Voluntary Simplicity

Thursday, November 30, 2006

I don't know if anyone will come upon this, but in the chance that there may be a few who do, I thought I'd post a few thoughts.

By Duane Elgin, from Voluntary Simplicity and the New Global Challenge

To live more voluntarily is to live more deliberately, intentionally, and purposefully - in short, it is to live more consciously. We cannot be deliberate when we are distracted from life. We cannot be intentional when we are not being present. Therefore, to act in a voluntary manner is to be aware of ourselves as we move through life. This requires that we not only pay attention to the actions we take in the outer world, but also that we pay attention to ourselves acting - our inner world. To the extent that we do not notice both inner and outer aspects of our passage through life, then our capacity for voluntary, deliberate, and purposeful action is commensurately diminished.

To live more simply is to live more purposefully and with a minimum of needless distraction. The particular expression of simplicity is a personal manner. We each know where our lives are unnecessarily complicated. We are all painfully aware of the clutter and pretense that weigh upon us and make our passage through the world more cumbersome and awkward. To live more simply is to unburden ourselves - to live more lightly, cleanly, aerohynamically. It is to establish a more direct, unpretentious, and unencumbered relationship with all aspects of our lives: the thing that we consumer, the work that we do, our relationships with others, our connections with nature and the cosmos, and more. Simplicity of living means meeting life face-to-face. It means confronting life clearly, without unnecessary distractions. It means being direct and honest in relationships of all kinds. It means taking life as it is - straight and unadulterated.

There is a culture of consumerism that has been cultivated in our society. There is industry built around reaching citizens as consumers, perpetuating a market environment, where systems of advertising, marketing and media become hegemonic tools to socialize the buying power. We are in an age of hyper-consumerism, and our choices of consumption in our system are having severe and real ramifications on the environment, the global community, and our individual well being. It often becomes challenging to see hope for change or to see possibility of experiencing life outside of the environment of consumerism that is saturated around us. So, I thought I would post some of Elgin's thoughts, for he offers a challenge to make choices that are in opposition to our experience of consumer society, and I think there is value in mulling this stuff over. I have the whole article if anyone is interested in reading it. I thought it was pretty great, so you could email me if you are interested. (jillianwong@gmail.com)

STAND UP against poverty

Tuesday, September 26, 2006

"What is STAND UP?

STAND UP is an innovative and exciting challenge to set an official Guinness World Record by having the greatest number of people ever STAND UP Against Poverty.

When is it happening?

Join forces with people all over the world on October 15, 2006 for STAND UP. Within a 24-hour period, a minimum of 10,000 people must physically and symbolically "STAND UP" to let world leaders know that we are holding them accountable for their promises to end poverty by 2015. " (quote taken from www.makepovertyhistory.ca)

"Stand Up because:

- Every day 24,000 people die from hunger
- Every day more than 100 million children are denied the chance to go to school
- Every day 1.1 billion people have to drink polluted water
- Every day 8,200 people die due to HIV/AIDS" (quote taken from www.standagainstpoverty.com)

Thanks guys.

Stepping in, stepping out.

Thursday, June 16, 2005

I have to echo Jeff's excitment and feelings of encouragment. There is dialogue happening, people are thinking and sharing thoughts, I have had such a great sense of hope from many good conversations. There is a common discomfort, and I think there are a lot of people feeling it, and this is where we can start doing something about it. Revolution is happening.

About change.
If change is going to happen, a need for change has to be realized. To realize that need, there needs to be an understanding of why things are the way they are, and why they need to be different. I agree that we need to start with ourselves, and I think part of that is working to understand the times that we are living in. Understanding how things are and why they are as they are. We need to dig to the roots of how we've been led to where we are, and then begin to dig them up from that very bottom. Then we have to create realization that relationship is something vital, something that is damaged, and something that is lacking in the way we are.

We need to know what we are opposing and pull it apart. If indeed it is capitalism that we are opposing, then we need to understand capitalism, and how and why it has shaped our world the way it has. We need to think about what it is about capitalism that we are actually against, and how it got to be that way. Maybe its not capitalism, I don't know. Read some books perhaps, talk to people, find your personal discomforts and work through them and share any thoughts.

How can we cause a need for change?
Right now, there is so much ingrained into our minds that it is difficult to see another way of living, or another way for our society to think. Something has to be done to break the bubble, and to allow others to experience the reality of something other than our current norms. Rosa Parks, during a time of racial segration in Amercia, started a revolution by refusing to give up her seat to a white man on a city bus. We could start a revolution by talking to our neighbours on the bus. Think about how things are, and how they should be different, and how that difference can be exemplified. Maybe we will need to start randomly hugging people, maybe we will need to make a commercial, maybe we will need to win the lottery and give all the money away... think out of the ordinary. Maybe this will happen some other way, so far outside the box that we can't see it yet. I don't know, but let's dig for it.

A slightly different note...
A thought of confusion.
Individualism, or primary concern for the Self is a problem. However, we are all made to be individual from one another. There is an important aspect of individuality that should not be lost. But then, how can individuality exist and be encouraged without promoting individualism? Capitalism allows for freedom for the individual, which is a good thing I think, however, it's negativity comes when compeitition and self interest lead to an importance on benefiting a sole person without regard for others. Capitalism at its core may not be the problem, but rather the way we use it, and the way we think within it. Do we change the system? Perhaps I may be speaking hastily because I know very little at this point, but I thought I'd throw something out there because I'm very interested to hear anybody's thoughts.

