Rebecca's Challenge: Make Your Own Simple Living Manifesto

Here we are at Day 60 of the 72 Ideas in 72 Days Project. Over the past two months, some items in the original Simple Living Manifesto have been relevant to me, some not. Either way, it's been valuable to at least reflect--however briefly--on each one.

I would like to pose a challenge to my fellow 72-Days-Project participants: On Day 73, take a look back at the 72 ideas and your posts here. Note which ideas have worked for you, think of anything that you might add to that list, and write your manifesto--one that is an actual manifesto (i.e., a declaration of principles and intentions, in the first person).*

In other words, synthesize what you've learned during the project and make it your own.

Here's my draft so far. Sixty items--some repetitive, some non-applicable--boiled down to just 15. (And I bet I can edit some of these down even further.) How's that for simplification?

1. I will pause to remind myself each morning of my priorities--my most important things.
2. I will proceed carefully on new commitments, making sure they align with my priorities (see #1), ensuring ample free time to spend doing what I love, with the people I love.
3. Every day, I will use my time in ways aligned with my priorities (see #1).
4. At the beginning of each week, I will create an organized to-do list (for work and home projects alike) of most important tasks. With this list, I will direct myself to the most important projects to focus on each day.
5. I will continue to work on limiting my communications, taking periodic email vacations, etc.
   
6. When tempted to shop, I will continue to remember that less is more.
   
7. I will edit rooms, closets, drawers, etc. regularly.
8. I will spend time each week organizing my computer files to minimize digital clutter.
9. I will remind myself to slow down.
10. I will remind myself to be present, to live deliberately.
11. I will remember to clear my desk once a week.
12. I will remember to delete emails when I am done with them. (More to come on this... I'm still catching up on posts here, but did figure out some successful strategies for my inbox.)
    
13. I will work with my partner on planning and prepping some meals in advance.
    
14. I will make time to exercise. (Sigh... I have not been doing a great job with this.)
15. I will remember to aim for equanimity.

So, what do you think? If you were to simplify the items from the last 60 days into a true manifesto that is meaningful to you personally, what would it look like?

--

*Did it bug anyone but me that the original Simple Living Manifesto is misnamed--that it's not actually a manifesto?

Rebecca, Day 49 (still catching up!)

49. Develop equanimity. If every little thing that happens to you sends you into anger or stress, your life might never be simple. Learn to detach yourself, and be more at peace.

I've been reading The power of now : a guide to spiritual enlightenment (Eckhart Tolle), which is an odd but somehow brilliant book. I definitely understand why it's been critiqued as being a bunch of mumbo-jumbo. But from what I've read so far, one of its major arguments is that we should all develop detachment from emotional stressors (though Tolle doesn't phrase it that way). I've been mulling this over and using modifying some of his strategies to be a bit more peaceful about things.

For example, Tolle argues that your mind is not yourself, but we all get tricked into thinking that we are our minds. Okaaay, whatever. But his point is that sometimes, we can look critically at the course our thoughts are taking and take note of unhealthy ruts -- eg., being prompted by X to dwell on Y and feel Z.

The general idea self-awareness and stopping to recognize stress triggers seems a good way to develop equanimity.

Rebecca, Day 52 (catching up!)

52: Make a Most Important Tasks (MITs) list each day. Set just 3 very important things you want to accomplish each day. Don’t start with a long list of things you probably won’t get done by the end of the day. A simple list of 3 things, ones that would make you feel like you accomplished something.

I am a big fan of to-do lists. I've always got a running list of tasks I need to accomplish. For about a year, I used a GTD Moleskine Hack and liked it; then, when I found myself the owner of an iPhone (thanks, honey!) and therefore an always-connected calendar app, carrying a Moleskine somehow became less appealing. And I switched to a single sheet of paper, labeled TO DO, that I'd hang onto for a week (or more, or less) at a time.

