Thanks you for your thread, it is a good topic.
I will give you a rundown of my spiritual practice more so than religious practice as I am not a Christian any longer.
My spiritual practice varies, especially lately.
I used to be much more regular.
When I was a Christian, it varied even more than what I will send in here.
Now I am an agnostic freethinker.
jesusneverexisted.org/jne/forum/ … opic=504.0
I used to study about religion and spiritual matters for many hours a week.
Then when I covered the material I wished to cover, over about a ten year period, I scaled back some on the studies.
I also did 9 years of working meditation during that time as well.
I was not searching so much at this point in my life, but more in the practice stage of spiritual life.
Recently I took on many more interests and find there is not enough time for it all.
So when I neglect my spiritual practice I can feel the peace evaporate over time.
Here is an old post that gives a rundown of my beliefs.
jesusneverexisted.org/jne/forum/ … ?topic=4.0
And some notes on my current practice along spiritual lines.
Whatever the area of mind abuse - a sick mind that is constantly busy cannot heal itself without rest. Nor can that mind think rationally when it is sick. Meditation on nothingness (zazen) helps quiet a “sticky brain” that seems to hold onto everything.
I can get positive results with just 15 to 20 minutes a day sitting meditation time. It helps if I sit at regular time. I meditate on nothingness, although some meditate on an object If you can get to a half hour meditation time, that is great.
Do not confuse zazen with sleep.
Having a brain awake and empty if far different from a brain asleep and still producing thoughts and dreams.
It just takes time and practice. Morning works better for me than mid day…there are less things distracting me earlier in the day usually.
The important point is to just do it and do it regularly and do not make demands on your meditation practice or have expectations.
Balance is very important in life. We need some spiritual practice and some physical as well. We sometimes forget we are spiritual beings residing in physical bodies living in physical world and need effort in both areas.
There are many other ways to use meditation besides traditional sitting meditation. There is also working mediation and walking mediation practices. If you do yoga, you can try combining meditation with your Yoga practice.
Mindfulness meditation all starts with being aware of ones breath.
I also make use of meditation tools such as a meditation timer. One type is a $10 CD that sounds a gong after a preset time. The other one is an expensive $100 electric gong timer that can also be used as an alarm clock or Yoga timer.
Sometimes I might use the 15 minute preset time just to get into a state conducive to meditation and when the gong goes off keep sitting until I feel like getting up naturally. These are usually the best sessions for me, although they require a person to have some freedom of time.
Seldom can I sit for longer than 30 to 35 minutes at a session due to time and my ability. But, don’t get caught up in ego and try to mediate ad infinitum thinking the longer the better.
One out of balance practitioner I knew bragged how he could meditate the main away from his rotting teeth with long hours of meditation. In his case too much sitting and too little oral hygiene – stay balanced.
Any sort of timer is fine except one that jars you out of meditation in an abusive and agitating manner. A timer frees one’s mind from worrying about such things.
This should also apply to our alarm clocks in the morning. I use a CD clock that plays birds singing. Start your day off in peace. If you need further advice, there are many good books, videos or tapes on meditating from your local library that can help. Also many internet resources.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zazen
mro.org/zmm/teachings/meditation.php
As an offshoot to my simple living work, I now use the practice of “voluntary solitude” to give me a more peaceful life. The same way I pick and choose which complexities of living I allow in my life, I now do the same with noise and commotion.
I first learned of this concept when reading a book by the granddaddy of backpacking Colin Fletcher. He described the benefits of pure solitude by walking alone. It occurred to me I was addicted to noise and commotion.
I felt like my mind was going to explode some days. Music and noise kept repeating in my brain all night and my sleep was fitful. I had the TV blasting all day with the stock channel or the news or whatever. It didn’t matter if I watched it or not, I just liked the noise. I had the radio or CD going whenever I was driving.
Even on the trail when hiking or biking, I had on earphones and at the pool a radio blaring. My mind was full of noise and I could never seem to get any escape with noise even in my sleep.
