Pretend to Save the World: A Formulator's Mindset to Sustainable Cosmetics

In a podcast starring Rich & Rox of ADHD Love, Rox shared how Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria (RSD) influenced her music career. For 20 years, she hesitated, convinced everyone would hate her work. Now, after therapy and a 'micro-dose' in self-confidence, realises that ADHD comes with a superpower.

Many with ADHD, especially women, often "mask" by pretending to be neurotypical.

"If I just pretend to be a rockstar and I do that often enough, I might even become one" - Roxanne Emery

This concept sparked a thought: What if we applied this mindset to tackle social and environmental issues?

Calling All Formulators: Let's Pretend We Can Fix Climate Change

Imagine you alone have the power to heal our planet. How would this affect your formulations?

How would your next formulation turn out? Would it be packed in a virgin plastic jar? Would it contain ingredients from all over the globe? Would people be exploited for the ingredients? Would there be microplastics in there? Chemicals that are non-biodegradable that are linked to hormonal imbalance in mammals? Would you pick the cheap vegetable oil or the fair trade cold pressed organic version?

Imagine this isn't fantasy, but you do have the power to fix climate change, social issues, biodiversity loss. Because you do. The cosmetics industry has a large footprint, although it is hard to measure. My personal guess is that 80% of the cosmetics products use 20% of the options in raw materials and packaging.

What if you could be the trendsetter to make those 20% the most sustainable options you can think of and lead the way into a sustainable cosmetics industry.

Start your next workday with this mindset: Formulate as if you alone can fix climate change.

“We don’t have to engage in grand, heroic actions to participate in change. Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world.” - Howard Zinn