Simplifying Life just a little

I’ve found it very interesting that the church year doesn’t start with a big kick-off, a big celebration of something – like Christmas, or Easter. It would make sense to start big! Or is that my American cultural perspective? I mean, many churches start the church year (you know- the Fall, coinciding with the beginning of the school year) with “Rally Sunday”, where they pull out all the stops, and make big deals of things, sing songs everyone knows and likes, etc. But instead of a big shin-dig, some big event, the church year starts Advent - a time of preparing for the birth of Jesus, a time of anticipation prior to the birth of Christ, a time of waiting with expectancy. Wow – waiting, anticipation, preparation, expectancy… Holy cow! So not-American, huh!

This got me thinking. Advent would be a great time for some form of Advent discipline. So I decided to focus my talks on things/ideas/possibilities for an Advent Discipline. The Sunday before last I talked about the idea of “Waiting”, of “Patience”, about practicing these things, things that we culturally tend to avoid. Waiting and patience is not something we tend to do well. And yet… isn’t that what this is all about as well – waiting with patience?

This past Sunday morning I was moved to speak about the related ideas of simplicity and simplifying. In planning for this, I remembered two different experiences that brought this to mind. About 15 years ago, B.K. (that’s Before Kids), my wife and I went one of those vacation places in Jamaica – I mean, we had all this money and no kids to spend it on. What to do? What to do? But I digress… back to the story- so, I remember for that one week, our most difficult decisions were, “Should we go eat, and then go to the beach, or should we take a nap first, then eat?” Oh, the decisions we had to make! Well, obviously things were pretty simple for that week; sun and beach, eat, sleep…

Then when I was a Seminary, we lived in the suburban DC area- first in Northern VA, then in Maryland. My wife worked with the George Washington University, in DC. We students were occasionally invited to various social events on campus. If you’ve ever been to Gettysburg, PA, you’ll remember part of the battle took place at the Lutheran Seminary there.

Sometimes it seems Gettysburg hasn’t changed much since then, it still has its slower way of life, slower speed than many of us in suburbia are used to. Well, on occasion, the seminary would put on some social events for students and spouses. The Lutheran Seminary there is surrounded by green grassy fields, old, large shade trees, old well maintained building… and a slower pace overall. On one of these occasions, my wife made a comment as we walked around a little – something to the effect of, “Wow, things are sure slower and more peaceful up here!” Well, that it was. Compared to the suburban and professional worlds of rush, rush, rush… then yes, Gettysburg-world certainly was a different one than we were used to – slower and peaceful.

Life certainly seemed more simple up there! And I don’t mean that pejoratively. I mean it in the sense that life seemed more peaceful, a kind of slower pace where you could take time to enjoy things… like a walk, or like what people used to do back in the day- sit on the porch and say hi to their neighbors. My father was raised in Baltimore city in the era when people actually did that kind of thing. It sort of seems kind of quaint now doesn’t it… “Hello neighbor!” and then sitting and chatting with them.

And yet, many of us really seem to desire that our lives slow down at least some. We seem almost homesick for an era, or a lifestyle, we probably haven’t even lived ourselves. And yet this seems pretty important to us. For some, it’s a matter of survival! Some people I’ve heard of have left high-paying corporate jobs for a slower-paced life in the country. They have done what one of my Political Science instructors in undergrad school called “to rusticate”… which means “to move to the country”. They simplified their lives in very dramatic ways… they checked out of the rat-race… they moved! And they seem to have enjoyed life more. Now, certainly life is a little harder in the sense that they don’t have access to the “mall” as easily as we do. They don’t have access to Fiber Optic cable for their computer as we do since internet companies are more reluctant to stretch these cables out to them, etc. But they have more time with the family, with the kids, with life in general. They seem to have more time in general. They have noticed a deepening of relationships, more attention to the activities of their inner lives, more focus on what’s really important to them. Maybe what they’re saying is they are less susceptible to the pull to do, do, do, and go, go, go than we are… probably because they’re not surrounded by a whole culture pushing a particular life-style at them as we are.