Once I started with voluntary solitude and shut off the noise, I went though a period of noise withdrawal for a few days, but gradually could see things were getting better. Sometimes our peace is disturbed by other means than noise. I’ve seen persons going out to be alone in nature and they bring their computer or paperwork with them.
Maybe they have removed some of the fuel for their stressed life but cannot let go of it all and must still feed their addiction even while in nature. Be aware of peace disrupters in your life, irrespective of whether they make sounds or not.
I now am very choosy when it comes to noise pollution and other disruptions entering me that can be cured by using solitude, deep quiet and renunciation. When we are quiet within we are in an easier position to find peace. I’ve known some people that have a completely quiet day once per week seeking quiet for their mouth and speak to no one in addition to seeking quiet for their ears.
Other persons I have talked with just make an effort to lower the volume of the noise they intake as well as lowering the volume of the noise they output…lowering their voice. No matter which road you choose, now is a wonderful time to seek the solitude of nature and practice voluntary solitude in whatever degree you choose.
Voluntary Simplicity is another important aspect of the spiritual life.
We seldom question if more of a “good thing” is desirable for our supposed happiness in life. The question, that Voluntary Simplicity helps answer, is the question of what IS enough so we may be happy right now in the present.
A life of Voluntary Simplicity focuses our attention on the fact that “everything we own take a little piece ~ peace of us.” And in doing so, we can let go of peace and life destroying rituals and possessions and replace them with a contented, satisfied and complete life in the present moment instead of a life that revolves around the next thing to be acquired in hopes of satisfying our insatiable appetites.
Greed is never satisfied by attainment - it is only satisfied by contentment. This orientation of conscious thought to simplify ones life in whatever activity the individual is engaged in is the foundation of success when it comes to simple living…mindfulness of our direction in life. Voluntary Simplicity is the tool I use to counter this desire to constantly expand my life with more complexities, stress and problems and to live within my comfortable boundaries for a serene life.
I started with 12 step programs in 1974 to work on various addictions. As such, I find a less complex life very useful to my addictions recovery work. The 12 Step programs do actually touch on the VS topic, although it is not specifically called VS. Here are a couple of quotes that can be taken as their efforts at applying VS to one’s life.
…From page 76 of the 12 & 12 of Alcoholics Anonymous…
“The chief activator of our defects has been a self-centered fear-primarily that we would lose something we already possessed or would fail to get something we demanded. Living upon a basis of unsatisfied demands, we were in a state of continual disturbance and frustrations. Therefore, no peace was to be had unless we could find a means of reducing these demands.”
End of Quote
I cannot tell you that I have no unsatisfied demands in my life; but, I will say that since joining the simple living movent my unsatisfied demands can now be counted on one hand, whereas in my prior life, I needed a notebook to record them all.
…Taken from pages 122-125 of the 12 & 12 of Alcoholics Anonymous…
“In later life he (the addict) finds that real happiness is not to be found in just trying to be a number one man, or even a first-rater in the heartbreaking struggle for money, romance, or self-importance. He learns that he can be content as long as he plays well whatever cards life deal him. He’s still ambitious, but not absurdly so, because he can now see and accept actual reality. He is willing to stay right size.”
End of quote.
I find VS to be a very important state of mind to be in. It shows which direction a person is pointed in with their life. The same way an addiction has 3 roads to go down, so it goes with VS. An addict can be expanding their addiction, freezing their addiction or reducing their addiction. A person suffering from an overly stressed or complicated life can be expanding the complications, freezing the complications or reducing the complications.
Thoreau says that we need food, shelter, fuel and clothes as necessities. In modern times, I will add transportation to the list depending on your local. Everything else is pretty much optional. If we have these needs met and are not happy, then their is no end to our supposed needs for that elusive state of happiness that we seek. We all seem to have no shortage of supposed needs or wants as complexity addicts. We only want to go in one direction…more.
