Living the Simple Life

by Elaine St James

  8. Remember a Time When You Were Truly Happy

  Ask anyone who is past the age of 35 to recall a time when they were truly happy. Most people will say they’re pretty happy now, though they may admit they sometimes feel overwhelmed by the demands of life these days.

  If you press them further, a lot of people will remember a time in their youth, perhaps a particularly wonderful summer when they had few cares or responsibilities and spent seemingly endless weeks fishing on a quiet stream or lazing by the neighborhood pool.

  Or perhaps they’ll remember the joy of being young and single, or of being newly married and madly in love. They had few possessions to weigh them down, no house payment, maybe only a small car payment. They worked hard, but work didn’t consume all their time and energy. Mostly they didn’t worry about health insurance, life insurance, home insurance, interest rates, the Dow, or taxes. Life was simple.

  Most of us wouldn’t go back to being young and totally independent and having nothing at all to call our own. But many of us would like to recapture the feeling of those carefree days.

  And sometimes, in the midst of simplifying, things can get overwhelming. If you’re changing jobs, reducing your income, letting go of the clutter, cleaning up relationships, dealing with some of the inner issues, or changing your long-established habit patterns, life can, in the short term, seem pretty complicated.

  So reconstruct your fond memories of happy, simpler times. Let them help create a clear picture of what simple living means for you. It will stand as a beacon for you in the process of getting back to the simple life.

  9. Be Willing to Change the Way You Play the Game

  Often one of the stumbling blocks to living a simpler life is our inability or unwillingness to change how we play some of the games that got us into these complicated lives in the first place.

  For example, for many years I was driven by the “need” to maintain our home to certain standards of cleanliness, organization, efficiency, and so-called style. After we’d taken some of our first steps toward simplifying, such as moving to the smaller place and changing a lot of our buying patterns, I realized this was one area in which I wanted to make some significant changes.

  When the town we live in was considering rationing water because of severe drought conditions, we made the decision to cut back on the amount of laundry we wash. This meant wearing our clothes a bit longer than we’d been used to, and not changing the sheets and towels every week as I’d always done.

  To my surprise, I didn’t have a problem with wearing our clothes longer between washings. Gibbs was once editor of Yachting magazine, so we’ve spent a lot of time on boats over the years and learned how to stand downwind from people!

  But I grew up, as many of us did, in a household where we changed the sheets and towels every single week no matter what, so I had some difficulty reducing the frequency with which we laundered the linens.

  Fortunately, my younger stepson, Eric, who had recently graduated from college, gave me some sage advice. He said, “Elaine, relax. I went for four years without changing the sheets.”

  The drought forced us to change the way we had always done the laundering chore. But Eric’s comment helped me put things in perspective, and I began to see how approaching that weekly task differently had simplified our lives.

  Gradually, I started to change some of my other expectations, such as how spotless my glasswear was or how clean my floors had to be. I began to look carefully at some of the routine household chores I’d always considered sacrosanct, such as the idea that our clothes have to be whiter than white, that our blues have to be bluer than blue, that our mirrors have to shine with a brilliant luster, or that our hardwood tabletops have to be polished to a blinding brightness.

  When you examine these precepts closely you begin to see how absurd they are. Has anyone ever been fired for having a ring around the inside of a shirt collar? Is our spaghetti bolognese less delectable because we can’t see our reflection off the side of the pan? Would houseguests actually leave, never to return again, if we didn’t use fabric softener on our bath towels?

  This is not to suggest that we eliminate housecleaning or laundry routines altogether, but simply that it’s possible to think of doing them differently, or that we can set our own standards rather than dutifully accepting those advertised by cleaning product manufacturers.

  Few of these dictates were determined by actual need, or even by our desires. They were set in the boardrooms of UniLever, Bristol Myers/Squibb, and Johnson Wax, among others. Many dollars are spent each year to get us to accept these and countless other ideals as our own. We’ve been made to feel inadequate, incompetent, insecure, dissatisfied, and socially unacceptable if we don’t meet them at every level.

  In the last thirty years we’ve given up time with our families, our leisure time, our sleep time, our money, our rapidly depleting energy, and our own free choice in varying attempts to maintain many of these conventions. In doing so we have generously lined the pockets of a couple hundred corporate executives while vastly complicating our own lives.

  Household cleaning routines are only one area in which we’ve abandoned our freedom of choice to the strategies of marketing gurus. Few areas of our lives are untouched by products that are designed for the sole purpose of getting us to feel insecure enough to part with our money. Our tastes in clothing, personal hygiene, health care, food, travel, automobiles, children’s toys, and practically everything else is manipulated by the pronouncements of those cunning advertising demons.

  I don’t claim to have been able to free myself completely from all of these mostly preposterous decrees. Far from it. I’m still emotionally attached to my BMW, and it’s unlikely I’ll ever be able to let go of my Revlon-generated need for lipstick. But becoming aware of the origin of a lot of these attachments has made it possible for me to simplify in many other areas.

