[Speaker 2]

Welcome to the Unchained TV podcast. I’m Jane Velez Mitchell, your host, and wow, do we have a treat for you today. The author of this fantastic new book, A Year of Compassion, 52 Weeks of Living Zero Waste, Plant-Based and Cruelty-Free.

 

She is a legend in the world of veganism known as the joyful vegan, Colleen Patrick-Goudreau.

 

[Speaker 1]

Someone who travels a lot and hosts vegan trips around the world, I’m often asked if it’s hard to find vegan food on the road. Short answer, no. Long answer, we forget that plant-based foods were once the staples in the diets of people all around the world, not animal flesh and fluids.

 

The trick is getting to know the foods native to the region you’re in, particularly the simple, traditional foods of the local population, and especially the foods characterized as cucina povera. Translated literally, cucina povera means poor kitchen in Italian, but it really refers to the frugal genius of poor Italian cooks who made the most of whatever was in their backyard. This approach isn’t unique to Italy.

 

Every culture has beloved dishes with roots in the flavors of necessity, and because plant foods have always been affordable and animal products have always been expensive, that’s why it’s easy to reflect your values of compassion and wellness wherever you travel, whether you travel on your own or on a joyful vegan trip.

 

[Speaker 2]

That looks like so much fun. I wish I could go on a trip with you. It could be in my future!

 

Now, to the one and only Colleen Patrick-Goudreau, the joyful vegan. Wow, you are just churning them out, book after book after book. What is the bottom line message of your current book, the new book, A Year of Compassion?

 

[Speaker 1]

Thanks for all that, Jane, thank you. So, you know, I’ve been saying for a very long time that it’s not that we can make a difference, it’s that we do make a difference. The choice we have is whether we want that difference to be positive or negative, and I think that’s what this book is in a nutshell.

 

It’s saying there are so many different things we can do to have a positive impact in this world. I chose 52, and there’s really more than that because each week has lots of information and tips. But it really is about recognizing that everything we do has an impact on someone or something else, and so I wanted to give people more tools, more resources, more tips, more inspiration for living as compassionately as possible.

 

[Speaker 2]

Well, I think you’re absolutely right. It’s that when we ask people to do something, we have to give them an action point. We can’t just say, hey, do this, you know, push them out into the world without any kind of guidance.

 

I mean, we can, but it’s not as effective. So in your book, you have some real detailed, here’s how to transform, here’s how to practice a year of compassion. I don’t know what a consumption audit is.

 

One of the first things, do a consumption audit for a week tracking all the animal products you eat. Well, I’ve been vegan for 29 years, so I’m not gonna be tracking that, but tell us about this consumption audit.

 

[Speaker 1]

So the first week, it opens with doing an audit of your consumption of animal products, as well as your consumption of waste. So this would pertain to all of us, whether we’re eating animal products or not. So the whole idea around zero waste, and obviously cruelty-free and plant-based eating.

 

Look, you’ve heard this a million times, Jane. I’ve heard this a million times. I have never met anyone who doesn’t say, I don’t eat a lot of meat, dairy, and eggs.

 

Most people say they don’t eat a lot of meat, dairy, and eggs, but the truth is you don’t know how much you eat until you stop. And that’s when you take stock, and that’s when you recognize what your habits are, and that’s when you have the opportunity to make changes. It’s the same thing with zero waste or anything we do.

 

We kind of have a perception of ourselves and what we do and how we eat and how we behave, and then we have reality. So the first week is an opportunity to say, what am I eating? How many animal products am I eating?

 

How much waste am I creating? What am I throwing away? Am I wish-cycling?

 

Am I throwing things in the recycling bin, knowing that it’s not really gonna be recycled, but just hoping it is because it’s in that recycling bin? So it’s an opportunity to really look at our behavior so that we can change our behavior. So that’s what the consumption audit is.

 

It’s the same chapter that’s asking you to do a consumption audit as well as a waste audit.

