simplify life

To realise our true nature

We must first simplify our lives

Most of us lead very complex lives. This has become the norm, especially in so-called developed countries. Of course, it has not always been so. Once upon a time most of us would have led rural, rather simple lives, growing food, eating, sleeping in a simple hut, making love occasionally, and not much else.

But look at the modern world. Most work these days is complicated. Most jobs require a lot of thinking. The simple things are, by and large, done by machine nowadays. And when we are not at work, we have so many calls upon our time. Relationships are no longer simple. Family structures are complicated. Accommodation is no longer a case of a simple one room hut – no, big fancy houses and apartments with mortgages, paperwork, bills. The administration of our lives is complex. And when we are not preoccupied with these things, the range of entertainment available to us is endless. And we have gadgets, bombarding us all the time with information, whether we need it or not.We are always contactable, always chatting on that smartphone. We can remain busy twenty-four hours a day, and most of us do. We have lost the art of truly relaxing. We have become addicted to activity, mental activity, thoughts. 

The modern world is built on this addiction, and it is self-sustaining. The world demands us to be busy, and our busyness creates a busy world. The two depend upon each other and fuel each other. But with all this complexity and all this phrenetic mental activity, we have no chance of discovering ourselves, of who we really are. We have no time and space to plunge into the centre of our being. We remain forever bobbing about in this turbulent, chaotic, superficial life. And we forget our essence.

So to rediscover our essence, to come back to our true nature, we must first simplify our lives. And this is not easy to do. Firstly, society at large expects us to lead complicated lives. People will not understand when you switch off your smartphone, or when you quit some well paid, stress inducing job. But these things are needed. And we will discover also that we are addicted to all this activity. When we have the choice of sitting quietly in nature doing absolutely nothing, or watching a movie, we will be so tempted to go for that entertainment, or to chat aimlessly with friends: gossip, chitchat of no significance or value.

And then, of course, there are the drugs – caffeine, to pep us up and keep us going, alcohol, to remove some of our tension and inhibitions, tobacco to calm our fraught nerves. These substances are addictive too, but they also are creating a chaos in our mind. They need to go as well.

And so if we embark on this undertaking to simplify our lives, we should realise from the outset it is not going to be easy. We are trying to kick an addiction. In fact, not just one addiction, but a whole family of addictions. Can we do that? Can we do that? Without it we are lost, and we will never know our true nature. This is a price we have to pay if we want to come home to ourself, if we want to rediscover our essence, if we want to feel whole again.