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View Full Version : Its tough to live simply sometimes, the spiral of change.....



sylvia
6-2-16, 2:23pm
Yes it's been work to tackle the challenge of living simply. To rewire your thinking, change your habits, most decisions have three fold meaning, I am trying zero waste living but that is impossible and time consuming. All I can do it just recycle and reuse. It feels like a spiral and to throw in my minimalistic tendencies I feel like living in Zen like home in Japan would be my answer. Has anyone been there or experience Japanese home traditions, like taking your shoes off etc.We now have a baby and I buy used and toys too. So I am waiting for inspiration in continuing my journey which sometimes isnt so simple or practical. Lately I leaning to what is easiest.Any similar experiences?:confused:

shadowmoss
6-2-16, 5:03pm
I think we all need to just find what we can do that is sustainable in our own lives. Whenever there is an option that is more frugal/simple/less waste that is available that we can do on a long term basis, we take that option. The biggest effect, I think, is what we do long term. The small things we do every day to move to the more simple lifestyle and make us feel good. The rest will come with time. Right now may not be the time to try to go all-in on simple and zero waste all the time.

SteveinMN
6-3-16, 6:22pm
No experience living in a zen-like environment. But I will note that, for the last two weeks, we've had our daughter, SiL, and their 9-month-old baby living with us as they are between houses at the moment. And there is almost nothing about a baby that encourages a zen-like environment. :) So much stuff -- diapers (disposable in their case; they started with cloth and just got overwhelmed); bottles, bottle cleaners, and the little cage for bottle parts that goes in the dishwasher; little food packets; toys; the "go bag" for grandparents and day care; the tanks that pass for car seats and strollers now; ... Plus the lack of a dependable timetable; you're on call for eating, sleeping, soothing, bringing the little one home from day care when (s)he's sick, and other good reasons.

And it seems so much of what a baby uses is not recyclable. Maybe it could be more so for some families, but for relatively young people working two career-type jobs, taking the time to be more environmentally aware falls well behind baby-care time and parent-care time.

So this may not be an optimal time to try to simplify life, at least in that regard.

Chicken lady
6-3-16, 6:59pm
I don't wear shoes in the house. That's pretty easy.

Dhiana
6-3-16, 10:21pm
Spent 11 years in Japan learning some of the ways their lives are simpler/less cluttered.
Learned a lot!! But dont forget, the KonMari method sprung from the same issues you are having.

To start, most things are just plain smaller.
The washers we had were smaller, they hang their clothes out to dry.
Smaller dishes, smaller apartments, smaller homes.

Smaller refridgerator made me more mindful of what I purchased. Less waste.
Most people walked to the grocer or used their stellar public transportation
so one can only carry so much food home.

One can only carry so much stuff/clothes back home.
Many places did not have an oven. If one does it is also the same machine
as your microwave. Very smart.

Many people do not have cars.

Great recycling, a different kind of garbage/recycling is picked up 6 days per week.

They are only now just getting into buying in bulk. Costco is there, but it is still very easy to buy a reasonable amount of something vs 50lbs and at a very reasonable price.

I get a bit scared at some of the quantities I see things being sold. It's easy to buy a good little kitchen funnel at the many 100yen/$1.00 type stores, whereas here I couldn't find anything smaller than a three pack of giant sized funnels here in the states :0

It is a huge difference in all around lifestyle and mindset.

Miss Cellane
6-4-16, 9:00am
No experience with Zen at all, but way, way back, on these forums, someone (I'm sorry I can't remember who) posted something that has stuck with me.

"Living simple isn't easy."

Her examples were things like making all her own bread. Breadmaking, even if you use a bread machine, takes time. It takes having all the right ingredients in your house when you need to make the next batch. It takes remembering to make the next batch before you run out of bread.

Cooking from scratch in general is considered "simple living." But it takes a lot of time and energy. You have to read the sales circulars, plan meals for the upcoming days, make a shopping list, shop (and maybe go to 2 or more stores to get the best deals), and then come home and put it all away. And after all that work, you still don't have anything to eat. You have to invest more time in cooking/preparing everything.

Homemade cleaners are better for the environment. But it takes time to shop for the ingredients, and time to make the cleaners. Then, sometimes, they take longer to do the job than the store-bought cleaners.

