#1 | How we started giving a sh*t

Today, we’re talking all about how we met, why we started this podcast, and our unique sustainability journeys. We even come up with some new phrases along the way and share what’s in it for you.

So, hit that play button to hear how we started giving a sh*t and what this season will look like!

Links and resources:

COP25 (and the more recent COP26)
Greta Thunberg (and Fridays For Future)
An Inconvenient Truth
PETA
Beyond Meat
Impossible Foods
No Impact Man – book, film, and website
Cowspiracy
A Vegan Diet: Eating for the Environment

Transcript

Note: This transcript is mostly unedited.

Brandee 0:04

Hello, and welcome to the tea on sustainable living podcast where your hosts, Hannah, and Brandee, try and help each other navigate the big messy gray area of giving a shit about the planet, and hopefully helping you along the way.

Hannah 0:16

Each episode we have honest chats about our sustainability fails, sometimes amongst ourselves and sometimes with guests, while also leaving you with a little sprinkle of hope and inspiration to keep on giving a shit.

Brandee 0:28

So go make yourself a cup of tea, get comfy, and let’s dive into the episode.

Hannah 0:33

Hello, Give-a-Shitters, this is Hannah, and this is Brandee, and you are listening to episode number one of the tea on sustainable living podcast.

Brandee 0:42

So exciting episode number one. So what are we talking about today?

Hannah 0:48

So we’re gonna talk about ourselves and our unique sustainability journeys.

Brandee 0:54

Should we also talk about the listener? What they’re going to gain from the show?

Hannah 0:58

I guess if we have to.

Brandee 1:01

Yes, you the listener will hopefully gain some things from our show. And we will talk more aboput those things. And hopefully we will make you laugh along the way. Hopefully you already have. I don’t know. Are we funny?

Hannah 1:11

No, we’re not.

Brandee 1:13

Okay, let’s get started then. So how did we meet?

Hannah 1:18

So we happened to meet when a mutual friend was actually leaving Madrid, which is where we both live, even though neither of us are from Madrid. And we got chatting and we realized we both were interested in sustainability issues. And it just so happened that the very next day was the climate change march in.

Brandee 1:40

Yeah, the Climate Change Conference cop or COP number something was happening in Madrid, and good old Greta was going to be in town for it.

Hannah 1:51

And we think we saw Greta. I mean, we didn’t see Greta, we saw lots of photographers, camera people surrounding Greta, as she tried to join the march.

Brandee 2:02

I think we can we can stretch that and say that we saw Greta.

Hannah 2:06

Yeah, we saw Greta.

Brandee 2:10

Yeah, and shout out to our friend Hannah, not this Hannah. Other friend Hannah, who was one who left. Come back?

Hannah 2:17

Yes, come back Hannah. Why did you move away? Why?

Brandee 2:22

So yeah, that was the start of our friendship, and ultimately, the origin of this podcast. Not long after that we started eating going to vegan vegetarian restaurants together,

Hannah 2:35

eating lots of delicious food. And over food, we would often end up talking about various sustainability issues, and our struggles and journeys. And over the last two, two years, two and a bit years, we’ve had so many conversations, and we got to the point where we kind of wanted to share them. And that’s how this happened.

Brandee 3:01

Yeah, so I think it’s been a natural progression. You have these talks and think, Well, yeah, we should start a podcast.

Hannah 3:09

And what is it that you’re doing Brandee, that means we actually did start the podcast?

Brandee 3:14

Yes, thank you for bringing that up. I am actually a podcast manager. So I am using this podcast as a portfolio piece. I would love to ultimately work with sustainable sustainability centered podcasters. But more importantly, I wanted to gain the experience from being the podcaster to put myself in my client’s shoes and future client’s shoes to understand the process from their end.

Hannah 3:37

So if you have a podcast or you want to start one, you should also get in touch with us. And well not with us get in touch with Brandee, I have no idea. I’m just here to talk. So on that note, I’m going to let Brandee talk instead. Can you tell me a bit about your journey to sustainability or with sustainable living?

Brandee 3:57

So my sustainability journey started with food shocker. I was actually thinking about this earlier today. 20 years ago was when I first became a vegetarian, almost 20 years ago, I’m turning 33 Next week, so when I was 13, is when it all started. Since then, I’ve been all over the I don’t know what to call it, vegan spectrum, plant-based spectrum, from vegetarian to vegan junk food vegan to then eating white meat again, at some point, I don’t even remember why. And the reason for for all of those shifts, in the beginning, at least was the ethics. And then eventually it turned into health, college, I think, and throughout all of that, starting to realize or hear people talk about the impact of what you eat and what the impact that that has on the environment. I was not unaware of climate change. I saw an inconvenient truth as most people did. The Al Gore documentary But it took a while to connect the dots between what I was eating and the environment. I think the, at least in the US, there are powerful people at play that that want wanted to delay people making that connection. But it’s out there.