 

[Speaker 2]

And Carol LaCava says, hi, Colleen. She’s one of our followers. When she found out that you were gonna be on, she was incredibly excited and said, I went to Africa.

 

I went to Rwanda. And she just had so many things to say about it. I wanna talk a little bit about the fact that you show how much fun a vegan lifestyle is.

 

Here’s the photos that just two of the dozens that she sent me from the trip. Tell us about how you work with World Vegan Travel and about this incredible trip to Rwanda where I know she met one of her best friends. They are best friends now, and why this is important for the vegan movement.

 

[Speaker 1]

Yes, Jeff. Hi, Karen. It’s so good to see you.

 

Karen’s amazing, as you know. So why is this important? Because my whole message from the very beginning, Jane, has been that living compassionately is not about deprivation.

 

It’s not about getting good enough. It’s not about what we don’t get and don’t have and don’t eat. It’s about all of the abundance and the things that we do experience.

 

And so for me, the trips are just another extension of that and a manifestation of the fact that just because you wanna live compassionately and not hurt anyone or live healthfully and not hurt yourself, that doesn’t mean you should not enjoy life. And it doesn’t mean that you should just get good enough, whether you’re traveling or just going to a restaurant or whatever it is. So these trips are a real manifestation of that.

 

And World Vegan Travel, they came about because these were people who traveled on a trip that I had hosted a decade ago, and they became good friends and they wound up starting World Vegan Travel because they had a background in tour leading and they just know what it means to create incredible experiences. So they’re doing their thing and I’m just really honored to be able to continue hosting these trips. So I do about four or five a year with them and they’re going on and doing twice as many now without me, which is great because there’s such a demand for being able to travel and not have to worry about it and not have to think about anything and experience this abundance that is a compassionate life.

 

Oh, Jane, I lost you there. I don’t hear your audio, so I just have to- There we go.

 

[Speaker 2]

Okay, these are the lists of things in your book that you can do every single day to make this more effective, to make yourself transform. So let’s just run through them. Finding animal-free textiles and making sustainable choices.

 

Let’s talk about that for a second.

 

[Speaker 1]

Yeah, so this is the idea is I did it weekly because I wanted people to not be overwhelmed and I wanted them to be able to process kind of each week’s action item. And one of the chapters, one of the weeks is indeed choosing compassionate fashion. And so that means obviously looking into what the materials are that we’re wearing, whether it’s leather or wool or silk or anything that comes from an animal.

 

And so that’s the idea. I mean, also there’s other considerations because I do talk about, you know, other kinds of materials and I do answer the question that a lot of people have around synthetics. And so I touched on that as well.

 

So yeah, the idea is that it’s not just about what we put in our mouths, but what we put on our bodies so that we’re not contributing to animal cruelty.

 

[Speaker 2]

Okay, let’s talk about the next one. Using plant-based options for common foods like oat milk, coffee creamer, and eggless mayo. Now I want to specifically talk about this because people act like, what do you eat?

 

Like pretending that they’ve been living under a rock for the last, I don’t know how many years. Okay, this you can find just about anywhere or any other vegan mayo. It’s not brain surgery.

 

It’s there, it’s there wherever I shop. If I go to Ralph’s, if I go to, I mean, it’s not hard to find. Or alternatives, vegan mayo, vegan butter.

 

I happen to love Miyoko’s oat butter, but you can find other vegan butters. When I was a kid, it was called margarine. All right, and that’s what we had in our household.

 

So this is not something that just erupted like artificial intelligence that people have to, you know, take courses on. And then here’s the soy milk that I like, but there’s a gazillion taking over the supermarket aisle. And in fact, correct me if I’m wrong, I believe that plant-based milks are the most successful aspect of the vegan food movement by far.

 

And I also have a soy milk maker. If you say, I don’t want to buy the carton and the cap, well, guess what? You can get beans at your co-op, put them in a soy milk maker and you can have soy milk.

