A Beginner’s Guide to Reducing Plastic in Your Life

If you’re just learning about the plastic pollution crisis, it can be overwhelming. Maybe you can’t stop thinking about how all of the plastic, everywhere, all around you, is affecting your health. Maybe drinking from a plastic water bottle feels different now, and so does storing your food in plastic containers, and eating out of plastic take-out boxes. You know there’s a real problem here, but where on Earth do you even start to try to fix it?

First, take a deep breath and recognize that big change doesn’t happen overnight: Reducing plastic in your life is a journey with many steps and choices, not a single, dramatic glow-up or immediate shift. What is reasonable change for you might not be feasible for another person. And that’s ok—after all, it’s not just individual actions that make a difference. To best protect human health, especially on the heavily polluted industrial fencelines and frontlines of plastic pollution, we need big-picture solutions that help to turn off the plastic tap.

But for right now, to help you make changes to reduce plastic in your life and make a positive difference for your body and your family, we’ve created this guide to break down the most actionable and helpful steps you can take today.