Too late in the game…

Joining Team Shorter Showers for the sustainable behavior challenge opened my eyes to successes and challenges teammates were experiencing in the last month. While reading their blog posts, I noticed many commonalities pertaining to the reasons behind the lengthy showers. Some reasons include: tiredness, extended moments of clarity, time to unwind after a long day, and of course shaving legs. I received a few similar comments on my posts (from girls) regarding shaving our legs and how it wastes an incredible amount of shower water. I was given good recommendations to reduce a significant barrier, but found that shaving my legs in the shower with water running is inevitable because the alternatives are not worth the time and effort. I can’t get around it; shaving a few times a week will happen.

I was quite impressed by a teammate who took on the challenge of lowering water use in addition to water temperature! I didn’t realize how much energy it took to heat the water with the temperature cranked up all the way. After reading this, I thought about my own shower water temps, and had the water so hot that my head would be steaming after I got out. A different tactic to reducing shower time, unlike mine, was to just cut shower time by the intended goal right from the start instead of taking gradual steps. I believe that if there’s a will, there’s a way, so strategy ultimately depends on the type of person.

  This community dedicated to taking shorter showers has influenced me, but in unexpected ways. I read a few posts where community members had to adjust their strategies to compensate for overestimating their abilities, or reducing time more than they thought because the challenge was simple. Knowing that others are struggling and succeeding sheds light on the fact that behavior change is NOT easy. Having a community this late in the game and especially with no one pressuring me to change has not made a difference on my behaviors, but regardless I am still taking shorter showers. If we met in class or were expected to blog our shower times, I would be much more inclined to stay true to reduced shower times. However, this is the real world, and we aren’t going to have anyone holding our hands for the SBC in the next few weeks or in the upcoming months and years.