When I think of simplicity, I often think of a colleague from years back. His desk was almost always cleaned off. He basically worked on a table with no drawers, and no filling cabinet in his office. When ever I’d come to see him, his desk would be clear except for the papers he was working on. I remember thinking back then of how impressed I was with his lack of clutter!

It’s harder for us to simplify and stay in this world! But there are things we can do. I think an important first step is to de-clutter our lives. De-cluttering certainly relates to the paring down of the amount of stuff we have in our homes and offices for sure. But it also can relate to the amount of noise in our lives and the amount of activities we’re involved in.

We have to work at “not collecting”, because left to its own, it just happens. Buy cool chest of drawers from Ikea, put it in your living room or dining for a few months, and guess what happens… they get filled up with stuff! We come in from getting the mail, we come in from running errands, from shopping, or we come in from work… and always seem to have arm-loads of stuff. And we need somewhere to put it. “Ah, look, a new chest full of drawers… cool!” See how easy that was?

Thing is, we really have to work at de-cluttering! We have to get in there and empty out boxes, drawers, closets, garages! Oh, Lordy, the garage! But if left unattended, things can get so out of control that they can affect our psyches. My wife has described something she calls “space-stress”. That’s too much “stuff” in one space. I didn’t realize how too much stuff in one space can really affect you. It may seem ironic how it takes work to simplify, but that just shows how against-the-grain simplifying is. We can life in suburbia, and not have so much. And getting rid of our extra stuff can sure help others! Goodwill can put it to use, or Grass Roots (a homeless shelter for indigent families), or the Day Center (a place that feeds and clothes and offers showers to homeless people who live in camps in the woods near Route 1 in Jessup), or give it away as part of those “freecycle” programs. Columbia has one, and there are always people giving away stuff to others who may actually need something someone else has. It’s good for the soul to give!

And what about noise clutter? Remember what you didn’t hear for a few days starting September 11^th, 2001? One of the side-effects of the tragedy – not one airplane in the sky for a few days. I remember some people commenting on how quiet the environment sounded. Look at your daily lives… how much “quiet” do you experience? Are you around a lot of people? Is there radio noise? TV noise?... Do you miss quiet-time? I think we who are surrounded by noise-clutter all the time really need some “peace and quiet”. Occasionally partaking of some silence is good for our souls too.

And the other form of de-cluttering is reducing the amount of activity in our lives. I talked about this last week, but it applies to this as well… I get that it’s unrealistic to eliminate all activity in our lives – we still have appointments, dead-lines, errands to run, etc. But taking a Sabbath day free from activity-clutter might not be a bad idea; one day where we don’t run to this, or have to go there. One day a week of little to no running around might be good for us. Or maybe just a portion of the day. Whatever works for you. I can hear some people saying this is too unrealistic for them- they work all week long, and only have the weekends to get all the other stuff done. I get that – then this may not be for you. But that doesn’t make this a bad idea in theory. De-cluttering in this way also takes work to organize so we can have that day, or partial day, but I’ll argue that we still need, deep down, some uncluttered time… filled with nothing but space. Remember the “Hello neighbor” thing? It only happens if we’re not running around somewhere else.

Then there’s the psychological aspect of simplifying our lives – getting to the point of not missing the stuff we get rid of, and not feeling like we’re wanting or needing other stuff we don’t yet have.

There really is a lot to simplifying ones life. It’s often not easy! But like anything else, it’s easier with others! I’ve heard of simplicity groups, some called “Simplicity Circles”. The idea is people with this desire to simplify their lives come together to help each other, share ideas of what’s worked for them, encourage each other in this life-style of de-cluttering and simplification, and supporting each other as they journey together. I don’t think a person has to have a whole group, but considering the whole culture seems to be against this idea, certainly some support and companionship is helpful!

There’s more to simplifying one’s life than just de-cluttering, for sure, but I think this is important. Consider simplifying your life this next week… start small, one thing at a time. Help others as you can by giving away what you’re not using. It’s all good for the soul, and it may even help someone. And see what it does for your inner peace. Happy simplifying!