So many of us feel down deep inside that our current lifestyles are not just “missing” something but actually in some way have “too much” but don’t know what to do about it. And that frustrates us. The rise in popularity of footprint surveys and rating systems point to this, 'am I good enough?' phenomenon.

Often these things do little more than tell us that we are in some way “NOT GOOD” and how can that be true? In even looking aren’t we making some effort to “be good”? So I don’t promote the very idea of footprint rating. It is too external and it judges people too arbitrarily against some fictional perfect person.

So what do I propose? I say “ONE LIGHT BULB” that’s right, one light bulb because that is making a difference, and every last one of us reading this can do it. Next time you are out at the store, go ahead and get a CFL replacement lamp. Bring it home and plug it in. Now some will say that I just told them to take out a working incandescent and waste it. Not so. Put that old, but still working lamp back where you store new lamps, sooner or later you will still need it to temporarily replace some other bulb that burns out. But maybe you could write a note to yourself and wrap that note around the lamp. Remind yourself that you want to pick up another CFL next time you go to the store, eventually you will have changed out all the old less efficient lamps and you can recycle the paper you wrote that note that you keep wrapping the old bulbs in.

Now, It is true that most of us can nearly as easily make bigger changes than “ONE LIGHT BULB” and if that is you go ahead and take this as a challenge. But if “One Light BULB” is the start you need, GOOD FOR YOU FOR STARTING!