On a recent trip the to grocery store, I had an experience at the checkout stand that ruffled my feathers more than a little. I had selected one lovely, ripe avocado for my evening salad, an avocado that apparently lacked a sticker, because the cashier asked me, “Is this avocado conventional or sustainable?”

I knew immediately what she was asking, she wanted to know whether she should be charging me the higher price for an organic avocado or not. I supplied the answer she was looking for, the avocado was organic, but it took me several more minutes to sort out the source of my sudden irritation.

I later realized the thing I was reacting to was the use of “sustainable” as the latest cultural buzzword, following closely on the heels of green, organic and natural.

New awareness and new options require a new vocabulary, and I realize that as our collective consciousness shifts towards valuing a more, dare I say it, “eco-friendly” lifestyle, we are going to experience linguistic growing pains. I also accept that where the cultural winds blow, marketing spin is sure to follow.

But what I really cannot abide is when words are used so haphazardly that they eventually begin to mean nothing. I fear “sustainable” is in danger of meeting such an inglorious end. So, for the record, I want to clarify that “sustainable” is not synonymous with “organic” – and I’m even going to go so far as to say that produce can be organic and not sustainable.

“How can this be so?” you might ask. Let me answer you with a question. In fact, let me answer with all the questions that came tumbling into my mind as I left the grocery store with my organic avocado:

“Where was this avocado grown? Was it trucked in fromCalifornia, flown in fromMexicoorBrazil? What really causes more harm to the earth, an organic avocado fromBrazilor a conventional one from a neighboring state? What kind of lifestyle are the agricultural workers leading who picked and packed this avocado, how many hours are they working in a day? Do they have health insurance, lunch breaks, toilets that flush? In what conditions are these avocados being grown, is the soil depleted, is the irrigation draining an aquifer?”

Sustainable means exactly that: it means you can continue without an end in sight, without straining, exhausting or causing imbalance. Refraining from using agricultural chemicals is one great step towards making something sustainable, but there is so much more that goes into creating a sustainable world. I daresay there is no precise checklist yet invented that can measure whether a specific product is sustainable.

Rather, achieving a sustainable world is going to take a constant process of assessment and recalibration. It’s going to mean each of us getting into the habit of asking ourselves, “How are these choices making me feel? Is this something I can continue to do / eat / live without, or am I heading towards an eventual crash?”

Here at Livin’ Spoonful, we know that even well intentioned changes can miss the mark: your ambitious new exercise regime, your 15-point elimination diet. We believe that developing a sustainable lifestyle means tuning in to the voice of inner wisdom that speaks to you with mercy and compassion, that always knows when something feels like a healthy choice and something feels like too little or too much.

We want to empower everyone to make sustainable choices for their lives and their families, by learning to listen to that inner knowing, and we hope to learn and laugh with you as we share our own experiences with finding that balance in our own lives.