  It’s sometimes difficult to know where to draw the line. But as you start to think about ways you could simplify, become mindful of the number of things you do each day because of standards that were set in a marketing session at Procter & Gamble.

  10. You Can Have a Simpler Job

  For many of us, our jobs and our work schedules have been one of the major complications of our lives. Our material well-being depends on our paycheck. Without our monthly income how could we eat or make the mortgage or the car payments? Without our jobs, the whole house of cards would come tumbling down. Often our very identity depends on our being employed.

  And so I often hear people say, “I can’t simplify my life as long as I’ve got to make a living.”

  But if you’ve got a demanding, time-consuming job, that alone might be sufficient reason to simplify your life.

  As we’ve seen, many people have already made changes in their lifestyle or are thinking about the possibility of downshifting, or possibly changing their career path altogether so they can free up time to spend with their families, or to create more leisure time.

  According to a survey conducted by the Merck Family Fund, 28 percent of working adults said they had voluntarily reduced their income in the last five years because of changes in their priorities. Others are being forced to make such changes due to corporate downsizing and changes in the economy.

  But if you’re like I was a few years back, you may not be open to the possibility of making career changes right now. You could well be thinking, as I did, “You gotta be kidding. There’s no way I could quit my job. And I could certainly never work part time. How could I support or help support my lifestyle if I did? I’ve got to make a living.”

  And, most likely, at this moment it’s true: You can’t quit your job. Not today. Not tomorrow. Maybe not next month. Maybe not even next year.

  Once I could see my way clear to simplifying my life, it was not that big a step to begin cutting my workday back to eight or nine hours. But it was several years before I could seriously think about unloading the real estate and doing so
mething else. In the midst of a complicated life, it often is impossible to change jobs, or even to think about it.

  So if the thought of making changes in your job picture presses all your buttons, don’t even think about it now. Instead, look at all the other areas of your life you can simplify.

  Simplifying in other areas will give you some breathing room. It’ll give you more time. It’ll give you more energy. It will reduce many of the financial pressures—if you’re living more simply, you’ll simply be spending less money.

  Having more time and less stress will open your mind to possibilities you may not even be able to think about now. And eventually, as you pare away all the extraneous stuff, a new way of approaching your present job or an entirely different career option may be staring you in the face.

  Yes, most of us have to make a living. And we have to look at ways we can support ourselves not only now, but throughout our retirement years. But if Vicki Robin and Joe Dominguez, authors of Your Money or Your Life, have been able to live on $500 a month for the past twenty years, then many things are possible in terms of career and employment changes for all of us.

  This doesn’t mean we all can live on $500 a month, but it shows us that it is possible to live, and live well and happily, on a lot less than we’ve led ourselves to believe.

  By slowing down, by simplifying, by breaking some of our consuming and spending habits, by teaching our kids simple pleasures, and by adopting simple pleasures ourselves, we can create a beautiful, happy, fulfilling life. And we won’t have to work as hard as we have been to maintain it.

  11. You Can Live a Simpler Life

  I spoke to a bookstore owner recently who described people’s reactions when they came up to the cash register with their books and saw a copy of Simplify Your Life sitting in a stack on the counter. Time and again he saw people pick up the book and read the title. And then they’d laugh. He said they laughed right out loud because the idea that anyone could actually simplify his or her life in this day and age seemed so preposterous.

  But, while waiting for their purchases to be totaled up, they’d flip through the book, just out of curiosity.

  Then they’d say, “Ah, yes, if I dropped call waiting, that would simplify my life.”

  Or, “Yes, if I didn’t have to answer the phone every time it rings, that would simplify my life.”

  Or, “Yes, if I started doing just one thing at a time, that would simplify my life. And if I cleaned up my relationships, that would really simplify my life.”

  And they began to get the idea that there are things we can do to simplify. Easy things—like leaving our shoes at the front door or changing the way we do the holidays—that would make a difference.

  They also see there are other steps—like changing our expectations, or learning to forgive, or getting out of debt—that are more difficult perhaps, but are possible, and that would significantly reduce the complexity of our lives.

  But I understand the initial skepticism. At first glance, the idea of creating a simple life often seems out of the question.

  When we’re in the midst of a complicated life, we think it would be impossible to slow down. When we’re constantly racing against the clock, it feels like there’s no way to create some extra time. When we’re so exhausted from moving ninety miles an hour, we’re certain we don’t have the energy to figure out how to do things differently.

  When we’re torn between the pressures of work, the demands of our children, and the needs of our inner selves, it feels as though there’s no way we could add one more thing, like simplifying, to our list of things to do.

  But it is possible. And there’s a magical, almost exponential quality about time. Once you free up even a little bit of it, other ways will start occurring to you to help free up even more.

