How might appreciating my connection with others invite me to act differently in the world? What might it inspire?

I have a connection with everyone, whether I realize it or not. In the news today is the plight of the Uyghurs, but many years ago, without knowing their name, I came across something and realized that the chance the cotton I was wearing would have been picked and processed by children or indentured or enslaved people was very high, even today.

“China produces 22 per cent of the world’s cotton, of which 84 per cent comes from Xinjiang, according to a report by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies.”

…and it isn’t just the Xinjiang province and the racial slavery there that is the issue. The issue is that when something is out of sight, and because we like things cheap, that we open the possibility for abuse. We need to shift our values, and buy more local, ethical, and quality items… not cheap and more and costly to the environment and peoples.

I am not perfect, and I am wearing cotton at this moment and I don’t know where it came from. And cotton is only one of the issues. But today’s question… how would I “act differently in the world?” Quite steadily, a little at a time, a product at a time, going for the “low hanging fruit” first, I have been changing my actions for better impact on the world, for the planet but also for the people all over, whether out of sight or not. Consumption, right now, is the main way we are connected to everyone, whether they are in a small village in Mongolia that has no electricity, or an Uyghur camp, or along a polluted river in Indonesia, or when children are picking through trash in Africa to get the raw materials to make our cell phone.

Don’t let the size of the problem stop you from making some small action today to help someone on the planet.

Here are some thoughts:
Buy Fair Trade organic coffee (I get mine at Aldi)
Buy Fair Trade chocolate, tea (available in many locations and online, look for Fair Trade brands and be willing to spend more)
Reduce cotton consumption, or buy used.
Reduce plastic consumption and plastic trash.
Regularly visit your farmer’s market or join a CSA or grow a vegetable garden.
Buy more organic food if you can afford it. (Someone has to work with poisons if it is not organic).
Buy less stuff, but buy QUALITY; many things you can buy once and make last a lifetime. If you buy less and buy quality, you can take the time to trace it.
Try an item from an ethical brand of clothing, instead of cheap clothes from a box store. Try just one… instead of a couple or a few cheap ones.
Wear each item of clothing more frequently – slow fashion, not fast fashion.
Dispose of your waste with less impact; reduce, compost, recycle, make sure those hazardous items like CFLs, paint and batteries make it to an appropriate facility.
Don’t buy things from the corrupt.
Support human rights and food justice issues.

Just start. Start small and build on it. Don’t indulge in guilt or overwhelm, just put a foot on the path or take one more little step. Each step will help some human, some brother or sister, somewhere.

With love.