One of the advantages of the Moleskine hack was its organization. On my single sheet of paper, I tried to maintain similar categories, and I'd list tasks in different categories ("phone calls," "emails to send," "errands," etc.). It functioned, but inelegantly.

Last week, I tried the "MITs" system described above, writing at the start of the week a to-do list organized by day. Dividing the tasks I had to do according to day helped me ensure time-sensitive items got done earlier in the week. In a couple of important cases, I subdivided by time of day (e.g., "Wed. a.m." vs. "Wed p.m."), according to timing needs.

Verdict: This worked well! I could maintain my routine of jotting down everything I wanted to do in a week, but essentially saved time on a daily basis by having my main priorities for each specific day listed. No thinking "Hm, what should I do next?" -- just "Ah, okay, I'll do that next."

Rebecca, Day 37: Meal Planning

I have been wanting to simplify meal times for a while now. The reason? If we start making dinner at 6 p.m., anything particularly nice to eat (or, rather, more complex than a simple pasta dish, salad, or sandwich) won't be ready till close to 7 p.m.

If we start our preschooler on his bedtime routine around 7:30, that means that life after a full day of work can consist of:

1. day care pick up
2. food prep and cooking while struggling to occupy toddler (often resorting to playing videos for him)
3. eating
4. starting bed time routine
   

In other words, no quality after-work time with my child until the stories and snuggles that put him to sleep. Considering my priorities, the situation is really disagreeable to me.

Enter my new gadget: the slow cooker I requested for my birthday earlier this month. That plus recipes from A Year of Slow Cooking and a couple vegetarian slow cooker books have been making quite the difference.

Slow cooker recipes require advanced planning. I'm sure some people who use slow cookers a lot get to the point where they can just throw stuff in it and hope it comes out well; but I need to follow recipes. Therefore, I need to shop with specific recipes in mind, and think about what will make sense for that week.

We've been prepping the ingredients for our slow-cooked meals after our son is asleep, refrigerating them, and then beginning the slow cooking process in the morning. This means that at 6 p.m., we're not starting the process of cooking; we're sitting down to eat a nice, warm, high-quality meal.

And what a huge difference this makes! It may not save tons of time--prepping a good slow cooker recipe takes as much time as prepping any recipe, and I've always felt that food prep work is the long boring part--but it is reorganizing our time in a way that makes sense for our family.

And I'm really happy about that.

Note: I've also checked out a couple library books on pressure cooking. We got a pressure cooker for our wedding in 2000 that we've used, maybe, twice? If I can get comfortable using it, I think we could use this pressure cooker to similar advantage. We'd prep food in advance, but instead of having it cook all day, throw the ingredients when we get home and see it ready to eat in only a few minutes. So far, I'm more drawn to the idea of food ready to eat as soon as we get home, freeing up the evening for walks and playing and other fun stuff--but I think the pressure cooker may have its place, too.

Rebecca, Day 17

Day 17 is about limiting your materialism and escaping consumerism. The description links to this page and offers several suggestions. Let's see how I do here:

• Limit television: Check.
  
• Eschew the news: Check.
  
• Limit Internet reading. I need to work on this. (See you soon, Day 60.)
• Give up magazines for books. No, thanks. The magazines I read, I love.
  
• Don’t go to the mall or Walmart. Check. I never go to the mall without a specific purpose. And I have been boycotting Walmart for years now.
• Monitor your urges. When you’re online, or watching TV, or at a store, keep track of the number of times you want to buy something. No, thanks... This sounds like boring busywork.
  
• Use a 30-day list. If you still really want to buy something, put it on a list, and write down the date you added the item to the list. Now tell yourself you cannot buy that item for 30 days. Many times, our urges to buy something will pass during this waiting period. I kind of do this already. It's called my Amazon.com shopping cart's "save for later" section.
  
• Declutter. Check (see Days 9-13).
  
