Voluntary Simplicity (Part 1)

It never ceases to amaze me how the Universe always provides exactly what you need at the exact moment you need it, in exact alignment with you demonstrating exactly what you want.

This weekend, the January 2009 issue of "O" magazine landed in my lap. It had been a prop for a play I was producing, and when we closed the show Saturday night, I started to throw it away but at the last minute decided instead to take it home for recycling.

Then, on Sunday, I was suffering a bit of a stomachache, so I left church early and went home to bed. There next to the bed was the magazine. I picked it up and started reading an article called Back to Basics by Allison Glock.

The headline reads:

Overwhelmed by consumerism and sobered by the economy, more Americans are embracing the less-is-more philosophy of "voluntary simplicity," trading possession obsession for personal fulfillment. Allison Block drops in on a few devoted followers and discovers that for them, enough really is enough.

I read the article with enthusiasm. After all, I was once part of the voluntary simplicity movement--sort of.

I grew up in a cluttered home. Three bedrooms, two bathrooms, two living areas, and four people, we should have had plenty of room, but stuff was everywhere. So much so that although we had both a dining room table and a "breakfast bar" (a counter extended from the kitchen that my brother and I fondly referred to as "the restaurant"), we could only eat at one of them, because the other was piled with "stuff." My mom, a collector of sentimental memorabilia and "just in case" doodads, would say, "We're messy, not dirty."

For as long as I can remember, I hated it. In fact, I used to lie on the floor, look up, and wish that I lived on the ceiling--there, everything was clean and empty.

Now, in the interest of full disclosure, I will admit that my own room was no better than the rest of the house. After all, although I dreamed of a better life, I didn't know how to accomplish it, and even as an adult I struggle with "stuff"--my ideal of owning nothing constantly battling my ingrained belief that "I should have..."

So it was with great excitement that I found the voluntary simplicity community a few years ago. I really believed that they could help me reconcile my ideal with my reality.

Unfortunately, the particular group that I joined was more interested in anti-consumerism than simplicity. In fact, it seemed to me that the lengths that they went to to scrimp and save and recycle and avoid buying anything was actually complicating their lives. It wasn't what I wanted--it just didn't resonant with me. It sounds silly, but one of the great moments of my life came the day that I realized I could throw away a paper clip. Let me explain.

I keep my paperclips in a box behind my desk in my basement office. I live in a three story house. If I came across a loose paperclip anywhere else in the house, I used to hold onto it, keep track of it, put it where I could see it, try to remember it, and eventually make sure it made its way to the box of paperclips behind my desk in my basement office. Not a lot of work, but a lot of mental energy.

Then one day I had a revelation--I realized that I could actually throw away a paper clip. This was unheard of. It wasn't done. It was wasteful. It was irresponsible! Ah, but it was freedom.

That was the kind of simplicity I was looking for, and so I left the group.

I had nearly forgotten all about the movement until I picked up the magazine on Sunday.

Click here for Part 2.