About 8 years ago, I embarked on a journey toward better health. After awhile it turned into creating a healthier home overall for my family.

At first, this mainly involved making better food choices for myself. Then, as I started to get educated, it evolved into buying better-sourced food for my family. Eventually, I was diving nose-deep into all things clean living.

Most people, myself included, would draw the logical conclusion that if something says “all-natural” or “plant-based” or “eco-friendly” it is safe. NOPE! That is not always true. Have you ever heard of “greenwashing”? Neither had I, until recently. According to Investopedia, Greenwashing is the “process of conveying a false impression or providing misleading information about how a company’s products are more environmentally sound. …Greenwashing is a play on the term “whitewashing,” which means using misleading information to gloss over bad behavior.”

In other words, Something can be labeled “all-natural” as long as it doesn’t have any synthetic or artificial ingredients. But there are plenty of chemicals that are not man-made that can kill us.

RELATED: My Favorite Non-Toxic Beauty Products

So, it would stand to reason that you can just start reading ingredient labels. Well, that is a good start but who can decipher all those unpronounceable names on labels? Not me. AND, I have found as my education on the subject has grown, that not all the scary-looking words on labels are bad. Some are just very scientific.

What’s a girl to do?

Well, here are 5 things you can start today that are pretty simple, to get on the road to a healthier home and family.

5 Things You Can Do to Have a Healthier Home

1. Let’s start with food. Shop the outside of the grocery store for real, whole foods as much as possible. When shopping the isles, look up. The healthier foods tend to be on the higher shelves (just out of eye level. So sneaky.) And when you can, opt for organic produce, grass-fed beef, and free-range chicken (or eggs from those chickens). Yes, it may be a little more expensive, but so are doctors’ bills.

2. Educate yourself. Explore the EWG (Environmental Working Group) website and download the app. They have literally spent decades doing all the research you wish you had time for on which products are safe. The app even gives products in its database number ratings that are color-coded (Green, Yellow, and Red) so you can feel good about where you are spending your money.

Another great site is I Read Labels For You. She literally does 😊

3. Switch out your personal care products (soap, shampoo, deodorant, baby lotion, toothpaste, etc.) Of the chemicals typically found in products people are buying every day – 884 of them are known to be toxic. 884! I’m going to let that sink in a bit. You can find great, effective, clean-label products that won’t break that bank and are better choices for your health. I wrote a blog post all about my favs if you’d like to read it.

The THINK DIRTY app is also great for scanning labels while you are at the store to check for toxic load.

You don’t have to throw everything out all at once (unless your budget will support something like that). AS you run out of something, make a more informed choice for its replacement. If you want to see what we use in our home, you can check those out here.

4. Trade in your toxic cleaning household products. I know – that is a super scary statement. Especially as we are trying to disinfect our homes more these days after our 2020 experience. But there are ways to have a clean home without have a toxin-filled home.

A SMART SCORE book was created for the brand I use most. Some of the products you will see in the book have been replaced with updated versions, but you will get an idea about how many toxins are in the products that may be in your home currently. If you want to explore replacing your current brand with my favs – you can look into it here.

5. Buy some indoor plants. Our indoor air quality is abysmal. It’s a combination of all the products that are releasing toxins into the air and our updated energy-efficient homes that seal up all the “leaks”. Adding some living green things to your home not only provides beauty, but it can increase oxygen and remove toxins like benzene, formaldehyde, trichloroethylene, xylene, and toluene. Here is an article that lists the best plants to get.

Hopefully, this is more helpful than overwhelming. It’s a journey, and those typically take time. So, give yourself some grace where needed. Even baby steps are moving in the right direction.