To manage your life and be creative, simplify

"Unnecessary possessions are unnecessary burdens. If you have them, you have to take care of them! There is great freedom in simplicity of living. It is those who have enough but not too much who are the happiest."
- Peace Pilgrim (1908 - 1981) See her web site at http://www.peacepilgrim.org

"Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you've imagined. As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler."
- Henry David Thoreau

Both authors have similar messages, though they approach the subject from diffierent angles.

Many people decry how busy they are, how they can't keep up with everything that must be done, how they lose sleep because they have so much work to do or how they can't figure out how to get off the treadwheel of the rat race. Some work 60 to 80 hours a week at their jobs, then come home to more work that needs to be addressed.

They act as if every task is of equal importance. More importantly, they refuse to give up some of those "necessities of life" to make their lives simpler. Many of those necessary things are necessary for a lifestyle, not a life.

In the rat race world, those who lead simple lives are considered to be simple, deviant, lazy or stupid.

Those who actually lead those lives that have been reduced to only what they can manage, and have free time to relax and recreate, do not see it as their responsibility to convert any of the rats to their way of thinking. They don't proselytize because they use their zeal to create new things instead of converting nearly dead ones.

Only those who have some time to do nothing have time to think, deeply and creatively.

One of the gretest problems of being part of the rat race is that you die like a rat. Be honest, how many of the rats you knew a year or two ago do you still remember today?

Bill Allin
'Turning It Around: Causes and Cures for Today's Epidemic Social Problems,' striving to help people build lives they can manage.
Learn more at http://billallin.com