  If you don’t know where to begin, start with one of the easy steps outlined in the next chapter.

  TWO

  Getting Started

  12. A First Step

  People frequently ask me, “How can I possibly simplify my life? I’m working too hard. I’m moving too fast. I’ve got my career, my marriage, the kids, the mortgage payment, and the car payments to think about. My life is too complicated for me to take the time to stop and simplify.”

  I know exactly what they mean. My life was that complicated a few years back. Even if I could stop for a bit, I felt I wouldn’t know where to begin. But finally, as many of us have, I reached the point of desperation. I had to start making some changes, and begin to simplify my life.

  But it didn’t happen overnight. It took us several years of concerted effort to create a simpler life.

  This is not to say that everything we did to simplify was difficult. Far from it. There were many things—like changing our exercise regimen, spending more time in nature, and creating time for solitude—that were relatively easy and gave us immediate relief.

  But if you’ve been living what we have come to think of as a normal life in this culture, it’s unreasonable to expect that you can simplify your entire life this Saturday between noon and 3 p.m. Realistically, it’s just not going to happen.

  Simplifying is a process. It no doubt took you years to build your complicated, high-pressure life. It will take some time to simplify it. You can’t undo it all today. But you can get started today.

  To start simplifying the only thing you have to do right now is decide that you really want to simplify, and then schedule some time to think about it. That’s it. Making that decision and setting aside the time is enough for one day.

  How much time do you need to schedule? It depends to some extent on how complicated your life is and how adept you are at changing gears. When I decided to simplify, I scheduled a four-day weekend at a local retreat house. It took a day and a half for me to unwind enough just to get to the point where I could begin to think clearly about my life. If you mull it over for a few minutes, you’ll know whether you can get started in an afternoon, or whether you need a couple of days or more.

  A weekend provides a reasonable amount of time for most people. If you have a very complicated life, you may need that much time just to get into the process.

  If you feel you can’t take the whole weekend right now, take half of it. If you can’t spend a whole day, then take half a day.

  In the next week, just schedule whatever time you think it’ll take. That’s the first step.

  Don’t underestimate the tremendous power of taking a simple step like this. An amazing thing starts to happen when you begin to simplify your life: Each step you take will make it easier for you to take the next step. I promise you, if you make the decision to simplify, and commit to it, incredible things will happen.

  13. Ten Ways to Free Up an Hour or More Each Day for the Next Thirty Days, So You Can Start Thinking about How to Simplify Your Life

  If you feel your schedule is so jammed that you don’t see how you could slow down enough to even begin thinking about simplifying, take a few moments to consider some of the suggestions here.

  This is a list of reasonably painless ways to free up an hour or more each day—that’s ten to twenty hours each week—for the next month.

  For right now, you don’t have to think of these as long-term changes—or as something you’ll have to do forever in order to create more time for yourself—although you may ultimately want to incorporate many of them into your simple life.

  There may only be a couple of ideas that apply to your life at the moment. Pick one (or two or more) that will work for you, and stick with it for thirty days:

  If your job allows, quit work an hour earlier than you usually do and use that time to think about your life.

  If your job allows, start work an hour later than you usually do and use the quiet time at home—after everyone else has gone—to think about your life.

  If possible, stay at your office an hour later than you usually do, and use the time to think about your life. Do this only if you can be certain you will have
uninterrupted time there.

  Get up an hour earlier. This may also mean you go to bed an hour earlier; but an hour in the morning when you’re rested and refreshed is worth two hours at the end of the day when you’re exhausted.

  Stop watching TV news.

  Stop watching TV (period). Unplug it and move it to an out-of-the-way spot if necessary. Do this even if you believe watching television relaxes you. It may, but it also programs you—in ways we’re often not even conscious of—to continue to complicate your life. And it clutters up your mind with distractions that keep you feeling overwhelmed.

  Don’t schedule any lunch dates.

  Don’t schedule any after-work social hours. No coffees. No pre-dinner drinks. No dinners. No after-dinner drinks.

  Stop reading the daily newspaper. (It’s only for a month!)

  Change your exercise regimen. For example, cut your daily program in half. Or, if you commute to a gym or an aerobics class, exercise at home and save the commute time. Or exercise just two or three days a week. Be creative here; it’s only for thirty days.

  14. Ten Ways to Free Up Miscellaneous Amounts of Time over the Next Thirty Days, So You Can Start Thinking about How to Simplify Your Life

  Many of these ideas are not only about freeing up time, they’re also about reducing the physical, mental, and emotional static that constantly occupies our minds, drains our energy, and keeps us from being in touch with how we would live our lives if we didn’t have so many distractions.

  Plan to stay off the phone, except for business or for emergencies. Announce to family and friends that you won’t be chatting on the phone for the next month. (You might be astounded at how much time you save and how much internal noise you eliminate each day by cutting back on your social phone calls.)