Do I Need Everything I Have?

Where is your rationale when you try to simplify your life?

Our busy-ness

We all lead busy lives. We surround ourselves with things that will make our leisure time more pleasurable. Save us minutes. So that we can make better use of our time. Essential things we call them. Upgrades. But could it be that we go overboard thinking that the essential attachments we have are things that we really need?

How often have you packed for vacation and asked, “Do I have everything I need?”

Just-in-case, you’d think, and another item makes it into the suitcase. And if you travel with children — forget it. That suitcase explodes with so many just-in-case items.

And on the return trip what happens? You end up having to purchase a new piece of luggage to bring all your belongings back home.

And the children, wiser the moment they set foot somewhere new, meld into their new environment, ignore the item you brought just-in-case. They adjust. You’re confounded.

It has happened to me. Preposterous!

But that’s with traveling when traveling was a common occurrence.

• What about the things you have in your house?
• The things you carry around in your handbag?
• In your pocket?

Yeah, let’s talk about the essential handheld devices.

Can’t leave home without it

Remember flip-phones? I received mine as a Christmas present in 1997. Not complaining.

• I never asked for it.
• Never thought I needed one.

But it was the best present to receive at the time. Indeed. Then after I got used to carrying it around everywhere; feeling anxious if I ever forgot it at home, I started to resent having one.

Why? Who’d be calling me? I didn’t go out of my way to share my number with everyone. And the ones who needed of my presence, my family, were already getting the best of me. I gave to them freely. They wouldn’t be calling.

My mother and siblings? Not likely. They lived where there was a time difference of fifteen hours. They wouldn’t need to call me on the cell phone. They’d call on the house phone if need be.

So that flip-phone was for naught.

Then came the iPhones. Handheld computers! Who would have thought! I got one too. Why? Because everyone had one.

How vain.

Every two years we kept upgrading to newer models. Yes, I got used to the damn thing. But enough is enough for us. For the past four years, my husband and I have had only our batteries replaced. Good enough.

But things are not made to last forever. Late last year, a dark shadow that keeps getting bigger and bigger started showing on my screen. WTH!

What I need now is to downsize.

Downsizing

It could start as wisdom from an older friend’s advice or as a nagging itch, out of the blue. One day you wake up and realize that what you need is a simple life. Simple elegance. It’s then that you come to wonder, “Do I need everything I have?”

You yearn for a way of life that reflects simplicity. You buy books on how to do it or talk to your wise friend. But you find it too hard to make the change. You don’t know how to live a simple life.

By its very nature, life is complicated. Never simple for adults. And with new technology comes the onslaught of over-information. That is why you and I don’t know how to do simplicity.

Due to life demands, we find ourselves upgrading when what we most want is to downsize. But how?

Well, the title question is a good place to start. Make lists if you need to.

Simplicity

“Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity! I say, let your affairs be as two or three and not a hundred or a thousand; instead of a million count half a dozen, and keep your accounts on your thumbnail.” ~Henry David Thoreau

I will not pretend to know all religions but I’ve read enough to gather that at the core of all teachings is the idea of simplicity. And for very good reasons. When we relinquish the extraneous what we’re left with is the essential. And isn’t it the essential all we need?

Clinging to non-essential attachments only weigh us down. All you need is all you need, said Darryl Brooks. A wonderful article. It speaks to those who care to learn from the generosity of someone with that kind of wisdom.

“A tough concept to wrap your head around. After all, our entire society is geared toward the exact opposite. You need everything, and you need it now.” ~ Darryl Brooks

What would happen if you just stopped? he asked.

Yeah, what would happen? It’s not about sacrifice, he added. Get your answers to that question in Darryl’s wonderful article.

Spirituality

As for this article, the core is on spirituality. Simplicity is what we need to embrace. That is if what we desire is the lightness to take us through our path to spirituality. It is not difficult to understand this wisdom.

Besides being beautiful, simplicity is a blessing. Less is more.

More than anywhere else, we see this wisdom brought to life in the aesthetic elegance of Zen Buddhism.

In the practice of Zen, meditation is called Zazen: just sitting. But the real meaning of Zazen is staying in the moment and just being: letting go of thought, movement, and speech. Pure presence.

The concept of the holy fool

We lose meaning and our very essence in busy-ness and complexity. Yet we, as spiritual seekers need to find solutions to help sort through the non-essential.

I’m not saying technology is bad. No Sir. Technology is good and there’s no stopping it. Technology is not the monster.

What we need to do though, is peel back the many layers of non-essentials from our lifestyles. To reach the simplicity we yearn for.

The concept of the holy fool, includes Jesus Christ, Buddha, and Muhammad. It exists in the Sanskrit, the Islamic traditions, and the Sufis. The holy fool is able to see straightforward essential truths. Truths buried in the complexities of the world. The simplicity.

Simplicity is also connected to childlike wonder of things. And a deep search into our souls should remind us of a time when we looked at things with awe. Through the eyes of a child and intuitive understanding. We carried no baggage then. Tap into that.

“You have to become like a child again to enter the kingdom of heaven.” ~ Jesus Christ

The title-question will get us to start. Calling forth the child within, refocusing our eyes and hearts to our child, is what will show us the way. To sort through the clutter in our desks, homes, lives; in our hearts, and in our minds.

We will find what we’re looking for and be able to determine its place in our lives.

It’s not about sacrificing anything. If you need it, keep it. Use it. It’s essential. If you have no use for an attachment then it’s not essential. Use your rationale. Do what you must.

And the next time you’re traveling, instead of asking, “Do I have everything I need,” ask instead, “Do I need everything I have?”

THANKS FOR READING I Wish You Miracles.