I went vegan for a month at Ohio Northern University.
I’ve explained my journey through the five stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance). Now, it’s time to take a step back and look at the bigger picture.
February and its 28 meatless days will forever hold a special place in my heart. Each day felt like an adventure. Each day forced me to step out of my comfort zone. Each day taught me a lesson that I will not soon forget.
While it was only 28 days, I can confidently say that I have grown immensely throughout this experience. The person that I was on January 31st is not the person that I am today.
There is something so powerful, so groundbreaking about recognizing a wrong in the world and looking within yourself for change.
Throughout February, I often questioned why I would put myself through such a demanding diet when my sacrifice wasn’t going to have a big effect. Even after being vegan for a month, factory farming still exists, climate change still persists, and over 6 billion people still resist changing their meat-eating habits. In the grand scheme of things, my month-long shift at the vegan factory didn’t do much to solve major issues.
However, the goal should have never been to change the world, but rather to change myself. To change myself into an individual whose actions align with my morals. To change myself according to the virtues that I value. And, I know it sounds cliché, but to change myself into the change I want to see in the world.
I am only one person. You are also only one person. There aren’t many things in this world that we can truly control. However, we can make a conscious effort to mold our own actions and to mold our interactions with one another and the world around us. These efforts won’t make us perfect people or create some sort of perfect world, but they do indicate that they are learning and trying, which is far better than ignoring and dying.
The veganism pitch is tough. Giving up so many delicious and sentimental foods and drastically changing your lifestyle is scary. At first glance, it seems like an impossible task.
There are many excellent philosophical arguments that command us to go vegan. They are compelling, but they are dense and often feel so detached from reality.
The real argument is simple. You know it’s wrong. Deep down, in your heart of hearts, you know that our current practices of meat consumption are severely flawed. If you haven’t in a while, look up “factory farming” and scroll through the images. Can’t you feel your heart drop? Doesn’t something feel wrong about treating animals like that?
Our culture loves to glorify “cute” animals and heartwarming animal rescue videos, but then it expects you to pay no mind to the atrocities that occur to get a burger on your plate. The whiplash is unbearable.
It leaves us with cognitive dissonance as we are led to believe that animal abuse is bad, but only when it doesn’t benefit you or the economy. We are led to believe that animals have value, but only when we put a collar on them and name something like “Buddy” or “Fluffy”. We are led to believe that living, breathing, and cognitive animals right in front of you are not the same as the chicken wings on your plate.
They are leading us into a lie. A lie that you buy without thinking twice. A lie that you’ve convinced yourself is true over and over again.
It doesn’t have to be that way.
Societal norms and societal lies are daunting to break. Sure, you could go vegan, but what will your friends think? What would you eat at your favorite restaurants? What will you do for the holidays? Will people judge you? Will they think you’re problematic?
These questions aren’t simple, but their answers cower in insignificance when you begin to consider this question instead:
Do your actions align with your morals?
If the answer is no, it doesn’t have to stay that way. Start today with something small. If your goal is to be vegan, then be vegan one day a week or try vegetarianism. Living in accordance with your values for just one day is better than a lifetime of never having the courage to try.
While it might not have changed the world, my veganism journey has certainly changed my world forever. I might not be a full-time vegan right now, but the consciousness I learned from that experience is something I hope to carry with me for the rest of my life.
I’ll end with a story. During my month of veganism, I was elected Vice President of Ohio Northern’s Student Senate. Each semester, the Student Senate holds an event where we give out free donuts to students the week before finals. In my new position, I was adamant that we offer a variety of donuts so that every student, regardless of their dietary restrictions, could enjoy this event. It was supposed to be easy. We found pre-made vegan and gluten-free donuts that were supposedly sold at Walmart. Two days before the event, we realized that our local Walmart didn’t carry these special dietary donuts, and it was too late to order them online.
We spent the next hour desperately calling donut shops and getting shot down shop after shop. There was debate about going a different route. I thought back to my vegan days, and my brain was flooded with memories of missing out and being denied so many simple pleasures like free donuts. At that moment, I firmly decided that we were going to get these special dietary donuts if it killed me. Finally, I found a donut shop an hour away with gluten-free donuts, and we found a recipe for vegan donuts online. Against all tradition, we made a Walmart run the night before and stayed up until 2AM baking a beautiful dozen vegan donuts by ourselves. Just three short hours later, I woke up at 5AM and got ready to drive an hour to the gluten-free bakery and an hour back before our event at 7:30AM. I got back to ONU at 7:28AM, and the event started without a hitch.
Some might call this crazy, and they might be right, but I’d rather be crazy a thousand times before I ever exclude someone based on their brave decision to align their actions with their morals. The excited faces of the gluten-free, dairy-free, and vegan students when they realized that they could have a donut were worth more to me than I could ever describe.
I am only one person, but I’m learning and I’m trying. The more I learn and I try, the better my world becomes.
I went vegan for a month at Ohio Northern University, and I implore you to try veganism for yourself.
Follow @sunnygoesvegan on Instagram to see my journey in video form.