Living Simply©
October 8, 2000
Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Midland
Jane Thickstun, Celebrant

"‘Tis a gift to be simple, ‘tis a gift to be free." Thoreau went to Walden. He lived in a small hut by Walden Pond outside of Concord, Massachusetts for two years in order to "live deep and suck out all the marrow of life."

"‘Tis a gift to be simple, ‘tis a gift to be free." Scott and Helen Nearing, an out-of-work socialist and his musician wife, created a self-sufficient farm in Vermont in the 1930s. They kept no animals, borrowed no money, worked only enough to sustain themselves in a healthy if frugal lifestyle, and had plenty of time to pursue their interests and have an active social life. They were still living this way in the mid-1980s when Scott died at 100 years old, and Helen continues to do it to this day.

Thoreau and the Nearings found ways to live apart from the commercialism of American society. They were already doing it in the mid-1800s and in the 1930s. How much more prevalent are those influences now than then?! How much more difficult to avoid the temptations to earn more, do more, have more?! Neither Thoreau nor the Nearings were raising children or saving for college educations. Is it possible it was easier for them to adopt a simple lifestyle because of that? They were writers. If they were living today, would they have succumbed to the temptation to write using a computer? Would they have explored the Internet?

"‘Tis a gift to be simple, ‘tis a gift to be free." The materialistic worldview that dominates our society leads us away from our religious or spiritual selves. By consuming less, we can devote more time and energy to the true meaning in our lives. More and more, people are rediscovering the importance of achieving a spiritual balance in their lives by resisting the temptations of popular culture and the materialism it is steeped in. It can be difficult when the dominant culture seems to scream "MORE IS BETTER," but we have to remember the importance our non-material needs, such as the deeper needs for relationships, love, beauty, and a sense of purpose, which can hardly be fulfilled by a trip to the mall. We are once again reviving them in this turn-of-the-century high-paced commercial culture, but these notions are hardly groundbreaking - nearly all major religious and spiritual traditions have been teaching them for centuries.

For example, the Hindu religion teaches that "That person who lives completely free from desires, without longing…… attains peace." (Bhagavad-Gita, II.71) Confucius said that "Excess and deficiency are equally at fault." (Confucius, XI.15) From the Jewish tradition, a passage in Proverbs says "Give me neither poverty nor riches." (Proverbs 30:8) And the Christian scripture says that it is "easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." (Matthew 19:23-24) In Islamic scripture, Muhammad writes, "Poverty is my pride." (Muhammad) Taoism says "He who knows he has enough is rich." (Tao Te Ching) And we find much in Buddhist literature to capture this insight, including the beautiful statement that "Whoever in this world overcome their selfish cravings, their sorrows fall away from them, like drops of water from a lotus flower." (Dhammapada, 336) The Ancient Greeks said "Nothing in Excess," (Inscribed at Oracle of Delphi) and "Everything in moderation" (Aristotle). An American Indian said to an early white settler, "Miserable as we seem in your eyes, we consider ourselves…… much happier than you, in this that we are very content with the little that we have." (Micmac chief)

"‘Tis a gift to be simple, ‘tis a gift to be free." To be simple is to be free, as the song so rightly implies. If we can get by with less stuff, we can get along with less work. Because we get hooked in - we buy into the belief that we need all these things, and we spend our lives paying for them. We pay for them with our lives. It is a kind of Faustian bargain where we have sold our souls for the American dream. The American dream has always been defined in terms of material success, and the more the better. They (or we) keep upping the anti - we are paying more today than our parents did for material needs. We end up sacrificing our non-material needs - those things that are higher on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.

According to a Labor Day article in the New York Daily News, "Americans are working longer hours than they did 50 years ago, despite a doubling of the nation's productivity rate. The Labor Department reports that the productivity of American workers rose 5.1% over the past year, the highest rate in a decade and a half. Amazingly, American workers now produce our 1948 standard of living by July. A highly efficient workforce keeps the economy steaming ahead, but meanwhile, many Americans come home from work with no steam left for the rest of life. And for an overworked, overstressed nation, today's Labor Day is a wistful reminder of what might have been. Unbelievable as it may seem, the U.S. Senate once passed a bill (which died in the House) that mandated a 30-hour workweek.