 

So let me ask you, why is it that people who are otherwise extremely intelligent, some of them are Rhodes scholars, they are lawyers, they’re doctors, they have high degrees, and yet somehow they’re kind of playing dumb on this issue as per why they can’t make these very easy shifts?

 

[Speaker 1]

That is a big question. It is actually the topic of my book prior to this one, which is called The Joyful Vegan. And I just want every vegan to read that book because it provides insight into exactly what you’re asking.

 

And I want every non-vegan to read it because it really is a guide toward, thank you for understanding kind of the psychological and the social aspects of this, Jane, because I think that’s a really big part of why people resist becoming vegan. I think it’s a really big part of why people struggle. I think it’s a really big part of why people stop being vegan.

 

And so I just want to push back a little bit and I know what you’re saying, but I don’t know that they’re playing dumb as much as it is really, really easy to have myopia when we live in a culture that in every way supports us eating meat, dairy, and eggs several times a day, every single day. And so I think it is more than that. I think it is a really deep compartmentalization and we’re so good at being able to compartmentalize.

 

We’re so good at being willfully ignorant. We’re so good at being willfully blind because why? Because we are social creatures.

 

We’re afraid of what it’s going to do to our social lives if we do something that’s so different than the people we spend most of our time with, our family, our friends, our coworkers. Why? Because we’re also creatures of habit.

 

We are ingrained to do the things that we started doing when we were very young. And so a lot of what is underneath these sometimes excuses, for sure, I’m not just letting everyone off the hook, but sometimes what’s underneath it is fear. They don’t know what’s going to be on the other side of it.

 

They don’t know how they’re going to be able to cook. They don’t know if they’re going to still be able to travel. They don’t know if they’re still going to be able to spend time with their loved ones, cook with their family, cook with their husband, cook with their wife, the things that they used to do.

 

So I think a lot of it is this myopia. Now, what does that mean? That’s why I do recommend doing something like a 30-day vegan challenge because it literally shifts you.

 

And that’s one of the recommendations in a year of compassion is take a 30-day vegan challenge. Why? Because it forces you, it enables you, it compels you to say, I’ve been looking at this shelf in the grocery store all these years.

 

I’ve been looking at these products, these mayonnaisees, these milks, all the things that have animal products. If I do this for 30 days, then you’re compelled to go, oh, I didn’t even know there was eggless mayonnaise. I didn’t even know.

 

And I know it seems crazy that people wouldn’t, but honestly, people are mostly just going about their lives, doing the same thing every day, eating the same foods every day. And it’s not until someone like you, someone like me, a book comes along, a TV show, a podcast, a conversation that makes someone go, oh, I didn’t know. Show me where to go.

 

Show me what to do. Tell me what to do. So I do think a lot of it is psychological and social.

 

And what we need to remember as advocates is what it was like because there was a time I didn’t know, and there was a time I made excuses. And so the work that you’re doing is amazing, right? Because it’s saying to folks, hey, over here, there’s stuff over here.

 

Just look long enough to know what is available to you so that you can make these shifts. And those products that you’re showing, those are the ways people can begin. So if you’re still consuming cow’s milk, then start shifting over to plant-based milks.

 

If you’re consuming mayonnaise, it is such an easy shift to switch over to something like the Vegenaise, like Follow Your Heart. So those are the little things. And that also takes the manufacturers and the companies that are making these products, thank goodness for these companies who are making these products.

 

But it also takes the openness and the willingness on the part of the people who need to shift a little bit.

 

[Speaker 2]

You have an incredible Instagram page. I was checking it out. Here’s, along those lines, your book is about compassion.

 

Here’s one of your riffs, as it were, on compassion. We’ll talk about it on the other side.

 

[Speaker 1]

I don’t believe for one second that people who eat meat, dairy, and eggs are not compassionate. Not for one second. I was compassionate when I was eating meat, dairy, and eggs.

 

I didn’t want animals to be harmed, but we are really, really, really, really good at compartmentalizing our discomfort. We’re really good at reconciling that dissonance, that discomfort, that conflict that we have. And the way we do that is in all of the ways we tell ourselves the stories we need to tell ourselves in order to keep eating meat, dairy, and eggs.

