the need to clear my mindset and not in flux. I like the idea of setting a set amount of time into meditation each day, as I’ve noticed doing it right before bed has really helped me really find my center and have the soundest nights of sleep. My biggest challenge with this task is trying to stay within a set amount of time in meditation, as I can often find myself getting carried away in deep contemplation.  I kind of have the opposite problem here, where I have my routine, visualizations, breathing work, etc in lock, I just need to work on becoming more “efficient” with guiding my own meditation. When it comes to the second challenge of the week, this is something I’ve been meaning to do myself, but never had the initiative or push to really consider making it part of my daily routine. I’m really a big believer in the one drop in the bucket mentality, in the sense that incremental drops will fill that bucket over time regardless. So for us to power down our electronic devices when they’re not in use, can really add up over a lifetime in energy saved. This challenge has been easy for me, as I usually try to turn off all my devices completely before bed.  I’ve noticed it has also made me more aware of all the energy I’ve been wasting, as I’ve been trying to power down any lights I have hanging, speakers I might’ve left plugged in or any other devices when I leave a room. 

 

For my one time action, I chose to explore my area further. I really enjoyed this challenge, because it really aligns with another challenge I’ve been eyeing for this upcoming week: waking up for the sunrise. On Saturday, I felt the draw to wake up nice and early for the sunrise and go for a run. This time, I didn’t go my usual route and instead wanted to do something a little different, so I took an old beaten path off campus and decided to run towards Amish country. It wasn’t long after I crossed the main interstate that I found myself in an area completely foreign to me. It was around Mazeppa area, where it turns to farmland over these beautiful rolling hills. Quickly I found myself completely secluded in cornfield, just taking in the beauty around me. For context, I grew up right outside of New York City, so any moment alone in silence can be a blessing and a half. In fact, I came to this school to get away from the noise of it all and get to experience what the other side is like out here. While I have spent extensive time hiking on wilderness trails during my time at college, this was the first time I ever got to see what life outside of Lewisburg is like in farm country in such a direct way.