simplicity is a choice

Heather and I had a nice talk tonight. We were talking about our future, our hopes, dreams, desires. So, we talked about simplicity. When we move, we have the desire to live simply.

Through our conversation tonight I learned some new things about simplicity--things I guess I "knew" before in my head, but not so much in my heart. (Funny how a person can learn things they already know, eh? Well, this "thing" I learned tonight is like that.)

For example, tonight I learned that, if we are truly going to live simply, some real choices await us. One of the things I've said before is "Things don't change unless things change." That sounds like a funny way of putting something, but it's my way of saying that we often want change (either personally or in group systems) without the pain of actually changing. We want things to change while somehow expecting that change to happen without us having to change anything. Sounds stupid, but I think that's how we're wired.

At any rate, that dilemma, that realization left me thinking, "How to change...really change..."

-No, I mean, really.

I discovered that if I really wanted change then I'd have to change. And I discovered that change came down to a choice--saying "no" to one thing so I have room to say "yes" to other things. Saying "no" to something means I need to let go of trying to reason my way into non-change through entertaining the idea that one can change if one simply becomes better organized, if one can simply condense what one already has so there is more room for what one wants.

A soul can enlarge through diminishing one's possessions, whether those possessions be emotional, physical or spiritual. I realized that letting go of certain emotional and even physical property can open up broad vistas for one's life.

Here's to letting go. Here's to the choice to let go. Here's to simplicity. Hold on, it's going to be one heck of an adventure, folks.