• Find other forms of entertainment. There are other things to do besides watch TV or movies or read magazines or newspapers or the Internet. Um, duh?
• Buy used. When you get the urge to buy something, and you’re convinced that it’s needed, try finding it used instead of new. Look in thrift shops or garage sales or flea markets or similar places. I totally already do this! I love buying things used. Often, older used items--e.g., furniture--are much more affordable and of a much better quality than new items.

While I'm in good shape by that list's standards, further down the page there are suggestions for "A True Path to Happiness." In general, I like the suggestions there and will see if I can implement some of them. (Especially the suggestion to exercise more! I used to be much better about this and would like to make exercise a routine part of my life again. I'll have to work up a schedule.)

Project Update: 10-13

If you see small household items on my front porch sporting name tags, don't worry. I haven't gone nuts and named frying pan "GEOFF" or the microwave cart "MEL B." I've just been--as Christa put it--freecycling like a boss.

• Needlepoint kits I'll never get to? Gone.
• Electronic charging station that seemed like a good idea at the time? Adios.
• Board games we haven't played in 5 years? So long.
• Carry-on suitcase with the missing zipper pulls? Bye!

Freecycle is not my only pal as I edit/purge/simplify. Craigslist sent a nice momma my way; she bought a bag of toddler boy clothes from me.

And at 3 a.m. today, I decided that tomorrow would be CLOTHING SWAP NIGHT. About a dozen friends woke up to learn they've been invited to stop by at 7 tomorrow with clothes and other small items they no longer want/need. It looks like four people are coming so far. If all goes well, everyone will unload a few items by leaving them with other folks who'll enjoy keeping them.

A lot of these items are from the closets that I worked on most of the yesterday. Office closet looks WAY better now. Living room closet now makes a LOT more sense. I've still got some figuring out to do in the coat closet, and probably spend more time in my son's closet, but things are looking pretty fine!

Days 14-15: My Name is Rebecca, and I am a Digital Packrat.

Simplify my computing life and declutter my digital packrattery?

Uh-oh.

As a GTD fan, I have previously tried applying the rules of Inbox Zero to my email files, but it never quite works. I think this is partly because I check my mail from multiple machines: my laptop, my phone, and when school is in session the instructor's station in my classroom(s). Maybe that's something I can change--but it would involve responding to messages less quickly, and I'm not sure how I feel about that. Hm.

Periodically, I try to clear out my inbox. I'll do the 30 minutes here, 1 hour there and succeed in getting rid of some email. I'll go through a month's worth at a time--but there is always more to do, because of the sheer volume of email I deal with.

I have 15,379 email addresses in my primary inbox at the moment. Note I said primary. I have high quantities in my two other accounts, as well.

As for photos and videos, I've got tons and tons of those, as well. But I'm not as digitally organized with my personal stuff as Christa is, apparently, so I can't give you a straight number.

I do have a serious external hard drive on order, however, which is specifically meant for the photos and videos and music, as they are eating up hard drive space.

Work files: I have a lot of those, but they're in good order. I could definitely take a look and see whether anything can be purged--but they don't worry me so much, as they're very well organized and I do use older files when I'm writing research-based material. (While writing my book this year, I regularly referred back to project files from 2005, and some as far back as 2003. Academia moves much more slowly than industry, and I suspect I have to keep more work-related files longer than the average person as a result.)

Anyhow, I don't have any quick ways of addressing these issues--this is NOT a day-long project for me--but beginning next week, I'll spend 30 minutes a day (per the tip in this article) tackling the email.

Wish me luck. Meanwhile, if anyone has good tips, I'm all ears!

Rebecca, Days 11-13: Editing rooms, closets, drawers

In the past week:

From my closet, I removed many items that no longer fit and/or have lost their appeal to me. Like James, I prefer to sell unwanted items when possible; but my favorite place to consign clothing recently closed, and I don't really feel like going through the hassle of booking a consignment appointment elsewhere and waiting a month or two for my items to be seen.

