Simplicity and Detatchment and Being 'Ish'

[snapdragon]

a simple life ?

hmmm
truth without frills but not without thrills

[MKG]

I can see the problem - you called a spade a spade rather than a growing medium facilitator, and I can see no evidence in your post of those bloody annoying acronyms every business head uses.

Think outside the box. Blue sky thinking. Team building concepts.

Thank heaven I got out.

[witch way?]

I love this thread - its so positive. We are half way to paradise. Got the space and are doing the SSish thing but still have to work part time. Don't want to but, we work from home and are in a position to filter our clients up to a point. Yes this means less money but more free time

One point to consider: Sometimes friends visit us and tell us how lucky we are. I have to bite my tongue because, although I agree to a small degree of luck, the rest is the result of choices we have made and lots of hard work. They have decided to spend their time working for material rewards and we have chosen not to. So I suppose what I'm saying is enjoy what you've got but (engaging smug mode) appreciate yourself for having achieved it.

[Milims]

enjoy what you've got but appreciate yourself for having achieved it.

I love it - it's so true! So many people seem to work only to have the money to buy the next latest "thing", without appreciating what they are holding in their hands right now. By always chasing after the next thing you loose sight of what you have and what you have achieved right now and you end up like that mad dog - always chasing your tail and not being able to see past your own bum hole!

[witch way?]

always chasing your tail and not being able to see past your own bum hole! [/quote]

Does that mean my bum looks big in this? W

[tim&fatima]

So many kindred spirits all in one spot, it's brilliant.
This is a really good thread and just confirms why we all login to this site.
I had a job as a manager I worked around 55 hours a week, would go into meetings, hear a load of cr@p and then be expected to go out and "sell it" to the masses. I did not agree with any of it. I just felt I was selling my soul. after work with a head feeling like mushy peas, I would come home snap at my wife, ignore "a"(only a few months old) and just want to sleep.
After a small health scare, i believe i had one of those EUREKA moments.
At the time we were paying £600ish a month for "A" to go to nursery so we could both work. I packed my job in as a manager and went part time.
with the money we saved from the nursery, we are only about £100 a month worse off.
so now I only work weekends, spend all week looking after a 4yrd, 3 Chickens, a greenhouse and a veg patch.
but with a greener, less waste living we are saving more for the future than ever.

[Stonehead]

Does that mean my bum looks big in this? W

Not if it's a simple bum.

[hamster]

Even in the job I'm in now, I find it hard when I have to transcribe or summarise a lot of 'business-speak' or too much financial waffle - I sometimes get these flashes of panic when I think that money is just an arbitrary value we give to something and yet so many people spend all their working life chasing it. I sometimes go to three-hour strategy presentations that you can summarise as, 'So, you're going to make this product, sell it, and make some money. Awesome.'

Try being a senior manager and thinking like that.

snip

Exactly why I fully intend to get out once I've paid off my student loan!

[Wombat]

Yup!

I just spent 11 hours with the lawyers working on mitigation for the prosecution about Brownie's death. Can't wait to get out! As soon as I get back from the UK I'll be looking for another job!

Nev

[witch way?]

always chasing your tail and not being able to see past your own bum hole!

Does that mean my bum looks big in this? W

Not if it's a simple bum. [/quote]

I'm downsizing.

[QuakerBear]

I'm glad I started this thread and I'm glad to see such posative thinking, it's wonderful, hurgh (that's a hug sound). Thanks for sharing all your views.

To a point my growing dis-satisfaction with a consumer lifestyle started to be abit negative, there was opting out and rejecting. But I'm in agreeance with many of the people here, I'm starting to opt in to a much more fulfilling and adventurous way. Nothing is becoming more simple in terms of the number of tasks I have to do, the complexity of tasks or my relations with people. But rather my priorotising is becoming more clear headed or simple. For example; I don't need to wear a plain dress and a bonnet to dress in a more simple and plain way, I need to free myself from my own emotional constucts that I've buit about the meanings and values of clothing.

It's odd, I first started to think of simpliciy from a very religious aspect, but the more I ponder and the more I talk with people the more it seems quite logical.

[witch way?]

Thats so true Q.B. There's no need to talk about absolutes in the way of life we've chosen. If I were to totally reject consumerism where would I get my computer from? (There's a limit to what you can make from old pallets). I think the more fanatical we become the more we alienate our ideas and views from the norm, whereas I would like to see more of our ideas BECOME the norm. This will only happen if we can put up reasoned arguments and in showing 'normal' people how much better life can be when you cut out the cr@p. W.

[Stonehead]

Thats so true Q.B. There's no need to talk about absolutes in the way of life we've chosen. If I were to totally reject consumerism where would I get my computer from? (There's a limit to what you can make from old pallets).

How quickly people forget.

The first Apple computers had home-made wooden cases...



And someone is the US built a super-computer from the gutted remains of eight PlayStations.

So, I'd say it's entirely possible to build a computer from pallets, an old TV, some scrap gaming consoles and a few other bits of salvage. Anyone up for a challenge? (Some of us used to build computers like this in the old days.)

[snapdragon]

...........So, I'd say it's entirely possible to build a computer from pallets, an old TV, some scrap gaming consoles and a few other bits of salvage. Anyone up for a challenge? (Some of us used to build computers like this in the old days.)

my 'technical' abilities are limited to using a sewing machine and creating clothes from sheeps cast offs - I can wire a plug but doubt I'd have the wherewithall to make anything so twiddlesome as a computer

nice idea though

[Stonehead]

my 'technical' abilities are limited to using a sewing machine and creating clothes from sheeps cast offs - I can wire a plug but doubt I'd have the wherewithall to make anything so twiddlesome as a computer

nice idea though

A woolly computer might go down well with the Kiwis among us. Especially if it had a webcam!