Retrain your Brain to Sustain

Shannon Feerrar
When contemplating what topic to do for my second artifact, I seemed to jump back and
forth between a number of different topics that I was really interested in. All were fairly new
topics and I really just wanted to learn more and educate others. After taking some time to hear
others and their topics during the collaboration session, one student had mentioned using her
background to look deeper into her topic of choice. Now having a starting point, my background
in Psychology, I needed to choose a topic that was going to make me look further into
sustainability. One of the first post I had posted during the first week, I mentioned not being too
familiar with sustainability and knew I had bad habits that would be hard to kick, I had to take
steps to unlearn my habits and slowly work towards living a life that is encouraging
sustainability.
Putting both these ideas together, I had decided on looking at the concept of the
psychology of sustainability. Why do we continue to live in a way that does not promote
sustainability, when we really know how we should really be living? Why is it so hard to break
our bad habits? What techniques can we use to unlearn our bad habits? Do we even know our
actions are bad habits? Through my artifact, I have found articles that explain the thinking of the
psychology of sustainability, sites that promote identifying unsustainable living and unlearning
bad habit techniques, pictures and music that I feel express unlearning bad habits and promote
thinking green. As I ask myself the question of how do I unlearn my bad habits, I encourage you
to take the time to look into your own life and chose to make a change. Retrain your brain to
sustain!

The pictures I chose are very simple and straightforward in my eyes. The first is a picture
of a road sign found on http://www.jonathandoyle.co/changing-habits-episode-1/, one labeled old
ways and pointing towards the left and the other sign pointing the opposite way and labeled new
ways (2013). What direction do we want to go in, I want to make a change, once I turn down that
road of change, I cant make a U-turn to go back.
When it comes to thinking green, I found a picture of Zazen at http://en.wikipedia.org/
wiki/Zazen#/media/File:The_Thinker,_Rodin.jpg. Having seen pictures of this monument before,
I feel that it is a universal pose people use for thinking. This lighting of this photo makes the
statue to appear as a green color. When I look at this, it makes me think, think green.
Simran Sethi presents a video presentation of, Its all in our Heads- The Psychology of
Sustainability (2013). She expresses the idea that research does not motivate us enough to make
a change, even though it teaches us what we are doing and should do to make a difference, but it
is current events and stories that motivate us to make the change (2013). How true, it seems to
take a significant event for us to try and make a change. Unfortunately this stands true in many
situations not just sustainability.
A musical piece that I am very familiar with, but has a totally different meaning than
currently relating it to is, The Divine Comedy (Smith, Robert W.). When listening to the three
movements on http://jksmusic.com/music/mb-arr/index.php?musicID=139, I think of the feelings
we feel when trying to break a bad habit. Movement one is full of ups and downs, the way it is
for us when we attempt to break bad habits but may not completely put forth our best effort.
Some days are good we refrain from our bad habits, the next we go back to the bad habit, a cycle
that continues. When listening to the second movement, it exudes our feeling of frustration when
we so badly want to go back to our bad habits. The first and second movements and their

intensity could also express the strain we are putting on the Earth with this bad habit. The third
movement, sounds as if there is relief. Relief that we have finally broken our bad habit and that
the Earth is feeling the relief of our small step to change!
A great article I found, The Psychology of Sustainable Behavior by Christie Manning,
looks into why we tend to make bad decisions and what we can do to promote good decision
about sustainability. The article uses research to explain the reasoning behind our thinking and
prove that their tips can make a difference in our lives. (2009)
Last, I found a sites, one that shares the top 10 daily habits that are killing our
environment (2013). How many of these bad habits am I exhibiting? How many other people are
doing the same? Although small bad habits to some, they are contributing bad habits. These 10
daily habits are a great way to start making a change.
Train your brain to start changing small bad habits, start thinking to sustain. One habit at
a time will increase your confidence and allow you to challenge yourself to make bigger changes
for the positive!
References
Doyle, Jonathan. June, 2013. Changing Habits-Episode 1. Retrieved on May 3, 2015 from,
http://www.jonathandoyle.co/changing-habits-episode-1/.
Lights, Zion. September, 2013. 10 daily habits that are killing the environment. Retrieved on
May 3, 2015 from http://www.onegreenplanet.org/lifestyle/10-daily-habits-that-arekilling-the-environment/.
Manning, Christie. September 2009. The Psychology of Sustainable Behavior. The Retrieved on
May 3, 2015 from,
http://www.pca.state.mn.us/index.php/viewdocument.html?gid=12949.
Sethi, Simran. February, 2013. Its All in Our Heads- Psychology of Sustainability. Retrieved on

May 3, 2015 from,

http://www.greenbiz.com/video/2013/03/07/its-all-our-headspsychology-sustainability.
Smith, Robert W. The Divine Comedy. Retrieved May 3, 2015 from,
http://jksmusic.com/music/mb- arr/index.php?musicID=139.
Wikipedia. Zazen. Retrieved on May 3, 2015 from, http://en.wikipedia.org/.
wiki/Zazen#/media/File:The_Thinker,_Rodin.jpg.