 

We need to consume animal protein. Animals are here for us. They don’t feel the same pain as we do.

 

You know, will we overrun with animals if we stop eating them? All the things we have to tell ourselves in order to feel good about the thing we’re doing that we know is harmful, that we know is destructive to the environment, that we know is harmful to the animals, that we know is harmful to our health. We know all of these things.

 

And so it’s not that the compassion isn’t there. It’s that it’s hindered. It’s blocked.

 

We have to make excuses to reconcile both of these contradictory things that animals suffer and that in eating them, we’re causing suffering. It’s really difficult to reconcile. And I can tell you that it is so much more difficult and takes so much more effort to put those boundaries up to our compassion and harden our hearts and look away and choose willful blindness.

 

It takes so much effort to have to do that. When you make a change that aligns your values with your behavior, when you become vegan, when you become vegetarian, whatever you wanna call it, when you stop participating in the thing that you know is anathema to your own values and is so intrinsically violent against animals, when you stop participating in that, it’s so effortless. It’s just so much easier to just go about your day and choose compassion over convenience and choose vegetables.

 

It’s just that simple. Being willing to look, being willing to see and bear witness and being open to making some changes is honestly one of the most liberating things we can do. For the animals, this is Colleen Patrick-Goudreau.

 

Thanks for watching.

 

[Speaker 2]

And you are watching Colleen Patrick-Goudreau live as we talk about her new book, which is all about compassion, A Year of Compassion. You can buy it on Amazon. You can buy it on Barnes and Nobles.

 

Do you have an audio book, by the way?

 

[Speaker 1]

No, there’s no audio book for this one, not for this one.

 

[Speaker 2]

Okay, because I’m listening to a lot of books as many people are and you have a great voice. So yeah, but you made so many important points on that video and it really thought, sparked so many questions on my part. My big question is why do some people get it and some people don’t?

 

And it doesn’t seem to me to have any rhyme or reason. Like somehow I could be talking to a plumber who gets it and then I could talk to somebody who is a leader in industry and graduated summa cum laude and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and can’t get it. In fact, may have because of their intelligence, not that plumbers are intelligent.

 

I can’t do any plumbing, but because of their high credentials, they may have more defense mechanisms or have fancier ways of explaining why they feel the need to eat animals. Have you ever come into an understanding of what makes some people successfully make the shift?

 

[Speaker 1]

So it’s the million dollar question. If we knew that answer, we would all just kind of go forth and just focus on that. So in the Joyful Vegan, I do talk about the psychological and the social and the emotional aspects, right?

 

And the things that stop us, especially the social aspects that stop us. I think there needs to be more research around the personality aspects because I do think there are probably some clues there, but I don’t think it’s going to be the only answer because I think, as I said, there’s all these other components and I think it’s multi-layered. I do think, Jane, that there’s an element of being willing to go against the grain.

 

So that’s not something that for some people, it comes really naturally. I think for you, it comes naturally. I think for me, it comes naturally, right?

 

For those of us who are okay going against the grain, for some people, it has to be learned. And one of the things that I remember over the years that I’ve been doing this work and one of the emails and kind of themed emails that I would get from people are those that said, I did not know my voice. I didn’t have my voice.

 

I didn’t know how to stand up for what I believed in and you helped me find my voice. That to me is one of the things I’m most proud of. And that shows me also that it can be taught and that it just requires some vigilance and it requires some willingness.

 

So I do think that a big part of it is being willing to say, to stand up and kind of stand out from the crowd. A lot of people don’t wanna do that. A lot of people are afraid to rock the boat.

 

Now, what I talk about is that you don’t have to rock the boat all the time. You just have to be able to stand firm in who you are and not be attached to how who you are affects other people. So it just might mean learning to say, I’m vegan, I’m vegan.