Line-drying clothes saves energy and makes the clothes smell great. It also takes more time than flinging those clothes into a dryer. You have to go outside, pin all the clothes on the line, wait for them to dry, then go outside again and unpin everything and lug it inside. Or you use drying racks inside, and if you have simplified to a small living space, you have no good, out-of-the-way space to put the racks in, and you have to side-step the racks for the next day. And you have to find storage space for the drying racks when you aren't using them. And you have to figure out how to hang up sheets to dry, because they are too big for the drying racks.

Shopping thrift stores and yard sales takes much more time than driving to a big box store that you know carries exact what you need and buying it. Thrifting can take weeks or even months to find what you need, if there is something specific that you are looking for.

I'm not saying you (general you, not the OP) shouldn't try to simplify your life. But we do need to acknowledge that if we are saving money, we are usually spending our time instead. If we are saving time, we are usually spending money to do so.

With a new baby, life gets turned upside down anyway. No matter how you planned to do things, babies seem to have a mind of their own, and your plans don't always work out.

So with a new baby in the mix, I'd take a week or two to think about what your priorities are now. Then take more time to figure out how to achieve those priorities in the time you have. And some stuff might just have to slide for a year or two, until you find a new balance.

Maybe you use cloth diapers most of the time, but use disposables when Grandma babysits and on trips, so you don't have to deal with lugging dirty diapers around all day.

Maybe instead of shopping for baby clothes, even used ones, you find a like-minded parents' group, where baby and toddler clothes are passed back and forth as the children grow.

Maybe instead of zero-waste living as a goal, pick one small area of your life and make that zero-waste. Find one thing you can control and work on that. Then, maybe, when you are comfortable with that, move on to another small area.

And make sure you are getting enough sleep. With a baby, I know that is hard. But everything is harder when you are running on a sleep deficit. Everyday tasks seem harder, you make more mistakes, life just seems to throw obstacles at you at every turn. If you can't get enough sleep during the week, can your partner take over the baby-care during parts of the weekend so you can nap? Or a grandparent or doting aunt or uncle or best friend? Because your post sounds tired, sylvia, and I think you need a chance to rest.

Gardnr
6-4-16, 9:18am
Taking shoes off at the door is easy and we've done it for over 20 years. The hard part? We have a lineup of shoes at the door....I still don't like that they aren't put away but this is where they are now "put away" at.

Baby food: my sisters (I don't have kids), carried a food grinder everywhere and all their kids ate of their plate. Period. The kids like everything. no jars and no shopping for baby food jars. Want to feed oatmeal? Put it in miilk in the fridge at night and let it soak up. Spritz it through the blender in the morning and you're done.

As far as hanging clothes indoors: I had hubby string a double clothes line in the spare room. He used a really strong "plastic covered cable" of some sort he found at Home Depot. It's 12inches from the ceiling. Easy on easy off. I don't use clothes pins. If it can't be tossed over the line, it hangs on a hanger. Love my clothesline.

ANd mostly: decide what you CAN do and do it feeling good about it. Let the rest go for now. Your child likely needs far less than you feel you should have. Don't get caught up in "Jonesing" where parenting is concerned.

TxZen
6-4-16, 9:23am
For me, zen ebbs and flows. Right now, I feel very zen but that is after almost a year of daily purging, trying new things, finding what works for us. We do take our shoes off at the door and I try to buy things that are not all packaged up. Instead of making my own bread, like the person mentioned above, I go to a local mom and pop store and buy a loaf and bring it home in my reusable bag. We try to find free events to go to instead of paying high costs for tickets. I bunch all my errands up into as few a trips as possible. What wasn't working? I bought a small vacuum, thinking it was easier to store and use. Wrong!! I had to return it and go back to my tried and true monster. With 3 dogs, 2 cats and boys, it keeps me sane and zen!! :) Another area- I tried buying in bulk but I don't have the storage area for it. I literally had TP stuffed into my tall boots in my closet because I had no where else to put it (we don't have a bathroom closet) Now I just buy TP at the beginning of the month and we are good to go. It's the small things with me.

sylvia
6-7-16, 12:45pm
Wow thank you for all the great replies and I totally dig everyone's advice and thoughts. So I conclude that we need to live somewhere between simply when its possible but effeciently so as not waste stuff, time, and effort. Minimalism is a bit of simplicity and efficiency. So perhaps something like that calls for "minimalistic efficient simplicity!" Yes a baby will throw all that out the door, but thankfully infancy is so temporary, we have no family very little help so I just plainly try to get by day by day. So much work goes into raising and caring for a baby its easy to get overwhelmed. I am now 40 and I know when I just cant do it i pretty m,uch just leave it for a different day. The result is the same it gets done a few days later but Im just tired but not burnt out. "We'll get there faster if we take it slow".