"As Dwight Eisenhower's running mate in 1956, Richard Nixon predicted that a four-day workweek would become the norm. Instead, in 2000, off we shuffle, bleary-eyed, lunch bag in hand, to work something that is beginning to resemble a six-day workweek. According to the Families and Work Institute, the average employed American now works more than 47 hours a week. Throw in a half-hour commute (which is short in many cities), and you've got a workweek that exceeds 52 hours. In more than four out of five marriages, both husband and wife work outside the home, putting an especially heavy strain on them and their children. And we come home tired to the bone. According to a 1998 study conducted by the University of Chicago, 41% of American workers say they come home from work exhausted, a 15 percentage point increase from 1989.

"Why do we do that? Why are we working so hard?

"The answer is complex. Millions of Americans work in minimum wage positions and must take two or even three jobs just to survive. This is a national tragedy that tears apart families and has dire social implications. Many other Americans work extra hours to put money in the bank out of fear that the basic protections we rely on, such as medical coverage and retirement benefits, won't be there when we need them.

But for a large number of workers, the explanation is less straightforward. Many of us are driven to work too hard by a culture that insists that more is better. Columnist Ellen Goodman put it well: "Normal is getting dressed in clothes you buy for work, driving through traffic in a car you are still paying for in order to get to the job that you need so you can pay for the clothes, the car and the house that you leave empty all day in order to afford to live in it." Our houses, vehicles, televisions, waistlines and credit card balances are getting bigger, but the time and energy to enjoy our lives is shrinking. The fact is that our national obsession with becoming a millionaire, or at least living like one, is a leading cause for our fatigue. In our chase for more, we seem to have lost the capacity to rest, to take time just to "be" rather than "do."

We work more than ever, more than is healthy or reasonable, because our market-driven society has created increased expectations of what we need to live. Or expectations of what Americans need to live have increased remarkably in just the last half of the last century. For instance, my house was built in 1938 and doesn’t even have a master bedroom with private bath. New construction usually has that plus cathedral ceilings, screened porches or decks, large rooms and many rooms. We had a shift to smaller cars in the 1970s, but now the thing to have is an SUV or a mini-van. It used to be there was one TV per house, if any; now it is the norm for every kid to have a TV in his or her room. And kids don’t share rooms anymore, let alone beds, as my mother did growing up, and as kids still do in less affluent parts of the country and the world. We turn on our faucets and expect unlimited water. We throw away more food in a day than some whole nations consume in a year.

Author Duane Elgin tells of going to a conference with a number of leading thinkers who were exploring the concept of a transforming society. He writes, "Although the meetings were of great interest and many grand pronouncements were made concerning the need for social change, I now remember none of what was said. However, I do remember having lunch with Elise Boulding--a devout Quaker, feminist, sociologist, and compassionate advocate of the need for nonviolent, though fundamental, social change. At the end of the first morning's discussion we emerged from the conference rooms to encounter an enormous buffet heaped with fruits, cheeses, salads, meats, breads, and more. Having worked up a considerable appetite, I filled my plate and sat down next to Elise. She had, without comment or display, selected for her lunch an apple, a piece of cheese, and a slice of bread. I was surprised that she had chosen such a modest lunch when such a bountiful offering was available. I asked Elise how she felt, and though she reassured me that she was feeling fine, I was still puzzled. I persisted and asked why she had taken such a small helping. In a few quiet sentences she explained that she did not want to eat what others in the world could not have as well. In this seemingly small incident I encountered a practical expression of the compassionate awareness that our individual well-being is inseparable from the well-being of other members of the human family." (pp. 58-9, Voluntary Simplicity, Duane Elgin)

"‘Tis a gift to be simple, ‘tis a gift to be free." I think the appeal for me of Thoreau’s experiment at Walden and Scott and Helen Nearing’s life in Vermont and Maine can be found in my own experimentation with living simply. I can remember a time long ago when I was young and naive, but oh so wise, when I was very much aware of the value of a simpler life, and I was living in a much simpler manner. It was so much easier then, when I didn’t have my own mailbox to receive junk mail, when I didn’t have a TV to see all those moving, talking advertisements, when I didn’t have bills or loans or credit cards, or even a checking account. It was also a time when you could call the phone company and get a real person right away, or even go downtown to their office and talk to someone in person! It was a time of idealism in the greater society, when among other things we saw a back-to-the-land movement and the creation of many communal living situations. It was a time when "natural" was in, and I was not alone in rejecting make-up and pantyhose and hair coloring and all those things women buy to "enhance" their natural beauty.