 

So can you tell me what you have on the menu that is appropriate for me? Just that alone could be really hard for some people because they don’t wanna call attention to themselves. They don’t wanna rock the boat.

 

So I think there’s something there, but the hope is that it’s not like it’s ingrained in your personality. Everybody can learn some skills to be able to communicate in a way that reflects their values and gets what they want without feeling like they’re constantly rocking the boat and making them.

 

[Speaker 2]

Yeah, and Paula Franklin is watching. She said, Ingrid Newkirk said there are studies that showed some people are wired for more empathy than others. What’s your thought on that?

 

[Speaker 1]

I’m not convinced about that. I am not. I think we, look, there are sociopaths and I’m not talking about them, but I think we are all wired as human beings for empathy.

 

I mean, Darwin and I talk about this in the introduction of the year of compassion. Darwin talks about how in evolutionarily speaking, compassion was actually one of the things that got us to where we are and that makes successful species. Literally being concerned about somebody else’s wellbeing and welfare is an evolutionary trait and it’s an asset.

 

So I do believe that we are all wired for empathy. It’s just some of us are, again, it’s not that we don’t have the empathy, it’s that other things are clouding the empathy and we’re prioritizing other things over empathy. And when I say that, that’s what I mean when I say status quo, social aspects, convenience, right?

 

Those are the things that I think people prioritize over their empathy, but I don’t think the empathy is not there. I think it’s there for everybody.

 

[Speaker 2]

Interesting. While we have you, I would love to get your thoughts on what’s currently happening with the media, which has, the meat industry after Beyond Meat was a very, very successful initial public offering in the stock market back in 2019, the meat industry went on the warpath and launched a PR campaign against meat alternatives and veganism in general. These are just three recent headlines.

 

The bottom one is from the New York Times of all things. Meat is back. Then the middle one is the New York Post.

 

Well, you’d expect that. And then the top one is BBC Science. It’s just a very slanted negative articles that are not balanced, commented on all of them on social media to say, hey, journalists, what’s going on here?

 

You’re acting like meat industry PR people. What are your thoughts on what’s happening right now with that kind of reporting that seems to be on the increase and how we can counteract it?

 

[Speaker 1]

I don’t know if it’s on the increase. I mean, they’re not leading the way. The media doesn’t lead the way.

 

They’re kind of following what they see. And they’re a business. They wanna sell newspapers and people like those kinds of stories.

 

People like the schadenfreude, right? Of like the downfall of somebody else. And so I think it’s just reflecting what media does.

 

So how do we counteract it, I think is the more important. I think that’s the more important question because it’s media’s loud and it’s powerful and it’s got a lot of money behind it. So how can we in our world, in our ways be able to counteract that?

 

I mean, again, like it’s gonna take the part of everybody. It takes the manufacturers who are making these products. We talked about it takes advocates.

 

It takes people who are in the industries that they’re in wherever we are, however we work, whatever industry we work in. Advocate just means using our voice. We need to be effective voices for the products and for this lifestyle.

 

As long as we make it sound, I think very different than what people are already familiar with. It’s one of the reasons why I think vegans can like, we can maybe pull back on using the word vegan I think sometimes because I think we can overuse that word. And when we overuse the word, I think it makes it sound to non-vegans like it’s an alien food group.

 

I mean, even one of those headlines you just showed me it said something about it being bad for vegans. This isn’t about vegans and non-vegans. This is about everybody having access to healthful food.

 

Now, obviously there is still healthful food out there. It’s called fruits and vegetables and nuts and seeds and beans and grains and herbs and spices. But when it comes to these commercial products, obviously again, I hate to burst the bubble of vegans, but they have been really successful not because of vegans only, but because non-vegans are also buying these products.

 

So these are things that impact everybody and everybody needs to use their voice to make sure they’re counteracting it.

 

[Speaker 2]

So you’re somebody who has been so prominent in the movement for decades. Where are we as a movement? In other words, obviously our goal would be to hit the vegan tipping point or the plant-based tipping point where plant-based is the norm and cruelty-free is the norm.

