Duane Elgin (born 1943) is an American author, speaker, educator, consultant, and media activist.
Poverty is mean and degrading to the human spirit, whereas a life of conscious simplicity can have both a beauty and a functional integrity that elevates the human spirit.
It seems to me that inner growth is the whole moving force behind voluntary simplicity.
I consciously started to live simply when I started to become conscious.
Simplicity means taking charge of a life that is too busy, too stressed, and too fragmented. An uncluttered simplicity means cutting back on trivial distractions, both material and non-material, and focusing on the essentials - whatever those may be for each of our unique lives.
To live more voluntarily is to live more deliberately, intentionally and purposefully - in short, it is to live more consciously. We cannot be deliberate when we are distracted from life. We cannot be intentional when we are not paying attention. We cannot be purposeful when we are not being present.
When a person's primary objective is to maximize material pleasures while minimizing discomforts, then life becomes a constant process of "pushing" (trying to push away from discomforts) and "grabbing" (trying to acquire or hold on to that which gives pleasure). With the loss of inner balance that accompanies a habitual "pushing and grabbing" approach to life, a deeper pain ensues-that of becoming aware of the ultimate unsatisfactoriness of the pleasure-seekingpain-avoiding process itself.
Living simply is not about living in poverty or self-inflicted deprivation. It's about living an examined life where one has determined what is truly important and enough … and then just let go of all the rest.
As my spiritual growth expanded and developed, voluntary simplicity was a natural outgrowth. I came to realize the cost of material accumulation was too high and offered fewer and fewer real rewards, psychological and spiritual.
I feel more voluntary about my pleasures and pains than the average American who has his needs dictated by Madison Avenue (my projections, of course). I feel sustained, excited, and constantly growing in my spiritual and intellectual pursuits.
Simplicity of living means meeting life face to face. It means confronting life clearly, without unnecessary distractions. It means being direct and honest in relationships of all kinds. It means taking life as it is.
The character of a whole society is the cumulative result of countless small actions, day in and day out, of millions of persons.
To live more simply is to unburden our lives - to live more lightly, cleanly, aerodynamically. It is to establish a more direct, unpretentious and unencumbered relationship with all aspects of our lives: the things that we consume, the work that we do, our relationships with others, our connections with nature and the cosmos, and more.
Our life is frittered away by detail Simplify, simplify. ” Or, as Plato wrote, “In order to seek one’s own direction, one must simplify the mechanics of ordinary, everyday life.
The essence of voluntary simplicity is living in a way what is outwardly simple and inwardly rich.
Compassion will no longer be seen as a spiritual luxury for a contemplative few; rather it will be viewed as a social necessity for the entire human family.
Only after people express their anger and sadness over the broken dreams of material prosperity will they turn to the task of building a sustainable economy.
The character of a whole society is the cumulative result of the countless small actions, day in and day out, of millions of persons. Who we are as a society, is the synergistic accumulation of who we are as individuals. . . Small changes that seem insignificant in isolation can be great contributions when they are simultaneously undertaken by many others.
In a world where nearly one billion people live near the edge of physical survival the relevance of intentional simplicity by the more affluent people of the world cannot be over estimated.
David Shi (historian of the simple life) describes the common denominator among the various approaches to simpler living as the understanding that the making of money and the accumulation of things should not smother the purity of the soul, the life of the mind, the cohesion of the family, or the good of the society.
We live almost completely immersed in a socially constructed reality that so fully absorbs our energy and attention that virtually none remains to experience the wonder of our existence.