So what happened? The world changed; I changed. My own changes have been necessary, but I live with a deep yearning to return to a simpler life.

And I am not alone. The fact that large numbers of Americans are feeling the need to simplify their lives is indicated by the burgeoning body of literature on the topic, and the number of groups that are forming to devote themselves to these issues. Much of what I am sharing with you today comes from the web site of the Center for a New American Dream, and organization with the goal of "helping people consume responsibly to improve our quality of life and protect the environment." I like its motto, which is "More fun, less stuff." I also like that it is using creative means to recruit members without the mass mailings that such organizations usually use.

At the Unitarian Universalist General Assembly a year ago, the delegates chose a study/action issue, which is now in its second year. This issue is titled "Responsible Consumption as a Moral Imperative." Responsible consumption is a moral imperative because we cannot continue to use the resources of future generations. We cannot continue to consume so excessively when others in the world don’t have enough. We cannot continue to rape the earth to provide ourselves with far more than is necessary for life. It is time to turn our attention to what is truly life-giving: our relationships - with ourselves, with others, with our gods. It is time to devote ourselves to something higher than material survival. We can survive with far less material stuff than we think we can, and we can be liberated in the process of living with less.

"‘Tis a gift to be simple, ‘tis a gift to be free." It is not easy to live simply. How do we even start to make changes? We don’t have to quit our jobs and take up self-sufficient farming in Vermont, or live for two years in a cabin by Walden Pond. I suggest starting small. I have just recently made one small change in my life that has already given me tremendous freedom. I was feeling overwhelmed by the amount of paper advertisements that made their way into my house. I started realizing how much time I was wasting looking through the ads, because I figured I do need some things, and those things I already need just might be on sale. I decided to throw out all advertisements without even looking at them, which feels like a terrible waste of paper, but makes my life much simpler. It also saves me from the temptation to buy things I don’t need.

I struggle with that temptation to buy things I don’t need. It takes some self-presence to realize I don’t need the thing. I’ll go in a shoe store and see a nice running shoe on sale, and think, "I should buy it for when my current running shoes wear out." Then I catch myself and say, "No, Jane, why don’t you just use the running shoes you already have." Or I’ll find myself in a fabric store and be tempted to buy some beautiful piece of fabric, when I already have fifteen sewing projects waiting at home that I’m not getting to. I was having such fun buying things for my new house that I ran out of money! I imposed a spending freeze on myself. It was hard, especially when my aesthetic sense felt offended by the mix of greens that now exists in my living room. I felt like: if only I could buy that rug at Lowes! It’s always something. I adopted a mantra: "I have enough."

In doing without, however, I became more aware of the things I really want. I became aware of how much I use material possessions to substitute for relationship, with others and with myself. Without that distraction, I was brought closer to the raw issues of life. Helen Nearing writes, "Perhaps the most profound reason for our intensely consumptive lifestyle is, at bottom, our fear of death. "You can't take it with you," as they say - though you can try to numb the terror with the things that money can buy."

As usual, we find the best in ourselves by doing our best for others. The ethical and the spiritual are inextricably tied. Living simply is not a simple thing to do, and takes constant vigilance and strength of purpose. We can draw motivation from the realization that every effort we make to live more lightly on the earth benefits every other being on the planet, as well as the planet itself. Spiritual goals are never reached by our selfishly merely aiming for our own spiritual enlightenment. We make progress toward our spiritual goals only indirectly, by aiming for the good of others, by aiming for the good of something beyond our small selves.

"‘Tis a gift to be simple, ‘tis a gift to be free." The materialistic worldview that dominates our society leads us away from our religious or spiritual selves. By consuming less, we can devote more time and energy to the true meaning in our lives.

The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Midland is recognized by the Unitarian Universalist Association as a Welcoming Congregation. We welcome, affirm, promote and celebrate the full participation of all persons in all of our activities without regard to age, gender, sexual orientation, race or any other such category of exclusion.

Please feel free to contact us with any feedback, corrections or questions at jaham@delta.edu