 

Was it Martin Luther King who said, the arc of history is long, but it bends towards justice. Where are we on that journey?

 

[Speaker 1]

I think we are, I don’t know where we are on the whole spectrum because hopefully we have millions of years still on this planet. But I do think that we are, you know, one of the chapters in a year of compassion, it would be the second chapter, I think, the second week, and this wouldn’t be for you necessarily, but it’s called Eat Less Meat. And, you know, what I say in that chapter is from an animal perspective, the amount of meat we should consider having is zero.

 

But when we’re talking about some other factors, which are factors that other people, that millions of people are looking at, you know, there are different considerations based on what you care about. And I really think that we all need to champion everyone continuing to reduce and find value in every bit of progress that people are making. Not everyone is going to go vegan.

 

I really wish that I could just say that was gonna be the case, that everyone would manifest their values and do no harm at all. I just don’t, put it this way, it hasn’t happened. And, you know, you and I have been doing this work for a long time.

 

It hasn’t happened. And the percentage of people who consider themselves vegan is still pretty small. So what I would say, what I see happening is that there’s an embracing from the general population, certainly of meat reduction, and I’m saying meat, dairy and egg reduction.

 

You said, you know, the success of the products, especially the plant-based milks is huge. And I do see in our lifetimes, I see the dairy industry, you know, virtually crashing because it’s just not, none of it’s sustainable. But I just don’t see that necessarily.

 

So maybe I’m just nitpicking about the language, but I do see more and more people are gonna continue to reduce the animal products they’re consuming rather than become vegan. But I think we’re gonna keep seeing more of that. And that’s why we need those products.

 

And that’s why we need the framing around this and to also champion people who are on this journey. We cannot make vegan be the only barometer of success. It has to be championing people consuming more vegetables, consuming more plant foods.

 

And I think we are at that point. I think we are seeing more people embrace plant-based eating. You know, they might not call themselves vegan or be vegan, but I think more and more people are seeing the value in consuming plants for themselves, for the animals and for the environment.

 

So, I mean, I think that’s hopeful. I take heart in that.

 

[Speaker 2]

Excellent. Now, the one factor though is the climate crisis. You know, it’s accelerating.

 

As somebody said, and he’s a scientist the other day, if the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change wanted to accelerate climate change, they couldn’t do a better job than what they’re doing right now with their pretty useless COP conferences. And, you know, one of the reasons according to critics is that they’re not talking about the impact of methane from animal agriculture. They’re sticking to fossil fuels.

 

And in fact, we just did an interview with a scientist who said that they’re drastically underreporting the impact of animal agriculture on deforestation, which is a contributor to climate change because trees absorb carbon. So if you eliminate the trees, those trees are not there. So it really depends on how you calculate it.

 

So when you think about all that and the fact that we’re in a race against time, there’s only approximately nine boundaries. We’re crashing through. It’s like species extinction, ice cap melting, on and on and on.

 

There’s a certain urgency as some of the extinction rebellion people say, you know, our house is on fire. Greta Thunberg has said that, and she happens to be a vegan. But when you consider the urgency of the message, the New York Times, and I have the clip here and I’ll find it for you.

 

The New York Times actually did a story in 2023 that said researchers from Oxford University examined the diets of 55,500 people and found that vegans are responsible for 75% less in greenhouse gases than meat eaters. Now, none of the advertiser-based mainstream media picked up that article, even though they all talk about beating their chest about climate change and showing what I call catastrophe porn of fires and storms and, you know, ratings grabbing drama. There’s a solution right there in a paper of record from one of the top universities in the world, Oxford University, completely ignored.

 

And that’s one of the reasons we started on Shane TV to try to tell those stories that are ignored by advertiser-based media because look at the advertisers, fast food and pharmaceuticals, the industries that would suffer if people went plant-based or they’d have to radically change. So what is your thought on that? Like, to me, it seems like there’s a bit of a conflict between let people join at their own pace, don’t push them, you know, that philosophy, and hey, we’re in a climate crisis, it’s getting exponentially worse, our house is on fire, we’ve got to make change rapidly.