Hannah 5:18

Yeah, I was just kind of going to ask you about that. Because obviously you’ve just said it’s been a 20 year journey. Do you think the, the emphasis from the outside world has changed over that 20 years? In terms of when you started? Did you really know? I mean, obviously, you need like you said you knew about climate change. But was it something that people around you talked about? Or that people connected at all? When you said that you were going vegan or vegetarian? Because for me, at least I know, when I say now that I’m vegetarian, people will say, Oh, is it for climate change, or that for like ethical reasons? So a lot of people who aren’t even vegetarian or vegan are very aware that that’s a choice some people are making 20 years ago, would you say that that was the case?

Brandee 6:08

No, it was not. I think that’s definitely changed in the last couple of decades. I think PETA has been around for a while. And if you told anyone back then you’re going vegan or vegetarian. They assumed it was for ethics. I think it’s also taken a long time for people to understand that you can be vegan or vegetarian and be healthy. You can also be a junk food vegan like I was the unhealthy. So they’re not mutually exclusive. Did I use that right?

Hannah 6:34

Yes, I think so, she says it’s not like my day job as an editor or anything.

Brandee 6:40

I don’t know why we struggle with that expression. Anyway, yes, it’s definitely changed. And I think as far as when the shift from ethics health started to shift to sustainability, I don’t know if it was outside people, I think it was honestly packaging on meat alternatives. Like Beyond Meat and impossible. It used to be impossible was the one that was in restaurants, at least in the States. And Beyond Meat was the one you bought in the stores. And they talk about the amount of water, they save the amount of land they save. And I think that’s probably when I really connected the dots. Okay,

Hannah 7:18

and just to clarify with everyone, when we’re saying vegan for ethical reasons, it’s not that being vegan or vegetarian, for clients for climate change, sustainable sustainability reasons, isn’t ethical. But we’re talking about maybe the difference between an ethical choice around animal rights and whether we should eat animals versus perhaps a slightly more pragmatic but still ethically influenced worldview around why you might be vegetarian or vegan.

Brandee 7:52

to also add to kind of how we came to how this podcast came to be, is part of my sustainability journey and struggles has been realizing the impact that corporations have on the environment. And yet, I’m the one who’s making all these changes and having a hard time with it. So that’s something that will come up probably throughout the season, as we tried to, under understand that you can have both, they are also not mutually exclusive. Is that right?

Hannah 8:26

I still don’t know. But what I what I do know, I think I know, is that that a lot of the issues that come up for me as well in the gray area, I think what creates so much of the gray area is around how you can live a sustainable, environmentally friendly life. Is that even possible? Is that kind of that dynamic between individual action and corporate action? Because on the one hand, you can say, Well, I’m just like a drop in the ocean. Whatever I do doesn’t really matter. So I might as well just like live. However, I like.

Brandee 9:08

What if Greta thought the same way? Yeah.

Hannah 9:11

But yeah. What if Greta felt the same way? It’s a great question. Because that that’s, that is part of it. Right? That your individual action. We’re not all greatest at all. But your individual action does impact others around you. Like I noticed that as a vegetarian, you know, just bring vegetarian food into work or having housemates who’ve seen have cooked. I think it has inspired a lot of people not only to go vegetarian, but like, you know, to try a few more meat free alternatives. And you never really know the impact that you have around the world around you and how that kind of ripples out. Would you say the same?

Brandee 9:53

Yes, I was just thinking in my head, the unseen ripple effect. Some of the nicest things that I’ve had people say to me Two people come into mind when I left my job in LA to move to Spain was the impact I had on them and making them think twice and even make changes in their lives like my one friend started. Her and her husband are now vegan. And she started bringing reusable containers into work because they always saw my glass jars. My other friend, that was one of the things she said to me, the last time we we met up before I moved was the impact that I’ve had on her, and then the impact that they’re going to have on their circle of friends and family.

Hannah 10:33

Yeah, it’s amazing. And it’s just like such beautiful things for people to say to you, right?