Random tangent...
I think this revolution needs to begin within the Church. Not the institution, but the community of believers, unified by a common pursuit of a relationship with God. Beginning, perhaps, by encouraging and understanding one another outside of preconcieved expectations and definitions of each other, coming together, working together, powered by prayer for each other. I really liked what Michelle had to say about the body, and I think we need to find and take out the Self in the institutional religions, find the genuinity of relationship with God and the relationship of our individuality to the body, and build that as our base. Maybe this is a sub-part of the revolution, but an essential root I think, or vital base.

I feel disorganized in my thought. I think I am unsure where to focus, what to focus on, how to focus our intentions into realistic action. Maybe that's ok right now. I'm not sure, but lets keep talking.

a move

Sunday, June 12, 2005

I like the way that teens are moving these days. I sense some deep, perhaps divine, discontent with the way things have been and the way things are. We want a change. A couple years ago I felt that this longing would soon be extinguished in this world where, well, hope isn't so easy to hold onto. Last night I went to my old church and experienced what I would describe as a renewed sense of hope. Maybe it was there all along, maybe I just couldn't catch a hold of it for a while.

I know that I have been told for most of my teen years that my generation was the one that had the power and the opportunity to change the world. At first I believed it, naively perhaps. After a few years I began to witness too many things that are holding my friends back from real life in community with each other and with God. Too many addictions, too much empty entertainment, too many deadend relationships, too much money, too much stuff. I didn't think that there was much hope for us to crawl out from under that.

Today I feel somewhat differently, with some reservations lingering I must admit. :) I do really see potential in my generation because we are hurt. Through discontent with the status quo, people reach out for change. And change is what needs to happen. We need to move away from a way of thinking where we are the center and the most important thing is what will make us happy tomorrow. We need to find a place where we care as much, if not more, about our friends as we do ourselves and heck why not care about perfect strangers while we're at it?

I see an emerging group of young people who are looking for a different way to live. I see a church that is eager to pray and is ready, maybe even waiting for a revival, a revitalization, a revolution. I think it all starts with a prayer. From there, hearts are changed. It all begins when we realize that we are on a highway to hell... and we reach out to someone, something bigger.

I believe that there is hope. Will you join me? The thing is that it's going to take a little more than hoping to make a change. It's going to take changed attitudes, changed worldviews, greater compassion, greater vision and courage, and way, way less 'me'.

Let's go.

If we are a body

Thursday, June 09, 2005

Some thoughts on the metaphor of the body.

Why is it so difficult for us, living in this western society, to see ourselves and others as a body? And if we do see ourselves that way, why is it so difficult to put that perspective into meaningful action?

The picture of a body just keeps coming back to me. It can be applied to all sorts of institutions and groups such as the church. I don't think we should stop there though. Why not expand our 'body' to include not just one local body of believers but many, or even all? And why does it have to be a metaphor for the church and not all 6 billion people on this planet? I feel that it is so important to erase or, at least, try to get beyond the lines that are drawn between people.

A body is a whole. It has many different and unique parts, and each has a unique use and purpose. No one part is perfect on its own but together all the parts make one 'perfect' whole. That whole has meaning. It can be useful and meaningful. Take one part away from the body and it is in pain. All the other parts suffer without that one part, no matter how small or imperfect it is.

See, the parts can't function properly on their own. They need the whole so that they can be used the way they were intended. I'd love to see the change that would happen in our world if each person would see themselves as just one part of a body, and their friends and even their enemies as other, equally important, parts. When you take the gifts and weaknesses, strengths and functions of all the parts and put them together, they help each other out and things work.

Like a mural, small pieces, when put together, make a larger beautiful masterpiece. Why can't we get this? We need each other. We need to appreciate difference and be accepting and embracing. Before we get beyond the 'us and them' or the 'every man for himself' way of thinking, we are never going to succeed as fully as we could together.

Relationship. I think that this may be what this whole thing boils down to.

What I've been thinking...

I believe something needs to happen. I believing something is already happening. I thought I'd try to summerize where I stand in my thoughts right now, just so you know. I'd love to discuss, to be opposed, or to be challanged by anything I say. This is a process and I don't want to be hasty in thought or opinion, but know where I'm at, its all still in question, and know that I have no idea where the end will be. Some is just adding to a lot of what fable of the bees has already said.

I currently believe that our potential as humans lies in our ability to relate with one another. Relationship is our purpose and should be our goal. Naturally there seems to be this desire within all of us to obtain more than what we have. I believe that their are two main roads that can take. One, to achieve more for your "self", and two, to achieve deeper understanding of relating with others. I believe we are going down the wrong road, and we are getting further and further away from our relational potential. Ideals of individualism, maximizing profit, consumerism and competition are so ingrained as the values of our capitalist western culture - values that have slowly drawn, and that are continuing to draw us away from focus on community, people, and relationships. It is so much a part of who we are that we negotiate it as the norm and allow it to blind us from, what I believe, is our natural inherent potential for relationship. Generally speaking, i believe we are killing ourselves - getting so caught up in a system of self, that we are losing oursleves. I don't believe that the solution is to come up with a set of how-to instructions to re-shape your life, or to dictate to others how they need to change. Nothing with "how-to", but questioning the "why we's", and stimulating that thought in others to see outside our boxes, and deepening the understanding of our relational selves. Challange how we think, and hopefully find and renew deep value in relationship as the base for how we live in whatever system we have. We can't let things continue as they are.

Some more questions:
- Why?
- Do we need to actually change the current system, or just how we think about it?
- Globalization. How do/can we negoitate with it?
- How do you genuinely reach the masses to really understand and seek the need for a change in thinking?
- What does that change look like?
- What are we thinking, what are people thinking, who else is thinking but not telling anyone?