So instead, I took them all to Buffalo Exchange. They give you cash immediately for any clothing/accessories they think they can sell. They didn't take that many pieces, but I got $40 for my efforts. Then I gave several pieces to a friend's daughter, and I am hoping to organize a clothing swap among friends for other especially good pieces. The rest, I will probably donate to charity or post to Freecycle.

From the family room/living room areas, like Natalie, I went to work on toys. My toddler has way too many to play with. Most of what he hasn't been playing with lately went into bins in the basement, and he hasn't missed a thing. I'm going to winnow things down further when I have a chance. I also edited our decorations, moving a few things around and eliminating a few others, and I like the way things look.

I would love to work on the basement, but that's tough because we have a lot of things down there that we do use seasonally--or that we are saving for a second child we hope to someday have.

From my son's bedroom, I pulled a ton of clothing from his drawers and closet. He has way more clothing than he can wear, so anything in his current size that I didn't like (especially sports-themed items), I put into a bag and posted on Craigslist for only $20. No takers yet, so if anyone would like a bag of 3T boys' clothes, let me know! I did the same with the 24M/2T stuff he has outgrown, saving only a few favorite and/or gender-neutral items for potential future use.

The other area that needs serious editing is my home office. I don't have a great office at work, but my department is supposed to be moving to a much better space next year, and I'm hoping I'll be able to move lots of my academic books and files there at that time. In the meantime, I'd like to make a plan of attack that includes:

• Sending old papers/files to One Dollar Scan for digitization
• Donating/giving away some other books
  
• Trying to rehome the closet and dresser full of craft projects
  

Re: the last item, before my son was born, our guest room was essentially full of items for potential crafty projects. Yarn, fabric, embroidery and needlepoint supplies, etc etc. I gave a majority to a very grateful friend who actually works in the wardrobe union in Boston and has a dedicated sewing room in her home. I kept what I thought I could get to soon and/or really, really loved. But the reality is that I have way less time for crafting than I'd like, and I still have a closet and dresser half-full with craft-related items. I think I just need to part ways with anything I can't work on very soon. With the limited time I have, there is NO NEED for an entire stash. If I ever run out of crafty projects to do (ha!), I can just go buy a new one, right?

If anyone reading this is crafty and would like to take a look through my stash, please let me know. :)

Rebecca, Day 10

Day 10:

Get rid of the big items. There’s tons of little clutter in our lives, but if you start with the big items, you’ll simplify your life quickly and in a big way. Read more.

I feel kind of "eh" about this one. Suggestions from the "read more" link leave me cold. I don't have "big things" lying around to get rid of. Eg: "TACTIC: If you rent storage space because you can't fit all your stuff in your home, recognize this as God's way of telling you that you have too much stuff." Rent storage space? Heck, no! I would never waste money on storage space indefinitely. We have only rented space for a month or two at a time, during moves, on an as-needed basis.

"TACTIC: Get rid of unused major appliances, furniture, and vehicles as soon as possible." Unused major appliances or vehicles? Um, no, we have exactly what we need. Furniture? Sure, as we became parents and turned the guest room into a nursery, etc., we have had some furniture to get rid of--but we've kept mostly on top of it with summer yard sales (and the occasional Craigslist ad). I DO have some antique guest bedroom furniture in the basement that I need to sell, but it's taken me three years to resign myself to doing so. It's so pretty; I'd rather keep it. But the housing market being what it is, we're not moving anytime soon, which is the only way a guest bedroom might possibly be in the realm of possibility. So, yes, that is a good reminder. I need to orchestrate getting it out of the basement (it's heavy) to be photographed and posted for sale online.

"TACTIC: Question the need to have a car." Actually, we experimented with this last summer. Our older car needed some costly repairs, so before doing them, we spent three months as a single-car family. We realized that we could reduce to one car if needed, but as our older car has been reliable and is completely paid off, our answer to that question is that the costs of routine maintenance, inexpensive insurance, and occasional repairs are worth the added convenience to our family.