Brandee 10:38

Yeah, feels good. Yay. What about your sustainability journey? When did you first start giving a shit? Well,

Hannah 10:48

I mean, I’ve just been talking about being vegetarian. And that’s part of the story. But actually, that’s probably a later part for me or later, the last kind of four years. So I would say, I’m quite lucky, I’ve grown up in a family that was fairly environmentally conscious. From the beginning. Obviously, as things are, you know, as society has changed, and governments have brought in new things, those were facilitated in my family. I’m not sure if this makes sense. But let’s go with it. So for example, we always recycled at least as soon as it was provided as something that, you know, the local council would collect recycling them, my family would recycle. So I think I kind of grew up supported by that. And then a big turning point as an individual, I would say, was actually through school. So I had an amazing geography teacher when I was in year nine. So that’s in the UK, so that I would have been 14, so shout out to Mr. Mae. And he did a lot of sustainability kind of projects with us in geography. And he showed us the inconvenient truth. So that was a big one as well for me. And yeah, and actually, I remember, this is a few years after I’d first heard him as a teacher, in 2010, he took us a group of us down to down to London to go to one of the marches, probably, again, a different cop. But I can’t quite remember that it felt like a really big event. And it was really amazing to have a teacher who kind of really inspired that in me. Something I

Brandee 12:33

left out in my story, it was the summer I tried to go completely zero waste, which didn’t work because I didn’t have a community compost bin. And I think I already knew I was moving. So I didn’t want to invest in a home compost, I moved to somewhere that didn’t have a community bin and realize that that is not a sustainable way to live. Probably have a whole different episode on packaging and plastic and the whole zero waste movement, which I think is kind of dwindling. No.

Hannah 13:02

Yeah, it’s definitely an interesting one. I remember this. Yeah, this is again, as a teenager, to this would have been, for me, sort of in a level. So when I was like, 616 1718, reading a lot of stuff. And it was very much that sort of zero waste kind of era. I mean, it’s still going on, but I think that was the start of it. I remember reading No Impact Man, which was a whole big experiment. I think it’s a journalist in the states who will for a year try to go zero waste. And he really like funny and is an inspirational book.

Brandee 13:40

And I think they made it into a movie. He tried to go without electricity. And he brought his wife and kids along for the

Hannah 13:46

journey. Yeah, absolutely. And yeah, I’ve seen that kind of movie your documentary, I think if I’m not sure if it’s a documentary or a movie, to be honest. But yeah, things like when they’re trying to, you know, clean nap is in the bath. Because they can, you know, use the washing machine. And yeah, so you just see the, the kind of the whole range. It was inspiring, but at the same time, it’s kind of like a level that you’re probably not going to reach. And like you say, we’re definitely going to do an episode on that. So that was kind of as a teenager, and then kind of just kind of rolling along. And then I moved to Australia for a year abroad. And that’s when I really got in touch with a lot of people who were really involved with activism. And I started volunteering with a group called Australian Youth Climate Coalition. And that’s when I met some Yeah, met some really interesting people. And I really liked the focus of their work. So they are Climate Action Group, obviously, with young people. So I think it was teenagers up to age 30. And that was the cutoff point. So yeah, was all even the staff were all like young people. And they had a sister organization called seed, which was for indigenous youth, indigenous and Aboriginal youth in Australia. So that also brought a different perspective. And that was a big thing, focus for the group. And it’s something I carry with me today for sure, which is about climate justice. And saying that whatever changes we make must, must be just changes, we can’t just change without thinking about the impact on those communities. It’s not helpful just to make these big shifts, we have to think about the people who are most going to most likely to be affected. And yeah, so that was a big year for me. And that was the year I became vegetarian, which I’ve been putting off for a while, I knew it was the right thing to do in terms of sustainability wise for me. And so I made that I made that choice that year. But I also found that it burnt me out quite a lot. And I think you’ve had similar experiences, right brandy of when you’ve got really involved, or at least speaking for me, I got really involved. And I was reading all these articles, and everything was so terrible. And, you know, there was the hope of working with other people. But at the same time, it was just so much and like felt just so overwhelming. And then I would say I mean, this is now five years ago, and I was probably probably just been stumbling on since then sometimes doing a bit more sustainably, sometimes a bit less.

Brandee 16:33

Yeah, the thing with a couple of things on this, I think sustainability or climate action, is that it’s not just about the packaging, or the food you eat. And I also wanted to say, yes, once you start to make changes, any change, it’s like an avalanche of Oh, no, there’s so much more I can do. I thought this one thing was going to be the thing that made me feel like I was doing enough to I get stuck in the gray area, because I have an all or nothing mentality. And it’s not sustainable to be all in on like my tried to be zero wasted. There’s so many factors that make it unsustainable.

