It's an unfortunate fact: For many people, the holidays mean driving to malls, running up credit card debt, purchasing stuff wrapped in wasteful packaging, and (for kids) accumulating as much crap as possible.
Does that mean thoughtful, socially responsible people should renounce the holidays and live like monks in hair-shirts?
Here at Shareable.net, we say, heck no. Sharing makes holidays more meaningful and more fun, and we've been publishing a series of articles to help you to design your holiday for merry sustainability:
- "How I Rescued Myself from Holiday Shopping Through a Donation Exchange": In which my colleague Neal says, I hate the waste and materialism and frantic shopping of the season--how can I drop all that and still make the holiday meaningful?
- "How to Make Your Holiday a Shared Affair": In which Danielle Davis asks how we can turn the focus of the holidays form me, me, me to we, we, we.
- "How to Throw a Toy Exchange": In which Dawn Friedman discovers a shareable solution to having too many old toys and not enough money for new ones.
- "How to Teach Your Kids to Share": In which I yell with frustration and then ask myself, Why is sharing so hard for my son? (The answer: Because he doesn't see me share often enough.)
- "A Quiet Christmas Manifesto": In which Jay Walljasper considers Christmas as a model for the world we'd like to live in.
Shareable.net is a brand new nonprofit, though we always hear that we seem slicker than many for-profits--let me assure you, however, that it is skill and resourcefulness, not copious amounts of cash, that makes us look slick.
In fact, we rely on the support of our readers to give voice to people building a more shareable world. If you share our values and support our mission, we hope you'll consider making a donation. It's fast, easy, and secure.
Thanks so much for visiting Shareable.net, and we hope to see you again in 2010!
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