Life does not go in one direction no matter how wealthy you are, life is always up and down. My goal in life prior to joining the VS movement was to get rich and buy anything I wanted to. My goal now is to live within my means, comfortably fit within my space and gratefully accept my current position in life. VS has contributed to this recovery and continues to do so each day. I make it a practice to wake up with VS, eat lunch with VS and to go to bed with VS the same way I do with my 12 step program work and without this constant awareness of how daily decisions affect my VS or 12 Step program, I’d be back on the road to my prior sick life.
Do not confuse VS with the misnomer of ‘Voluntary Poverty’ VS is not about living low, it is about making choices and balanced living. You get out what you put in with VS. If you do not cut back enough on the complexities that rob you of living life, then all you have is your same complex life back that you started with. If you cut out too many complexities and are unhappy or bored, don’t worry, you can always add them back. We suffer from no shortage of stress and complexities of living, especially if you have a family. Life gives us plenty of problems for free. You can even trade the complexities that offer no reward other than more problems for new complexities that offer rich rewards or good feelings.
For instance, I gave up some of my computer compulsion time and put that time into yoga class and meditation. I started with VS in 1996 by canceling some subscriptions to 5 business newspapers and magazines and pulled out about 50-60 rosebushes that we could not care for. After that, I saw the beneficial results and kept at it, questioning everything and experimenting with which complexities could be removed and which needed to stay in order to live a balanced life.
We make what we want of VS, there are no rules other than if you do not do enough you do not get any results. There are no VS police to boss you around and tell you what is right or wrong. We have to decide this for ourselves as individuals. As I have said before, the program is the final judge of your success, not you, not me, not anyone else.
A lady wrote in asking if she could be into VS and still have a gold chain? Yes, we can have a gold chain, we can even have 10 gold chains if we please. Can a person have 100 gold chains and still be into VS? No, I could not say with a straight face I was into VS and own 100 gold chains. But, the person that has scaled back from owning 1000 gold chains could definitely say they have applied VS to their lifestyle by cutting back from 1000 to 100 gold chains. It is all relative and all up to us and what we wish to derive from our efforts at simplicity. Another fellow posted how he wanted a canoe, but his wife said he could not have one and be a VS devotee.
It is not up to others to tell us what we can have - our recovery or VS program will tell us. If the canoe would comfortably fit within a financial budget, and a person has the comfortable space required to store it and the object does not cause a person any undue harm or problems such as maintenance that they cannot upkeep, legal problems or rob them of time they cannot afford to give, I see no problem in having it.
A person wrote me and asked, "Is writing your long 5 page post really simple living? " My response was, “Yes, writing 5 pages or even 5000 pages is vastly superior to living the old, sick life that I used to live.” Critics are all around us and work to tear down programs instead of building them up. Either our efforts at simplicity or recovery will promote our peace or destroy our peace - so put peace first. Always listen to your recovery program instead of the critics - it has the final say.
Below are some definitions of VS from the book The Circle of Simplicity ~ Andrews.
“For me, voluntary simplicity is living consciously, trying to eliminate the unnecessary, the superficial clutter. It is trying to live morally and ethically in the global economy by using less.”
“I think that voluntary simplicity as living on purpose, making sure I have the time to do the things I want to do, not wishing my time away.”
“I think voluntary simplicity is being true to yourself, true to the environment. It’s finding that place for every facet of my life and defining how much is enough. For me it is spiritual.”
“It’s choosing to enhance one’s life by surrounding yourself with what really brings you fulfillment. It is defining my own standard of success and prosperity, community and fun.”
“Voluntary simplicity is balancing the realities of my life (limited economics, time and energy) with my values and implementing them into a lifestyle that is comfortable and rewarding. I think voluntary simplicity is an “art of living.” I believe it is an art to live, to be true to yourself and to be open to innovation.”