Gardenarian
6-7-16, 3:35pm
What do you mean by "three-fold meaning"?

jp1
6-7-16, 10:04pm
To me it seems that there are three different conflicting things you're trying to attain. Minimalism, simplicity, and zen.

I travel a lot for work and one of the things I love about it is the simplicity and zen. I walk into a hotel room and everything is just there, all ready for me. No cleaning or chores. In the morning I leave to go do my work and in the afternoon I come back and the bed is made, the towels hung up, the trash emptied, etc. All I have to do is change into casual clothes, turn on the computer if I need to do work, whatever. When it's time for dinner I go to a nearby restaurant and food appears at my table 10-15 minutes later. Then I can go back to the hotel, read or whatever, and then go to bed. Plenty simple. Plenty zen. But nothing minimalist about it when one thinks about all the people working behind the scenes to make this all happen, not to mention the credit card charges on my corporate card.

Minimalism and simplicity can be achieved. But as Miss Cellane spelled out so well, there's nothing particularly zen about it. It's a lot of work. Perhaps for someone who doesn't work outside the home or have a small child it could feel zen to make minimizing and keeping things simple a core part of one's activities, but most people, like me, have lots of other commitments like work and everything that is done to keep house feels like a chore. I mean, really, after being away for work for 10-11 hours the last thing I want to do is come home and bake bread or watch clothes drying on a rack. What on earth am I working my butt off for if I can't at least splurge on the natural gas it takes to just toss the clothes in the dryer for an hour and be done with the laundry. Our gas and electric combined only runs $40/month. It would take a massive amount of willpower on my part to put up with the work required to not use the dryer. If I did those types of activities my life would be reduced to just work and house chores. Fine for some people, but for me, no thanks. Once I retire I will re-evaluate, but not now.

The closest I ever came to achieving all three, minimalism, zen and simplicity was when I lived alone in a tiny (250 sq foot) studio apartment in midtown manhattan from my early 20s to mid 30s. My job was a 15 minute walk from home and not terribly stressful. Nor did it require or expect much overtime. I could wake at 8am, be at work by 9, and be home by 5:15. That left me nearly 7 hours of evening free time. And since my apartment was so small my cleaning and laundry routine was basically 3 hours one evening every other week. I'd take the laundry to the laundromat, come back and clean the bathroom. Go back to the laundromat and move everything to a couple of dryers. Come home and clean the kitchen, mop the bathroom and kitchen floors. Go pick up the dry laundry, come home and fold it and put it away. Then I'd vacuum the living room rug and do a light dusting. And that was it. The next 13 days the only chore I had was cleaning the kitty litter box. With 7 hours of free time every evening I could focus on cooking stuff from scratch and it felt like fun, not a tiring chore. After all I still had time to go for a bike ride every evening (including on laundry/cleaning night), could spend hours reading books every day, go out to meet friends for a drink or movie, etc.

sylvia
6-9-16, 10:17pm
Im not sure what you are referring to Gardenarian as "three fold meaning ?"

JaneV2.0
6-10-16, 11:24am
I've always said that my idea of simplicity is to live in a hotel. You summed it up perfectly, jp1.

Ultralight
6-10-16, 11:30am
The closest I ever came to achieving all three, minimalism, zen and simplicity was when I lived alone in a tiny (250 sq foot) studio apartment in midtown manhattan from my early 20s to mid 30s. My job was a 15 minute walk from home and not terribly stressful. Nor did it require or expect much overtime. I could wake at 8am, be at work by 9, and be home by 5:15. That left me nearly 7 hours of evening free time. And since my apartment was so small my cleaning and laundry routine was basically 3 hours one evening every other week. I'd take the laundry to the laundromat, come back and clean the bathroom. Go back to the laundromat and move everything to a couple of dryers. Come home and clean the kitchen, mop the bathroom and kitchen floors. Go pick up the dry laundry, come home and fold it and put it away. Then I'd vacuum the living room rug and do a light dusting. And that was it. The next 13 days the only chore I had was cleaning the kitty litter box. With 7 hours of free time every evening I could focus on cooking stuff from scratch and it felt like fun, not a tiring chore. After all I still had time to go for a bike ride every evening (including on laundry/cleaning night), could spend hours reading books every day, go out to meet friends for a drink or movie, etc.