 

How do you reconcile those two?

 

[Speaker 1]

So I’m probably somewhere in the middle because I definitely don’t say everything’s fine, just take your own time. You know, I still think we need to champion people wherever they are on this journey because not doing so doesn’t help at all. But I also think that a constant crisis messaging actually exhausts people.

 

And people, you know, if everything’s an emergency, then nothing is. So I think there’s also an element where people just turn it off and tune out. So I think there’s somewhere in between and I’m usually kind of the somewhere in between.

 

And so some of what I’m also doing in this book, Jane, is also saying, hey, you know, absolutely, 100%, like in terms of, you know, the climate situation that we’re all facing. I mean, fossil fuel is number one, number one, number one. I mean, it just absolutely is.

 

And so what I’m talking about in this book are all the ways that we can actually contribute to, you know, positive things. So, you know, that’s why in that chapter on eat less meat, I’m saying, hey, if you, Mr. Person, who’s saying that you’re not gonna be vegan, okay, here is what we know in terms of the impacts of the different kinds of meat production on the climate, on deforestation, on biodiversity. Can you pick one of these and say, all right, like I’m at least willing to not do this, X, eat beef, right?

 

That’s the one that has the most impact in terms of land use, in terms of, you know, the lack of biodiversity, the deforestation, et cetera. So I’m at least trying to say, you know, don’t do nothing because you can’t do everything. Can you do something over here?

 

The other thing I would say is that I’m doing in this book and I’m doing in my messaging is there’s so much we can do individually. You know, I mean, we drive an electric car. We gray watered our plumbing.

 

I am working on increasing biodiversity on our property. Everybody has the opportunity. How many trees did you plant when you came back from that protest?

 

I mean, we need to do things in our own backyard as well. And I mean, I’m making this very short because there’s, you know, that’s like literally what the whole book is. But the other thing is, it’s not just going to be individuals.

 

It’s going to be legislators and, you know, elections matter. And so we need to put people into office. And that doesn’t just mean, you know, nationally, but nationally matters hugely.

 

But we need to put people in office locally, regionally, statewide, wherever you live, who are going to take this seriously. And there’s a lot we can do locally. And I think we really underestimate the power that we have in our own backyards to have the impact we say we want to have.

 

There’s only so much we’re going to be able to do doing national protests and writing to our national, you know, Congress people, but there’s a lot we can do in our own backyards. And that’s what I’m trying to do is empower people to realize they have a lot of impact right here where they live, where their feet are.

 

[Speaker 2]

So you have actually in your book something that one could do every single day of the year. And as we wrap up, how would you suggest that they approach this? Because I know you say you don’t have to read the book cover to cover.

 

You can kind of, you know, pick what is easy for you. How would you suggest that people use this book to transform their lives?

 

[Speaker 1]

Well, I do a mindful, I picked the things, you know, because look, you could find a book that says 101 ways to help the planet and help animals, but I think not everything’s going to be effective. So I really picked the things that I think are going to have the most impact in terms of zero waste, cruelty-free and plant-based. And I kind of was mindful about where they landed in the journey.

 

So if you do want to pick up this book and read it week by week, the whole point is for you to be able to absorb the information. And, you know, when I say something like do an audit, you can’t do that in a day. The whole point is to take a week.

 

And I think, you know, I always use the karate kid analogy. Once you start doing things that are different, they start to become part of your habits. And that’s what this book is about.

 

It’s just saying, you know, try this for this week, make some changes. And if you do this long enough, it will become part of your, you know, it becomes part of your DNA. So just don’t do nothing because you can’t do everything.

 

Do something, anything. And this book is hopefully people’s anything.

 

[Speaker 2]

Yeah, and even as a vegan, I’ve had moments where I realized, oh, I’m a hypocrite. I need to change. I was uploading a whole bunch of videos to Unchained TV about podcasting, about composting.