An in-depth discussion and clarification of the term “Voluntary Simplicity” by Philip Slater
All personal solutions to wealth addiction involve one form or another of what has come to be called Voluntary Simplicity. This doesn’t not necessarily mean going “back to nature” and does not mean living in poverty and discomfort, although some people may elect forms of simplicity that would be highly uncomfortable for the rest of us. Above all, it does not mean forcing yourself to give up something you really enjoy, out of some pious conviction that it’s the “right thing to do.” Voluntary Simplicity merely means trying to rid one’s life as much as possible of material clutter so as to concentrate on more important things: creativity, human survival and development, community well-being, play.
The key word in Voluntary Simplicity is “voluntary,” which means that the giving up of the material clutter is not coerced either from the outside or from the inside. As Andre Vanden Broeck observers, only those who have experienced affluence are in a position to have a “choice divorced from need.” The poor aren’t in a position to make such a choice-they are stuck with a scarcity that is neither simple nor voluntary.
Nor is Voluntary Simplicity coerced from within, for to deprive yourself out of some ideological conviction is merely to feed the Ego Mafia. The word “simplicity” may have overtones that arouse our suspicions: a vaguely puritan ring, conjuring up images of drab smocks, self-righteousness and flagellation. But if this is in the spirit in which Voluntary Simplicity is embraced the result will most certainly be noxious.
There is an old Zen story about two monks traveling together who encounter a nude woman trying to cross a stream. One of them carries her across, much to the consternation of the other. They continue in silence for a couple of hours until the second monk can stand it no longer. “How,” he asks “could you expose yourself to such temptation?” The first monk replies, “I put her down two hours ago. You’re still carrying her.”
Addiction is internal; if you experiment sincerely with Voluntary Simplicity and find yourself still thinking of money and possessions, your simplicity is a fraud and you might just as well go back to pursuing wealth until you’ve had your fill of it. To achieve its goal, Voluntary simplicity must be undertaken in the spirit, not of Puritanism or self-flagellation, but out of adventure. All adventurers throughout history have, after all, been people who abandoned comforts, possessions, love and security to seek new experiences in faraway places.
Richard Gregg, who coined the term in 1936, once complained to Gandhi that while he had no trouble giving up most things, he could not let go of his books. Gandhi told he shouldn’t try: “As long as you derive inner help and comfort from anything, you should keep it.” He pointed out that if you give things up out of a sense of duty or self-sacrifice they continue to preoccupy you and clutter your mind. To talk of “denying oneself” is to use the language of despotism. Simplicity is an affirmation, not a denial of oneself.
End of quote
V writes:
It is always nice to have our own work confirmed by others that have gone before us as well as those that follow us. Many years ago I coined the phrase “Everything you own takes a little piece ~ peace of you.” A couple years ago I came across Richard Gregg’s original work on Voluntary Simplicity penned in 1936 and this is what he said on the subject of peace disturbance or as he termed it “SIMPLICITY A KIND OF PSYCHOLOGICAL HYGIENE”.
Taken from the original work:
Pendle Hill Essays Number Three
THE VALUE OF VOLUNTARY SIMPLICITY
RICHARD B. GREGG
Acting Director of Pendle Hill 1935-36
Chapter X. SIMPLICITY A KIND OF PSYCHOLOGICAL HYGIENE
There is one further value to simplicity. It may be regarded as a mode of psychological hygiene. Just as eating too much is harmful to the body, even though the quality of all the food eaten is excellent, so it seems that there may be a limit to the number of things or the amount of property which a person may own and yet keep himself psychologically healthy. The possession of many things and of great wealth creates so many possible choices and decisions to be made every day that it becomes a nervous strain. Often the choices have to be narrow. The Russian physiologist, Pavlov, while doing experiments on conditioned reflexes with dogs, presented one dog with the necessity of making many choices involving fine discriminations, and the dog actually had a nervous breakdown and had to be sent away for six months’ rest before he became normal again.
