To Live Simply Is to Live Differently and That’s Terrifying. Here’s How to Make It…Not

Rule no. 1 — cultivate a FU attitude

There is a dude on this earth who for the last 35 years has walked around the world living in just a tent.

My mother-in-law told me about him whilst I was staying at her place this weekend. She waxed lyrical about this different way of living saying things like:

People can do anything!

It just goes to show, you don’t have to live the same way as everyone else.

Your only barrier is your imagination.

However admirable her attitude is towards people who throw out the Western life rulebook, she forgot one glaring issue:

Most people are terrified of living differently.

And in our modern, consumption-filled, bigger-is-better world, living simply is living differently.

It’s only once you recognize how f**king scary it is — and do something about that fear — that you can make real changes that facilitate exactly what many people want their simple life to give them.

Happiness, contentment, and a life worth calling good.

To live simply means owning a F**k You attitude

If you live in an upwardly-mobile, middle-class, American Dream-tinged world, no one is going to cheerlead your simple life.

Your parents will probably hate it because they’ll see it as a rejection of everything they wanted for you, from bigger houses to fancier cars.

Your siblings will probably hate it because when you grow up in the same household, differences are even more marked and that can be super uncomfortable.

Your friends will probably hate it because your intentionality throws their own values and life direction into sharp relief.

It’s hard because you (hopefully) like your family and friends and don’t want your simple life to cause a rift. To deal with that — and them — means owning a (respectful) FU attitude.

I was always the black sheep of my family. I’ve always thrived on living differently and I’ve always had a hefty dollop of FU attitude toward societal norms. So people around me were hardly surprised when I announced I was selling everything I owned at 35 years old to indefinitely travel.

But that’s not the case for everyone. I’ve met enough people who live on the road that struggled with what their close friends and family thought of them and their life choices. Many of them had huge internal conflicts that lasted years and halted their plans, sometimes for decades.

The difference is that eventually, their desire for a different life outweighed other people’s critical remarks. They eventually crafted an FU attitude because the alternative was the scarier prospect.

And every single one of them tells me their biggest regret is that they didn’t cultivate that attitude sooner.

There is no living simply without an FU attitude. If you don’t cultivate one, you’ll always be too scared of what other people think of you to pull the trigger.

Everyone struggles with this because in our heads we’re still Neanderthals trying to fit in with the pack. The difference is it’s no longer 50,000BC, it’s 2023. You don’t need the approval of the pack anymore.

And here’s the secret. Parents, friends, family — many of them eventually come around because it’s not like you’re living radically differently, you’re just living with a little bit more intentionality and simplicity.

And if they never understand it, that’s when your FU attitude kicks in anyway.

To live simply is to believe in your own abilities

The longer I go around the simple living block — writing, reading, and talking to people about it — the more I realize that one of people’s biggest stumbling blocks is that they don’t believe in themselves.

They don’t believe they can do it. They don’t think they can execute a new, exciting, interesting, less conventional life. They’re scared that they will fail. They’re worried they can’t live with the conveniences they *think* they’ll lose if they choose to live more simply.

What they — and perhaps you — don’t realize is how much of living simply is within your control. Ironically, it’s far more in your control than living the money-grabbing, upwardly mobile life we’re all expected to chase.

In practical terms, there isn’t much to fail. You’ll live quieter and more sustainably. It will be cheaper. It will be easier.

But living a simple life isn’t just about practicality. It’s about mentality and that is, admittedly, far scarier. It’s maintaining that FU attitude. It’s about ignoring those 10,000 ads you’re served every single day. It’s about sticking to your principles and values in the face of a hundred questions like:

When are you going to return to the real world?

Don’t you feel deprived?

And my personal favorite statement:

Well, it’s OK for some, but I could NEVER live like this.

At the risk of sounding like a 1980s motivational speaker, do you believe in yourself? If you don’t, that might be why you’re so scared.

The chances are however, you do have the mental strength to stick a metaphorical middle finger up to the mental gymnastics required to live a simpler life.

You’re stronger than you think.

To live simply is to get comfortable with thinking outside the box

When I was younger I thought that questioning everything I thought of as normal was a) a pain in the ass and b) scary. What if I question everything so much I become too far removed from “real” society and I end up on my own? Isn’t it best to not question and stick to societal norms?

I spent my twenties and thirties sharpening my abilities to question everything and think outside the box. To my utter surprise, I found that it wasn’t scary at all. It was in fact freaking awesome because a whole world opened up for me. And humans are not as sheep-like as we’re led to believe. If there is a way of living — no matter how unconventional — someone will be doing it, so you’re never alone.

The most confident people I know are the ones that think outside the box and question everything. They don’t shut an idea down straightaway, they mull it over, they question it, they’re curious about it. It’s this confidence that leads them to craft different lives for themselves.

Much like exposure therapy, the more they think outside the box, the less scary what lives outside the box becomes.

Living a simpler life is out-the-box thinking at its finest. Because it’s an all-encompassing lifestyle, it means questioning everything you think of as normal, from the way you spend your money to the abode you live in, to the way you educate your kids.

Once you start to exercise your out-the-box thinking muscle, the easier and less scary this whole simple living malarky becomes.

Any life lived differently seems scary. Living within our societal norms often feels like the safer option.

But what if our societal norms are f**ked? What if they’ve been hijacked by people whose names rhyme with Fezos and Tusk and Puckerberg or an out-of-date American Dream?

Isn’t it scarier to live adhering to a screwed-up system that doesn’t care about anything other than the dollars in your pocket than it is to live a little bit differently?

A FU attitude, self-belief, and the ability to think outside the box is what will get you there.

They’re not especially easy mindsets to cultivate — the best ones never are.

But they are worth it because they give you at least a fighting chance to live a life worth living. A simpler, easier life.

I’ll see you on the other side.

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