The weather is crazy right now. There really isn't a better way to say it. I’ve been alive for 20 years and have witnessed devastation from many serious storms. Severe weather is bound to happen every year in some form, but it seems like major disasters are becoming more common. Every time on of these storms hits, meteorologists and experts say “a storm like this hasn’t hit this area in 50+ years”. But with two major hurricanes coming from the Atlantic and destroying island nations and U.S. coastlines, forcing millions of people to evacuate their homes in a two week span, something doesn’t seem quite right.

Some say that “hurricane season is just bad this year” or “this is just the time of year when these things happen, it’s a fluke”.

Sorry it’s not a fluke.

The influx of severe storms and weather in the last few years is unbelievable and I find it hard to believe that it is just happening “by accident”. While the conditions in the weather may be right to create such storms, the fact that these storms keep happening year after year and are getting stronger must mean something has to be changing with our climate.

Now it cannot be proven that climate change is to blame for these storms, but there is evidence that the world’s average temperature has risen by 1 degree, making the oceans warmer and slowly melting the icecaps melting and I find it hard to believe that these numbers are lying.

I watched a documentary last fall entitled “ How to Let Go of The World and Love All Things Climate Can’t Change” directed by Josh Fox. Fox travels around the world and observed the areas of the world that are living with drastic changes in their lifestyles because of changing patterns in nature, mostly due to pollution. He went to the East Coast and interviewed people whose homes were destroyed by Superstorm Sandy, the Amazon rainforest where drinking water and fish populations have been poisoned by oil spills from deforestation companies, the Pacific Islands, where the people decided to peacefully protest oil companies drilling in their oceans and adding to the pollution that was causing massive storms, flooding and sometimes wiping out their homes. He even went to China, where the pollution was so dense, that people check the air quality like the weather and somedays stay indoors because the pollution is too high. However, part of problem is how heavily the rest of the world relies on China’s industrial production, causing a fair amount of their pollution.

That’s right, the rest of the world is contributing to China’s pollution, just by importing the products we use every day. We as a population could change our habits, but that would mean changing how we live. However, acknowledging that our actions have consequences and trying to be more mindful that what we do today will change the world we live in for the next generation and beyond.

The point of Fox’s documentary is that these storms may not be in our backyard right now, but it is in somebody’s and I don’t think they asked for it or know how to stop it. I am just as guilty of living with this reality because you don’t see me making my own clothes, walking everywhere or giving up my Apple products for our environment. But for now, I can support that a change needs to be made and try to convince the people who make the changes that we should be using our resources for our environment, because nobody will have the next big thing if we don't have a safe environment to create it.

So I’m a believer in awareness and teamwork. Nobody can “blow” Hurricane Irma, Jose, Katia or what ever the next storm will be called with a fan (even though I find that really funny), but maybe we can use our minds and hearts to give our planet a little love and find solutions where I can wear clean clothes and not feel bad that I’m preventing some little girl in China from going outside. People are working HARD at solving this BIG problem, and they are just as much a hero as the people who defend our countries, protect our cities and heal our bodies and minds when we are sick.

So to all the people impacted by these storms in the past, right now and in the future, I’m praying for you and I’m sorry that the storm chose to came to your backyard. NOBODY deserves this, but it will come and it is up to us if we want to believe if it is a fluke or not.