It is generally conceded that those of us who seek a simplified lifestyle are most often not very “greedy” for wealth or fame. Yet the reality of life, no matter at what time in which we live, demands that we have some income. It is mere fantasy to think that we can go into the “wild” and live off mother nature’s abundance, sans all commercial contact with the ‘outside’ world.
There have been plenty of people who have dreamed of this, including ‘yours truly’. But not for very long, at least not if we are of a sane mind. Just think through the details and we can realize very quick that such a life would likely be “short and hard”. I have read of some people who have survived in such a state for a very long time, but just “surviving” is not much fun, it certainly cannot be considered a “simple life”.
Putting our feet on more secure ground we can understand that living simply will certainly free us from a lot of the income problems that confront so many of our generation. The modern nations live under a constant consumerism mindset. In fact, most of the worlds economies are build on the ideal that people must consume lots of goods and services, otherwise there will not be money enough changing hands to support governments, industry and a whole host of needy and greedy folk.
But our question is this; How can we live a simple lifestyle without being addicted to consumption, that demands we earn a large income working at some job that we don’t like?
I would suggest that we really ought to check our standard of living. This can best be understood by a saying that my father used to have, which I have often heard him make in the context of our modern lifestyle, “The cost of living has not gone up nearly so much as our standard of living.” I will say that again in a paragraph by itself.”
“The cost of living has not gone up nearly as much as our standard of living.”
Compare if you will the standard by which our grandparents might have lived. Mine certainly did up to the 1940’s or so. The houses were much smaller, build from mostly rough cut sawmill lumber that had simply been dried in the open air. No 2,000 square foot houses for the common people! I am just guessing that they were lucky to have a thousand square feet and that at a time when families were much larger on average than what we are today. Those same houses were without the benefit of electric, running water or an indoor bathroom. Heat was provided with wood, or in eastern Kentucky where my ancestors came from it might have been coal. Water was carried from a hand dug well into the house. Heated on the wood or coal stove when required. I still recall my maternal grandmother’s water system. She had a very deep well, obviously hand dug on the side of a mountain. The well was probably 4 feet wide, round of course, the sides of this well was reinforced with flat fieldstone harvested right from the mountain side on which the well was dug. She did not have a windlass type of system to raise the bucket, but rather a common pulley and rope. I remember as a child being fascinated at the depth of that well and the clear cold water that we would pull up in the bucket. The water level seemed to be 30 feet below the surface, if not more. ( Our memories are not reliable for such details, as children things usually seemed bigger than they were in reality.)
You get the point. With our big modern houses we literally ‘consume’ energy by the barrel. I find no fault in how much anyone consumes, but we are talking about attempting to live a simplified life. That energy must be provided by industry, which in turn must make a profit or they won’t be in business very long. In turn, I have to pay cold hard cash for all these products, whether it be the electric, gasoline, propane or any other form of modern energy.
So much for housing. Consider our food supply. It was not that long ago, say 100 years, which is not much in history, that most Americans grew some type of garden. Even folks in towns grew backyard gardens for fresh vegetables. Now in our cities and many in rural areas, many grow nothing in the way of food production. It is simple economics to see that food produced by our own sweat, will cost less than that which is grown on corporate farms and delivered to our local grocery store by fuel guzzling trucks, then stocked by people expecting to get paid and then purchased by me with more of that green, hard earned cash.
If we are going to live a common simple lifestyle, we will either need to have “easy money” or learn to grow at least a portion of our food.
Does it not seem that in an effort to find a simple life, money becomes a serious issue? That is unless you are wealthy and can afford to support your lifestyle however you want. I doubt that many of my readers fall into this category. I state again, I find no fault with the majority of people who have chosen to strive for a complicated life, ever reaching and working to ‘improve’ their standards. It is just not what I consider worth the effort. How many people have spent the best, most productive part of their lives, working at things they did not like doing, so they could fulfill a dream of retiring to a common cottage and live simply?
It seems to me that whatever our “dream” is, we best go straight for the goal, rather than going about it in an irrational manner.
The clothing we wear for the most part can be gotten for mere pennies when compared to the cost of a article of clothing in the 19th century. With modern production methods, food and clothing requires much less of our annual income than it did for our ancestors. Most common people then had to scratch for cash to buy necessary cloths. I hardly dare to look in my own closet knowing that I will find more clothing than what most whole families would have had 150 years ago. We also have the advantage of good used clothing that can be purchased for next to nothing.
What we find again is that the “standard of living” we demand is what makes most of us slaves to a regular paycheck, which in turn requires many to labor at jobs they don’t like, to earn money they would not need, if we would control what we spend in a rational manner. It really is a rare family or individual that has avoided the snare of consumerism.
I must be honest. I don’t consider myself much of a ‘good example’, I rather make the case for the sake of common sense living. Those who know me are aware that I am as guilty as the next person when it comes to purchasing things I don’t really need. My only defense is that it has been a few years since I have purchased anything on credit or paid interest to a credit card or bank. That however does not void the reality, that my life could be simpler if I would save more and spend less.
Dare we talk of transportation?
If there is anything in our modern life that has enslaved millions of us, it is the “standard” of our transportation. I am not disputing the near necessity of some kind of automobile in our day and age. The infrastructure no longer exists with small general stores on every corner, where one could buy most of their necessary items within a short distance by foot, buggy or horseback, nor earn a living by sitting at home. So we who live in a rural area are forced to use some type of automobile, for simplicity if nothing else. For it is certain that trying to purchase, care for and use a horse and buggy, is not a “simple alternative” to the automobile. We live in an Amish community, let me assure you that there is nothing simple about their transportation problems. Most often when they go shopping they hire a driver to take them to the major stores, and all the while they still maintain a horse and buggy for shorter trips. I dare say a horse eats whether or not he is traveling, plus the cost of a trained horse and buggy is not small change. When my truck is parked it is not “eating”, even though I still must pay the tag tax and insurance, otherwise it can sit still and I am not likely to have to chase it down, like I would a horse, when I need to go somewhere.
What sort of vehicle transportation should one have, if they want simplicity? Naturally the real needs of everyone are different. However, there are some basic common sense principles that can be applied to transportation for simple living. First, unless you want to be indebted for a long time, you don’t buy a new car. It is not only the price of the car that must be considered, insurance on a new vehicle is extremely costly, in our state the yearly tags are based on the value of the vehicle, thus we would have to pay a high annual “tax” for a new vehicle.
Reality tells me that what a person can afford to drive is directly related to their mechanical ability. If you are a fair hand at auto repair you can get along with an older worn auto, better than someone who is mechanically challenged.
We ought not to be afraid to think outside the box, an overused expression, but one that makes the point. Use your own imagination, but stay in the realm of reality when it comes time to carry out your plan. Sometimes that which we “dream” can turn into a real nightmare if we don’t keep our feet on the ground and be realistic about the execution of what we think up as a solution to some problem that we attempt to solve in unconventional ways.
It is my firm belief that many people who feel they are in desperate situations could rescue themselves if they would put their mind to work rather than pull out a piece of plastic for a quick fix, then spend months or years to pay for a fix that might or might not have been the solution to the problem at hand.
I will end this post with a quote from the American philosopher Henry David Thoreau, “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation. From the desperate city you go into the desperate country, and have to console yourself with the bravery of minks and muskrats.”
Even though I don’t agree with Thoreau’s naturalistic religious views, he is worth reading for anyone wanting to simplify their own lives.
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