"TACTIC: Reconsider the need for a vacation home or property." I would LOVE to have a vacation home, but alas, I do not. (I am clearly not a member of the author's target audience for these tactics.) If I did, though, I would be very careful to choose someplace that could generate rental income to cover expenses.

"TACTIC: Ask yourself if you really need sport boats, vehicles, and other large pieces of equipment." Hahahaha. No, I definitely don't. That's why I don't have any! Silly.

Rebecca, Days 8 & 9

Day 8:

Limit your media consumption. This tip won’t be for everyone, so if media consumption is important to you, please skip it (as with any of the other tips). However, I believe that the media in our lives — TV, radio, Internet, magazines, etc. — can come to dominate our lives. Don’t let it. Simplify your life and your information consumption by limiting it. Try a media fast.

While this challenge was in many ways covered by my Day 7 post, I do have some additional relevant experiences I can share.

We got rid of our DirectTV package a year ago, and sold our television set at a yard sale earlier this summer. We haven't missed either at all. I would use DirectTV's DVR feature to record all kinds of programs that I'd never have time for, and when I turned it on, I'd bizarrely feel as though it was a to-do list I needed to get through. (Remember, I love lists!) So although I worried I might miss DirectTV, the system was prompting me to spend more time than I otherwise would have, and the result is that I feel much freer now.

Now, we do Hulu and Netflix through a computer--it's much cheaper, and easier to avoid the ambient television viewing that happens when a set gets left on all day long.

In all honesty, I think this wasn't a big challenge because I'm just not that inclined to watch much television. I'm too busy for it, and I don't LOVE a lot of what's out there, anyway. And if I don't love it, why spend time on it?

There are a few shows I truly enjoy watching, like 30 Rock, but I can get these on Hulu. (The only one I can't find online and really miss is What Not To Wear.) I watch between, say, two and five hours of television over the course of a week--way less than the national average of 28 hours a week. Some weeks, I watch no TV at all; actually, I can't remember what or when I last viewed. I think it was at least two weeks ago.

I believe that overall, my screen time has been displaced from television to the internet. I don't know how many hours I spend online, but I suspect I have more in common with teenagers than I'd think.

Day 9:

Purge your stuff. If you can devote a weekend to purging the stuff you don’t want, it feels seriously terrific. Get boxes and trash bags for the stuff you want to donate or toss.

This is something I try to do regularly. I strive to keep only things that are useful and/or beautiful in my home, and to make sure every item has its own place. I do not always keep up with this--I'm so busy!--but I find that when I can keep up with decluttering/purging unused items, it's easier to tidy up, as fewer things lying around means less time cleaning.

I do like trying to get cash for the things I no longer need when I possible; we have a yard sale every summer (ours was a couple of weeks ago) and plan to have another in October. Also, today I took a pile of clothes I can no longer use to Buffalo Exchange and got about $40 for my efforts, yay! Then I gave several items to my friend's daughter, who was delighted. Now I need to see if any friends can use the remaining items; I'm proposing a clothing swap for next week. :) Anything they can't use, I'll donate them to charity.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to Days 10-13. Does anybody have really special tips/tricks/suggestions for discarding or rehoming items? I may watch an episode of Hoarders for extra motivation. I kind of can't stand that show, but the results are great--it's the perfect motivator!

Rebecca, Day 7: Limiting my communications

I'm back!

Day 7:

Limit your communications. Our lives these days are filled with a vast flow of communications: email, IM, cell phones, paper mail, Skype, Twitter, forums, and more. It can take up your whole day if you let it. Instead, put a limit on your communications: only do email at certain times of the day, for a certain number of minutes (I recommend twice a day, but do what works for you). Only do IM once a day, for a limited amount of time. Limit phone calls to certain times too. Same with any other communications. Set a schedule and stick to it.

Limit communications? Who, me??

