How many decisions do you make everyday?

Real decisions, I mean, where you actively choose between two options rather than follow your usual practice. When you got in the shower this morning, did you choose a shampoo or grab the only there one, your usual one or the nearest one? When you fired up your computer at work, did the option of not doing that cross your mind? How often have you bought a different newspaper to usual, just to get a different perspective on life?

I realised this morning in a coffee shop that, by choosing a cappuccino for a change rather than my default black americano, I was making different choice that I take maybe 1 in 20 times. Last week I read the Daily Mail cover to cover for the first time in years (which was a shock to the system in more ways than one). A few years ago I signed up to a ‘green household awareness’ scheme but failed to weigh my rubbish for more than a couple of days at a time before defaulting to chucking it straight in the appropriate bin. Me – Mr Sustainability himself – couldn’t even cope with this minor deviation from the norm. Embarrassing.

We are creatures of habit.

And, as Sustainability practitioners, we have to embrace that, rather than fight it. We’ve got to appreciate new habits take a long time to form and, more importantly, working with people’s normal routines rather than against them is the quickest way to get Sustainability embedded into the organisation.