Eating Vegan Changes the World and Me

I followed the Internet machine's cookie crumbs and came to Sean Bonner's post about eating vegan to change the world. He has an excellent series of posts about how to change the world--specifically, the environment--through our own personal actions. Being vegan was the first suggestion because of the huge impact it could have on healing the environment.

I have been toying with eating vegan for almost two months now. I am not fully vegan yet, but I am making progress towards it. Right now, I am learning the skills to make eating vegan delicious and triumphant for myself. For example, I am buying less dairy and eggs, making delicious and nutritious dairy substitutes (rather than just buying icky processed soy dairy substitutes), and expanding my repertoire of vegan recipes.

I don't want to force myself to eat vegan. One day I will find eating vegan makes me happy, healthy, and satiated, and I won't want anything else. For now, I have to confess, I just ate a homemade crustless quiche because that was what the leftovers in the fridge called out to me to make. I am not ready yet. But I am learning more and eating more vegan every day.

For the longest time, I couldn't imagine going vegan because that would have meant drinking coffee with soy or rice milk. I loved the bitter cut with creamy, and soy and rice milk just don't cut it because they are too watery. So in February, I just decided to stop drinking coffee. Then I don't add milk to my drink! Now I drink mostly green tea in the morning, because it is the only kind of tea that I don't want to cut with milk.

It is now almost May, and I haven't drunk coffee in a cup--even though I have had a few tiramisu slices and a scoop of accidentally-ordered mocca latte ice cream. It was quite easy, like my going vegetarian. One day, without much forethought, the idea just occurred to me to eat vegetarian or to replace coffee with tea. And even though sometimes I see how much easier and convenient it might be to eat meat or drink coffee, I don't go back. Like those phases of my life are in the past now, dead to me.

The irony is that I occasionally drink a chai or tea latte. Yes, I quit my caffeine addiction in order to support my vegan exploration but still indulge in frothy milk drinks. Perhaps one day my brain will decide that the time is right for me to eat no more dairy or meat products. And I won't ever go back.

Carol J. Adams, author of The Sexual Politics of Meat, says : "You think change is too hard; not changing is harder, you just haven’t found that out yet."