I have an iPhone, and I constantly use it to check facebook, my email, and my google reader RSS feed (Day 60, I'm looking at you!). Whenever I'm bored--waiting in line or whatever--I check them reflexively.

On the positive side, I'm pretty easy to reach; I respond quickly to emails and facebook messages. But maybe it would be simpler to limit these things, scheduling them if possible--to not be connected all the time, and to let down time be downtime.

I've tried a couple of things already:

EXPERIMENT #1: Following the tip above, a few days ago, I set two daily alarms (12:45 and 4 pm) on my phone to prompt me to "check email." I decided not to check email at any other time. But there's always been some reason to. Plus, I always seem to be in the middle of something I don't want to stop when the alarm tells me to check my email. (The lack of a routine in summer makes working with the alarms difficult.) Experiment fail!

EXPERIMENT #2: A couple of days ago, I deleted the facebook and the google reader apps from my iPhone. It was a spur-of-the-moment decision, and I hesitated (isn't one of the reasons we love our smartphones is their apps?).

The result: It's been refreshing to have some space! It reminds me of when I've traveled abroad for vacation and was worried about having no data plan (or a very limited one), but then kind of liked it. Perhaps I was splitting my attention too much and didn't realize it. Interesting!

So, what next?

EXPERIMENT #3: I'm going to run with the "vacation" idea and take an email vacation. The semester starts soon, so it's now or never. (Or, I suppose, now or December, when the semester is over.) Today, I am turning off my email accounts on my phone, and I am setting an autoresponder on both my work and personal accounts, stating that I will be offline for the next week.

Although I will actually check email now and then, as I will really need to send some work-related messages (I wouldn't want to ignore my lovely publisher!), I'll limit email-checking to when I'm at my desk.

Wish me luck! And if you need to reach me? Just call me. :)

Rebecca, Day 2: On Commitments

Day 2:

Evaluate your commitments. Look at everything you’ve got going on in your life. Everything, from work to home to civic to kids’ activities to hobbies to side businesses to other projects. Think about which of these really gives you value, which ones you love doing. Which of these are in line with the 4-5 most important things you listed above? Drop those that aren’t in line with those things

The next few days in this project become tricky for me. Back around 2006 or so, I started using the GTD system (which I love because it uses lists!) to figure out how to prioritize my commitments and tasks and focus on those priorities.

The upshot is that tasks like "evaluating my commitments" don't feel productive/useful at this point--so, evaluating this part of the 72-day challenge commitment, I'm going to skip out for a while. :) You'll hear from me again when we get to Day 7: Limit your communications, which is something I really need to work on. (Talk about a challenge.) Wish me luck!

Rebecca, Day 1: Taking Stock

72 Ideas in 72 Days? I'm up for a challenge! Count me in.

Day 1: My 4-5 most important things. Okay, let's see. I'd say my priorities have been clear for some time, especially following my son's birth in 2008. Having a child forced me to prioritize how I spend my time. Let's have a look at my bios on facebook and twitter; they're little lists.

• From facebook: "She sings, she writes, she crafts things." (That's my riff on Jason Mraz.)


• From twitter: "Professor. Singer. Writer. Mom."

So, tweaked and restated, these are my 5 most important things (and not necessarily in one particular order):

1. Family (particularly spending quality time with my toddler) and close friends.
   


2. Writing--academic writing, to be exact, which involves reading and research.


3. Teaching. I'm so glad I work at a teaching university, where our class sizes are small and I can enjoy working closely with my students.


4. Singing. I'm a classical singer; music is really important to me.


5. Crafting, which I readily abandon when 1-4 don't leave me any time to spare. My craftiness is always changing, e.g., from crochet to knitting to cross-stitching to needlepoint. This summer, it's taken the form of a lot of canning (mostly with friends--see #1, above).
   

Is all that too specific? I'm not sure--I guess we'll see. But I'm looking forward to seeing other people's lists this week!