Livin' the dream!

Gardenarian
6-10-16, 1:06pm
Yes it's been work to tackle the challenge of living simply. To rewire your thinking, change your habits, most decisions have three fold meaning...

From this line - I don't know what that means.

sylvia
6-10-16, 11:59pm
Yes I see three fold meaning is what you ask yourself, do I need it? can I live without it? will I regret getting it?. I think maybe if I find a way achieve simplicity without overthinking every single consequence of should I hand wash the dishes, machine wash them or just get paper plates to just give myself a break.Perhaps there are many ways of a stay at home mom achieving Zen. Take a walk with the baby and just be with nature while unfinished chores are waiting, or do chore first but then miss the moment, or try to just drop it and meditate. Then I want to be more green about my home so I cook mostly from scratch but then there is such a mess again. So in conclusion we cant always be simple, nor efficient nor minimalist. But we can always try.So that is the challenge of simplicity and the three fold meaning. Hope this answers your question. I appreciate you pondering to understand.

Williamsmith
6-11-16, 3:31am
I can pin my search for quiet and simplicity to my retirement and I used minimalism as a technique to bring it about. My life was cluttered with things and responsibilities. Lots of things at home and lots of responsibilities for the outcomes that bring resolution to people's lives in some of the most challenging situations imaginable. During my last few years at work I was responsible to make progress in unsolved homicides, cold cases if you will. Some were really complex and required a complete reexamination of the evidence. One case had over 600 items of evidence and included the skeletal remains of the victim. Yes, the evidence room contained the victim's body.

To be assigned to make progress in cases that were abandoned was a burden. So upon my retirement I was searching for a way to peel away from those responsibilities and concentrate on myself without feeling guilty about my own abandonment of other people's hopes for resolution.

I was drinking way too much, I was not sleeping well and I was overweight. I began searching for a book on simple living for answers. It had to be a simple book. Many of the books I found were large complex behemoths. I couldn't think of anything more contrary than a large complex book on simplicity.

And then I found , "The Path to Joy and Freedom......Simple Living". By a Franciscan Native American ...Jose Hobday. I thought , who would know more about simple living than her? All in less than 100 paperback pages.

I could not summarize hers words any simpler than she has so I will quote, and though she is gone now...I will thank her for showing me a way to obtain quiet, peace and resolution myself.

Simplicityhttp://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/images/clr.gif"Simplicity is one of those great words that can't be defined easily. But it can be described and it can be distinguished from things that just look a little like it. If we persevere, we can recognize simplicity when we experience it in others and, more importantly, when we practice it.
"Simple living is not about elegant frugality. It is not really about deprivation of whatever is useful and helpful for our life. It is not about harsh rules and stringent regulations. To live simply, one has to consider all of these and they may be included to some degree, but simple living is about freedom. It's about a freedom to choose space rather than clutter, to choose open and generous living rather than a secure and sheltered way.
"Freedom is about choices: Freedom to choose less rather than more. It's about choosing time for people and ideas and self-growth rather than for maintenance and guarding and possessing and cleaning. Simple living is about moving through life rather lightly, delighting in the plain and the subtle. It is about poetry and dance, song and art, music and grace. It is about optimism and humor, gratitude and appreciation. It is about embracing life with wide-open arms. It's about living and giving with no strings attached."

Gardenarian
6-12-16, 3:54am
Okay, Sylvia, got it. Yes, so many questions and so many options!

As to housekeeping, I have an established routine - which keeps me from having to question every little thing. Ditto with food - I avoid most prepared food, but will buy things like canned organic beans to make things a little easier.

I am not a person who enjoys housework. I have heard they exist...somewhere....

Cypress
6-22-16, 12:49pm
I am curious on how to live simply with multiple people in the household. I am a solo SNL and only have myself to keep on track. How on earth do folks keep to a simple life style surrounded by people with different preferences.

I reuse the wax paper cereal liners for packing my lunch. I've had coworkers comment on that as being unusual. Some people seem to notice and comment when routine things are done simply, I don't know why but it seems to bring out a controlling comment. On my own, I can maintain the Zen and peace it brings, in groups, it falls apart.

I started volunteering at a equine rescue nearby. I love a quiet morning at the barn doing chores. The other volunteers can be way too chatty and yackety yack. So, I go down the other end of the barn and just focus on the task. I hear comments, oh she's down the other end again, she's over there. If you do your own thing, it brings out attention not sought. Some folks get upset when you do your own thing.

