A Power Strip and some M&Ms to the Rescue!

When I first started trying to understand why I consumed so much energy, I figured that my behaviors happened just out of habit. For my entire life, when I walked into a room, regardless of if a light needed to be turned on or not, I would hit the light switch. When I was evaluating my progress in changing my behavior, I noted breaking my habits as the toughest part. To help me get used to this change, and as a reminder, I told my roommate to remind me (or us!) to only have the lights on when necessary, or to only plug in devices that absolutely needed to be charged. By the end of the week, I realized just having this small reminder from my roommate was very helpful in changing my behavior.

The barriers to changing my behavior were also apparent. However, to help myself, I plug my most consuming items, my phone and computer chargers as well as my desk lamp, into a power strip. That way, to turn off all of my devices, I just have to hit the switch on the strip, rather than go around and unplug all of the chargers and cords individual. This made it a lot easier to reduce my consumption, and definitely made me more likely to follow through with my behavior change.

To create a benefit for my change, I placed a small container of M&Ms on the table right next to my light switch. Now, instead of reaching to turn on the light, I can reach to grab and M&M to reward myself for remembering not to turn on the lights (unless, of course, necessary!) This was also very effective (and delicious!) in reminding me not to turn on the lights and convincing me sticking with my new behavior was worth it.

When thinking about the future, I think I will definitely make a conscience effort to keep the lights off unless necessary and only plug in electronics when I need to charge them. It is a fairly easy change to make, and I think my habits are bound to change in the near future, making it even easier. I have also learned the positive environmental impact just changing these simple things can have, which makes it even more rewarding (the M&Ms don’t hurt either!)