Healthy Homemaking Series: Stuff

Baby Step 13 - The Story of Stuff

Challenge: Watch the video on the The Story of Stuff website with your family.

Why: This video is intended to be an eye-opening portrayal of the negative effects of consumerism.  It will challenge your thinking about possessions, where they come from, their true value, the domino effect of all the choices that we all make each day, and your place in it all.

How:  Brad and I and one of our best friends sat down together to watch the 20 minute video.

The Story of Stuff is narrated by a well educated, experienced woman who makes the information easy to understand and keeps it engaging with the use of simple animation.  It certainly contains a message that needs to be heard.  Some of the information I knew, but I learned a lot of new stuff too.  It goes through the system of extraction, production, distribution, consumption, and disposal showing how and why this can't work for the planet or us as people if we carry on the way we are.

I sometimes make the mistake of believing everything I hear or read without much thought, and thus I was glad to be watching the video with Brad and our friend as they are two intelligent, well educated, critical thinking men.  They felt that the video was sometimes overly biased, and that some of the facts may have been somewhat misleading.  It is always good to take everything you hear with a grain of salt, even if it's a message you believe in.  Overall, we all enjoyed and appreciated the video.  I was happy to have seen it and am glad to promote and support it.

This challenge came at the perfect time for Brad and I.  Just a week ago, we had decided that we had too much "stuff" and wanted to take on a more minimalist lifestyle.  We are on a mission to clear out our place, and this video is definitely some added motivation.

I encourage you all to take a little time to watch The Story of Stuff, especially with your families, and discuss it afterwards!



If you really enjoyed that, there are more videos to check out on their website including The Story of Electronics, The Story of Cosmetics, The Story of Bottled Water, and more!