Ultralight
6-22-16, 1:09pm
I am curious on how to live simply with multiple people in the household. I am a solo SNL and only have myself to keep on track. How on earth do folks keep to a simple life style surrounded by people with different preferences.

I reuse the wax paper cereal liners for packing my lunch. I've had coworkers comment on that as being unusual. Some people seem to notice and comment when routine things are done simply, I don't know why but it seems to bring out a controlling comment. On my own, I can maintain the Zen and peace it brings, in groups, it falls apart.

I started volunteering at a equine rescue nearby. I love a quiet morning at the barn doing chores. The other volunteers can be way too chatty and yackety yack. So, I go down the other end of the barn and just focus on the task. I hear comments, oh she's down the other end again, she's over there. If you do your own thing, it brings out attention not sought. Some folks get upset when you do your own thing.

When you do your own thing I think that some people view it as you judging them in some way, which you might be doing (saying they are too chatty and such).

When I tell people I don't drink, the first thing they assume is that I think I am better than them or I think I have a tougher constitution than them.

Some simple living folks who live with complex living folks come up with zones. This room is to remain simple, this room you can clutter up, etc.

It is a tough issue. Do you live with a family? Housemates?

Teacher Terry
6-22-16, 1:34pm
WE do zones and that works great.

Ultralight
6-22-16, 1:36pm
WE do zones and that works great.
details?

Teacher Terry
6-22-16, 1:38pm
DH's mess must stay in his office ( I have my own), 1 car garage and large shed. I can easily close the door to his office when company comes. The rest of the house is neat and uncluttered.

Ultralight
6-22-16, 1:39pm
DH's mess must stay in his office ( I have my own), 1 car garage and large shed. I can easily close the door to his office when company comes. The rest of the house is neat and uncluttered.

So for the rest of the house is it one of those deals where he messes it up and then you come through and clean right afterward?

Teacher Terry
6-22-16, 1:54pm
No,he is generally not allowed to mess up the rest of the house and rarely does.

Ultralight
6-22-16, 1:56pm
...not allowed...

Love it!

Teacher Terry
6-22-16, 2:11pm
Well we came to this agreement mutually shortly after moving in together 18 years ago. I knew that I could not live with a slob in chaos and he was willing to compromise.

SteveinMN
6-23-16, 8:17am
I started volunteering at a equine rescue nearby. I love a quiet morning at the barn doing chores. The other volunteers can be way too chatty and yackety yack. So, I go down the other end of the barn and just focus on the task. I hear comments, oh she's down the other end again, she's over there. If you do your own thing, it brings out attention not sought. Some folks get upset when you do your own thing.
For some (many?) people, volunteering is a social outlet as well as a way to do good works. So, yes, there will be chatting and yackety yack.

I have, too often, seen people doing lots of things beside the task at hand, which bothers me (because I know it's difficult to get so many people together in one place and moving in one direction; why dilute the effort?). But then I realized that, without the social aspect of it, many folks would not come out at all, so I'm happier for whatever gets done rather than how much gets done.

sweetana3
6-23-16, 9:27am
Yes Steve. My husband is a big time volunteer at Habitat for Humanity. He supervises other temp. volunteers and has to keep them all involved, working toward a goal, happy and safe. He has worked with teenagers, retirees, business owners, military, etc. Some are individual volunteers and many belong to groups who signed up together. They are all different and within groups there are great differences in work and chattiness. So some jobs just take a little longer than others.

He loves getting a project done but volunteers as much for the social and "getting out of the house" as for the actual work. For an IT guy with no construction experience, he has learned a huge amount.

sylvia
3-2-17, 4:17pm
Hi everyone, its been a while for this thread however I wanted to say that Mariekondo method helped with the clutter. Now I have my answers how to select. I now have a simple living vision that is congruent with my life mission of less stuff. Ive been trying to achieve this frugal/simple living/ minimalism, and it looks like Im finally getting results. The big picture I want to approach the end result (Similar to law of attraction-visualize outcome.) I will not be feeding the crawl space storage monster under our house. So I am not keeping anymore new seasonal decorations, only a few boxes left. Resulting in not going in there ever, no more stuff rerouted there. The garage is a big problem, my son puts everything there, I toss everything there. But its DHs turf he will be responsible for clearing it out. He is fed up-trust one more warm weekend and out it goes. Living simply is a personal journey , you go step by step what works for your situation.