Hannah 17:15

I think it’s also an area where you sometimes get pushback from people, less and less now, because I think in general, you know, I think everyone is pretty aware that climate change is bad. You know, we don’t need to tell you this. This isn’t what this podcast is about. We already know we need to make some shifts. But the hard thing is knowing where and how and how to do it in a way that’s not overwhelming. And I found that sort of area where sometimes being me people, and also probably I’ve done it to other people at the same time where if you talk about what you’re doing, sometimes people will say, Oh, but what about this? But haven’t you thought about that, and bringing up these other things, and often they are relevant points. But I think sometimes it’s a way to kind of disconnect from the issue. You know, okay, you’re doing this, but really, you haven’t, you’re not doing X, Y and Zed. So why are you even doing that one thing? And it’s also easy to get into that mentality when you’re thinking as well. Yeah, and then we get lost in the quagmire of gray do the

Brandee 18:27

big ugly gray area. It’s the worst.

Hannah 18:30

absolutely the worst.

Brandee 18:33

But it’s where we need to, to be. Because like we’ve joked before, we can’t all be Greta.

Hannah 18:41

I think that’s where this podcast comes in. As we are trying to navigate those issues that we’ve already raised. I know for sure I feel a bit stuck about where to go. And the conversations that we’ve had, have helped me in seeing the way the way Brandi lives. And I’m in her beautiful apartment right now. And she has all these glass jars and bulk food. And for me that was really inspiring. And so kind of this podcast and sharing some of those conversations with you is a way for us to sort of process and move towards more action. And that’s something that we’re consciously bringing in do you want to talk a bit more about the actions we want to take?

Brandee 19:28

Yeah, the whole point of this podcast is for this to be a learning experience for all of us and and myself as well as your the listener and for how to not only get unstuck, but also try to avoid going down the spirals of well throwing up your arms and saying well, nothing I do matters.

Hannah 19:50

I think what we want to do is maybe go a little bit down the spiral, because that’s natural and that’s what happens when these big issues come up but kind of too together, pull ourselves back out of the spiral. And very purposely saying like, Oh, wow, these are the issues. And this is where the gray spiral is. And we’re going to kind of put a toe then because that’s real life. And that’s what happens in our brains. But say, actually, you can’t live here, you know, oh, you can, but it’s, it’s shit.

Brandee 20:22

The gray spiral, I like that. Yeah. So I think we want to give ourselves the tools and you to get ourselves out of the gray spiral when it happens. And trying to, at the same time, recognize when we’re heading down that path and try to avoid it.

Hannah 20:40

So as part of that, what we’re planning to do is have a little gray spiral chat, maybe just between us and maybe with friends. And then we’re going to kind of talk about projects that we’ve seen around the world, and how they’re inspiring to us. Because you know, there are a lot of people doing amazing things around climate change action, sustainability issues, and we want to kind of want to celebrate this food we want. We want to celebrate the successes of other people. And then we want to challenge ourselves with an action step.

Brandee 21:25

Yeah, absolutely. We want to learn from the inspiring things other people are doing. And take some small actions, whether it’s one likely give you multiple action ideas, depending on where you’re at, and what is easy or accessible to you. So each episode, we’ll start with spilling the tea on ourselves and talking about a specific fail. We’ve experienced recently, and or the recent gray spiral, we’ve gone down and try to help ourselves get out of it. And

Hannah 22:00

yeah, yeah, it’s gonna be awesome. So stay tuned

Brandee 22:06

for lots of tea, and honest chats and to meet our friends.

Hannah 22:11

Yeah, and to meet a friend because that also, and also, please get in touch with us. This is a shared journey, you probably have tons of ideas that we might not have thought of. Or the you can tell us about what is, you know, accessible in the place where you live? Yeah, me? Well, I like talking. And brandy sometimes likes talking and sometimes like interviewing, so please get in touch.

Brandee 22:46

I like talking on social media. So connect with us there at the tea on sustainable living Palace, your ideas, your thoughts, your struggles. If you want to come on the show and chat with us.

Hannah 22:55

Yes. Come on the show. That would be awesome. Let’s meet the listener. I was gonna say Rita, but it’s the listener. Yeah. I think we’d better stop here. Right, Brittany?

Brandee 23:08

Yeah, I think this feels like a good place to stop. Thank you so much for listening, and we’ll catch you next one.

Hannah 23:15

See you soon.

Brandee 23:18

Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the tea on sustainable living podcast.

Hannah 23:23

If you made it to the end, we can only assume that you’ve enjoyed this episode.

Brandee 23:27

Please consider sharing this with a friend or family member who could use some support on their sustainability journey.

Hannah 23:33

And find us on Instagram at the tea on sustainable living and let us know what you liked about the episode.

Brandee 23:38

Alright, Give-a-Shitters, tea you later. Get it? Tea you later? As in, see you later? So punny. Whyyy?

Transcribed by https://otter.ai