The Things Around Me


Cave Drawings from France

I often sit here in my cheap little chair, staring at my cheap refab computer, drinking my cheap Wal-Jack decaf coffee; and I ask myself. D why don’t you write articles about living cheap? To be honest my minimalist lifestyle comes more out of necessity than a lifestyle choice. If I had the choice I’d have a place on a lake, or on the beach, or maybe on a cliff with some fantastic view of something. Instead the view I have is of a cabbage patch, a church, and my neighbors jungle of a yard (can someone say lawnmower?).

My point is we all dream. Several years ago I set out to redefine my situation by setting some goals for myself. And although I had tried and failed to do this on a number of occasions; this time it was different I found the right resources and had a better mindset to achieve my goals. The funny thing about dreams is that over time they tend to change. In my case I had a pretty clear agenda set and a pretty specific idea of where I wanted to go. And for a long while I was plotting along meeting many of those goals.

But then a funny thing happened, things around me started to change. Technology started changing, the world in general started changing, even my professional and personal life changed. What ended up happening was I learned to adjust as the things around me adjusted. So the goals I set out to do some seven or so years ago are basically not the goals I work for today. Changing plans is never easy, while in school and in the real world projects get changed all the time. The thing I had to learn is that sometimes change is good.

Adjusting to a minimalism lifestyle was an adjustment, but with careful planning we’ve made it work. Much like my changing career plans the willingness to allow change is a virtue that got us out of caves and into warm dry homes. The thing is you don’t have to live life with a laissez-faire attitude nor do you have to plan your life down to the last detail. Balance is the key. In other words give yourself a path the follow, but at the same time allow space for hic-cups to occur. Things change, if they didn’t we wouldn’t have seasons and we’d never grow old and die. Once you learn to embrace these things then you can live your life in the moment and learn to roll with the tide.     

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