 

And in the process of uploading the videos about composting, I realized I don’t compost. Oh my gosh. So I pulled out a big bowl, put it in my refrigerator.

 

And I, every time I have a banana peel or an apple core or anything, I start throwing it in. And you know, it’s become really fun. And then I got my building to get some green bins, which are actually required by law in California, but a lot of them don’t show up or at least Los Angeles.

 

Anyway, now we have three green bins and it started something. And it was for me having that aha moment, like, oh, I’m telling people to do something and I’m not doing it myself. So, you know, it’s fun now.

 

I’m proud of myself that I compost. And I’ll tell people, I’m composting. You know, past neighbors, look, I’m composting.

 

So it actually is fun. I think the bottom line and the final thing that I wanna ask you is, how do we show people that this is a fun lifestyle, that it’s an adventure, that it’s joyous? You’ve talked about your incredible tours that I’ve heard so much about and it’s on my bucket list.

 

I definitely wanna take one of your tours with World Vegan Travel and the Joyful Vegan. How do we let people know that this is the most fun lifestyle on earth?

 

[Speaker 1]

Well, like we said, I mean, if all we talk about is doom and gloom, and if we use language that makes it sound like it’s inaccessible, and if we talk about it in a way that makes it sound like it’s hard, you know, I just think it’s not gonna be appealing or attractive to people. And so I’m not talking about being an authentic. I’m not talking about, you know, being a Pollyanna and just walking around like everything’s fine.

 

But I do think if we think there’s any joy and value in living this way, then that’s what we should be reflecting outwardly. And people are attracted to that, Jane. People are looking for reasons to feel hopeful.

 

People are looking for things to do. We also have to be compassionate to everybody wherever they are in this journey. So if someone comes to us and says, I’ve tried, I’m trying, I stopped eating chicken three times a week, but I’m still eating pork and beef, instead of just saying, well, that’s not good enough, you need to do more than that, bring them in to your experience rather than push them away and rather than making them feel bad.

 

So I think there’s a lot we can do in the way we talk about it, the way we frame it, and certainly the way we show up. Because if we just show up angry and grumpy all the time, no one’s gonna wanna be part of that. So we model what we want people to experience.

 

And I think there’s a lot of reasons to be hopeful and joyful, as you said, I think it is the most incredible way to live to be able to wake up every morning and know that I, in my behavior just today, in my little life, that I can do so much to not contribute to harm, to actually contribute to compassion and to the wellbeing of others. Like, how does it get any better than that? I just don’t think it does.

 

And so if we can reflect that and live that, I think other people will want it.

 

[Speaker 2]

I am so thrilled. I know you’re a very busy person. Thank you for taking the time to be here today.

 

The book, you gotta get this book. It’s absolutely fantastic. It is life-changing, also a great gift What a non-shaming way to let folks that you love know, hey, here’s a way you can increase your compassion.

 

And it’s not a scold, it’s a gift. So actually, especially because it doesn’t really have the word vegan, which you’re right, can sometimes create a little backlash in the title and it actually doesn’t even have it on the cover at all. I think that’s a great book.

 

Actually, I’m getting it. I’m getting it. There’s a whole bunch of people that I already wanna give it to.

 

I’m going to a birthday party this weekend and I would like to give that person who’s definitely not vegan a copy of your book. So thank you so much for joining us. And as always, please support Unshamed TV.

 

We are the world’s only free vegan and animal rights streaming television network. You are free to download on your phone, on your TV with streaming devices. You can also just watch us online.

 

So it’s a vegan Netflix. Okay, that’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard. I love Unshamed TV.

 

[Speaker 1]

Unshamed, Unshamed TV. Your life will change, it’s just that easy. Unshamed TV has all sorts of content for everybody.

 

Unshamed TV changed my life. Unshamed TV is crushing it. I love Unshamed TV.

 

Unshamed TV is my go-to. Unshamed TV, who knew?

 

[Speaker 2]

Unshamed TV, yes!