a zero
waste life
in thirty days
anita vandyke
A Zero Waste Life: In Thirty Days
First printed in the United States of America in 2020.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be sent by email to Apollo Publishers at [email protected].
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.
Text copyright © Anita Vandyke, 2018.
Cover, interior design, and interior line drawings © Louisa Maggio, 2018.
Interior watercolor illustrations © Melissa Stefanovski, 2018.
Cover illustration by kirpmun/Shutterstock.
Hand-drawn lines by Marie Smolej/Shutterstock.
Author image by Joi Ong.
First published by Vintage Australia. This edition published by arrangement with Penguin Random House Australia Pty Ltd. Licensed by arrangement with Rights People, London.
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
Print ISBN: 978-1-948062-60-2
Ebook ISBN: 978-1-948062-61-9
Published in compliance with California’s Proposition 65.
The wood used to produce this book is from Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified
forests, recycled material, or controlled wood. Controlled wood cannot be:
• illegally harvested
• harvested in violation of traditional and civil rights
• harvested in forests where high conservation values are threatened
• harvested in forests being converted to plantations or non-forest use
• harvested in forests where genetically modified trees are planted
contents
Day 4 compost, compost, compost
Day 5 put yourself on a spending ban
Day 6 do your first zero waste shop
Day 7 make your first zero waste meal
Day 8 prevent food waste
Day 9 declutter your home
Day 10 organize a “project pan”
Day 11 make your own beauty products
Day 12 make your own cleaning products
Day 13 shop your wardrobe
Day 14 make secondhand your first choice
Day 15 declutter your home
reflect & review
Day 16 give yourself a green prescription
Day 17 buy real food
Day 18 eat less meat
Day 19 learn to embrace minimalism
Day 20 spread the word
Day 21 declutter your mind
Day 22 make do and mend
Day 23 value experiences over stuff
Day 24 vote with your dollar
Day 25 be of service
Day 26 dispose of items mindfully
Day 27 create not consume
Day 28 maintaining minimalism
Day 29 get involved!
Day 30 rest and review
conclusion
references
acknowledgments
To my family,
who taught me to not waste my life.
introduction
This book is a practical guide designed to help you reduce your waste by 80% in thirty days. It’s also a reflection on how I became an accidental environmentalist. It tells the story of how I went from being a maximalist to a minimalist, from “hero” to zero—to living a “zero waste” life.
I didn’t grow up with a hippie mother or a passion for the environment, I was just a person trying to find happiness in all the usual places—money, power and status. But this triumvirate of success didn’t provide me with the happiness that I expected. I was wasting my life.
But how did this journey all begin? What is living a zero waste life? I’ll start from the beginning. My “aha moment” as Oprah calls it.
It all started with a simple no. Standing at the supermarket checkout, the cashier looked at me and asked, “Would you like a plastic bag for that? It’ll be an extra 15 cents.” A plastic bag for 15 cents? Sounded like extortion to me. I had just quit my job the previous day and I needed to make ends meet on one income. That first no, based on economics rather than environmentalism, was over two years ago, and since that day I’ve said no to plastic bags over a thousand times. I’ve also said no to disposable coffee cups, fast fashion and excess consumerism. And in saying no to all this, I’ve actually said yes to a whole new life. That first no led me to a zero waste life.
How did I end up here? I thought, while crying at a dining table surrounded by my mother-in-law’s Royal Doulton porcelain figurines. It had been another terrible day at work and I’d come home to an evening sorting the many boxes of stuff we’d brought with us to my in-laws” house, where we had recently moved in an attempt to pay off our debt. The dam had burst and I didn’t know how to stop. All I could think was how did I end up like this?
On paper my life was the epitome of success. I was the one my parents didn’t have to worry about: the daughter who graduated high school with a near perfect UAI (the Australian equivalent of the GPA), had a well-paying corporate job and the latest Givenchy boots in my closet. It was a supposedly picture-perfect life.
My