Subsequently, American psychologists, by similar methods, produced neuroses in sheep by requiring many repetitions of mere inhibition and action; and as inhibition is an element in all choices, they believe it was that element which may have caused the neurosis in Pavlov’s dog. Of course, people are more highly organized than dogs and are easily able to weigh more possibilities and endure more inhibitions and make more choices and nice distinctions without strain, but nevertheless making decisions is work and can be overdone.
I’ll leave you with a snip of wisdom from Thoreau from his book Walden.
“The twelve labors of Hercules were trifling in comparison with those which my neighbors have undertaken; for they were only twelve, and had an end; but I could never see that these men slew or captured any monster or finished any labor. They had no friend Iolaus to burn with a hot iron the root of hydra’s head, but as soon as one head is crushed, two spring up.”
Also see: simpleliving.net/forums/
And a big help to with regularity with my spiritual practice is The Star System I have developed.
The early Greeks spent much time on asking the question of what constitutes a ‘flourishing of the species’ when it comes to humans. Animals have a natural ability to not act against themselves and their actions are always in the direction of such a flourishing - unless they come under the control of humans. Many of us do not have this ability to dedicate all our actions to such flourishing unless we give it some thought and effort. As such, I need many reminders, even with basics, as to what constitutes healthy behavior for me and what does not.
I use the star system I use to remind me daily of important recovery, spiritual or health related areas I have to work on.
I write down the code letters as shown below on the right margin of my day book. If I do the minimum requirements, I put a ’ * ’ next to the letter. If it is a 11 star day, things are on track, if I see 5 or 6 stars, I’m headed in the wrong direction. The acid test for us is once we have this realization of our direction in living wrong do we continue in the wrong direction or make an effort to turn ourselves around to living healthy again?
This is my list:
S
E
W
C
C
CA
SS
L
A
R
H
(See below for descriptions.)
S leep (Did I get 6-1/2 hours sleep minimum? In my prior life I would average 4 to 5 hours a night when left to my own methods of living.)
E xercise (No star unless it is decent exercise for at least 45 min that leaves one sweaty or at least feeling the efforts at the end of the workout.)
W ater drink 3 cups a day minimum. (I also drink tea and juices.)
C hew each bite of food minimum of 10 times (I have to make a conscious effort to be mindful of each bite of food I am eating as my normal way is to put in a second bite before I’ve finished the first - sensation addiction. )
C alories (My caloric budget is 1800 calories a day 6 days a week and 2500 calories on Sunday if I wish to stay at my goal weight of 155 pounds.)
CA computer addiction (Very easy to escape life through the computer. I have to limit my computer time to stay healthy.)
SS spiritual studies (Did I spend a few minutes that day reading along the lines of recovery, self improvement or spiritual studies?)
L ate No late night eating after 9PM. (Late night eating is great for putting on the fat and generates nightmares for me as well as fitful sleep. When do our internal organs ever get a break? I used to eat from 7 AM until midnight.)
A cceptance (Did I release my life to God or a Higher Power and practice acceptance as suggested in the 12 step programs as well as my Buddhist and Taoist practice.)
R age (I am a rageaholic - did I blow up today? Rage is a very easy program to blow. No rage for months and then boom the inevitable blow up comes without having mindfulness of the disease.)
H umilty (Did I make an effort to be humble today? I don’t have to be the humblest thing on earth, but did I make any effort at all?)
Make up your own star system for what you would like to accomplish. Just keep it short so you’ll stick with it, don’t start making lists of 20 to 30 stars to remember each day. I don’t write down areas that I do not have trouble with, I concentrate on areas that give me problems.
I’ve been using this system for 8 years with slight modifications and find 12 to 14 is the maximum reminders I like to deal with. For an excessive person like myself I could easily write down 25 stars each day and soon not care about doing any of them due to burnout. Always seek balance and sustainability for the long haul as recovery is a life long program.
