Simple Steps

You sure learn a lot when you jump in and decide to do something like this. In just one week, I've already been challenged and educated. One thing I've learned is to never say what I'll be writing about next week, there are too many variables and too many changes occurring in my thinking on this project. So unfortunately, I'll be postponing the blog about RV buying until I've actually bought one. That just seems like a better idea to me. And this week, I'll be writing about simplicity instead. It occurred to me that writing about the cart before the horse that drove it would be like, well, putting the cart before the horse, and we're not going anywhere with that configuration. So let me share with you some resources that took me from a chaotic life that kept me from my dreams, to a being a pretty lean machine these days,  that makes everything seem possible.

Eight years ago I attempted this whole "on the road" thing for the first time - completely on a whim and with so little planning that I'm ashamed to remember it. I packed way way way too much stuff into my RV - trying to think of everything we may possibly want. Seriously, my kids can remember having to move boxes out of the way to move around in the space, or use the bathroom or their beds. We had a TV and tapes - yes, vcr tapes, and a vcr. We had a game cube with games for the kids and I had stuffed so many books in alongside the beds that we probably had an extra hundred pounds in books alone. We had a stock of food and alcohol and all my art supplies, tools, clothing that we never wore, craft supplies we never used. And more than that, all the stuff that was left in storage, that had to be paid for and moved around when we decided to not be on the road anymore - it cost over a hundred dollars a month to store things that I later gave away, or sold for very little money because I couldn't figure out how to get it where we now lived.

A friend of mine gave my daughter a book about the women traveling on the Oregon trail and she would read it aloud as we drove that trail. I remember vividly reading about these women needing to leave furniture and beloved belongings along the way because horses had died and the remaining beasts could no longer carry the whole burden. We marveled at their ingenious solutions to packing - eggs packed in sacks of flour - and empathized with their agony, leaving heirlooms sitting alongside the trails and watching out the back of their wagons as they disappeared in the distance.We were living these same experiences. It was easy to empathize. I learned a lot from that time. And you would think that my pack-rat ways would be changed forever, but it actually took me several more years to take that inspiration and do something with it.

The first step was noticing that it was a problem and that trip sure helped me figure that out. After realizing that any further travel would really require a full life overhaul, and getting past my brain's internal chatter justifying repeatedly that all artists are this way - that chaos is part of the process (this is a lie, by the way - it actually keeps you from your process) - I began to look for resources that would help me to streamline. This exploration led me to a better understanding of how these belongings were stifling me and how they were even related to my health - both emotional and physical.

I found a yahoo group that revolved around the concept of minimalist living or simplicity. What drove me to that step first was how I felt when I was in the home of a friend. He had a very streamlined, organized and minimalist home. He made minimalist art, and I felt completely at peace in his presence and in his home. From that first email list, I was introduced to the excellent blog of Leo Babauta, called Zen Habits. For me, finding this blog was the first step in understanding what I wanted. Leo's words are simple, and reading his streamlined blog made me feel as I did in my friend's home - peaceful. From there, I learned about GTD, Getting Things Done - a productivity book by David Allen. I bought the book and tried to work with it for a while to organize my life. I learned a lot of useful things and I recommend the book for getting your whole life in order, but it does read a lot like a business manual and that's a bit of a turn-off for artsy folks like me. I think Leo has pulled some of the best of the book into a more streamlined version and is giving it away on his website, but I still suggest the original for a few important things.

Managing my time and my projects came next and GTD helped a lot with that, but I have to tell you that it was not until I began to get rid of my things that my life really turned around. For me, dismantling a mindset that had been ingrained throughout my childhood was extremely difficult. Just the act of constantly reminding myself  that this is not who I am, but what I was is almost a full time job. Regularly reading blogs like Zen Habits and joining mailing lists like Fly Lady helped me to make new habits that stuck so well that I no longer needed the daily reminders. Good resources expect you to grow out of them. I think that's the best sign that you're onto something good.

Fly Lady is a website that I learned about from some people who hated it. And it's not really my cup of tea either (sorry Fly Lady). But the daily reminders in my email box and the way of looking at cleaning and decluttering - set your timer for fifteen minutes and pick a small area to do so, and think of your home as having quadrants that you clean only one of each day - changed how I approached the daily routines. I have managed to get rid of nine-tenths of my wardrobe and useless belongings using the techniques learned there. This means that only the things I adore and use all the time will go on the road with me, and only the things I adore that I can't use all the time will be taking up storage space. I can't relay how happy that makes me. I just rented a five by ten foot storage unit for thirty five dollars a month - inside and air conditioned. I've never been able to afford a climate controlled unit before because I always needed the largest they had and was already paying over a hundred dollars a month. I think I'll have room to spare this time.

Once I began to look at my belongings based on how much I loved them and how useful they are to me, I began giving a lot of stuff away - making a lot of other people very happy. This eased the pain of thinking about all the money I'd wasted buying things that were not amazing. But there was that little pinch and that pinch taught me to never again buy a single thing that was not more amazing than the things I already owned. And I've implemented the tried and true method of "one in/ one out" - if I buy something, I have to get rid of something else. This keeps me from buying anything frivolous. I've developed an intuition about objects now - I can hold it out and ask myself, "will this add to my life, or hold me down?" and the answer I first think is the right one.

For a while I was on a mailing list related to the project The Compact which you can read more about here. The Compact is a pledge you make to buy nothing new for a year (or two). There are rules and certain allowances (for food and a small number of "cheats") but essentially, you pledge to buy nothing new. There are mailing lists for support, to confess your cheating, and to get guidance. You don't need these but having support for any new habit goes a long way towards keeping you on task long enough to let it take hold. On The Compact, you can buy used items at thrift stores and yard sales, get freebies on freecycle or from free boxes or friends. So, this doesn't directly help you with simplifying or streamlining your life. However, although I've never been a big mall shopper, I was shocked to learn how many of my new item purchases were made without even thinking about other options until I took this pledge. I resisted the urge to buy a food processor and then bragged to a friend about my first "compact" moment - the next day, he brought me a small food processor he'd found in the free box at his work. Through the process of thinking about every purchase I made, I became aware of not needing things as much as my initial thought told me I did. I undid a piece of the brainwashing. And that's an important step.

Somewhere around this time, I began to rethink everything having to do with property. My family decided to have an all thrift Christmas to keep to The Compact - we all took fifty dollars and went thrift shopping for each other. And we held it after the actual holiday so that more people we loved could gather at a lower air fare. Then we began thinking about why we let someone else tell us when to have a holiday - or even to have a holiday at all. Why weren't we just making up our own holidays? So now we do. Sometimes we have "after valentines" holidays where we give each other deeply discounted gorging amounts of candy or flowers. We're no longer tied to what we must do. And it's hard for any of us to remember why we ever were.

This brings me to the final streamline focus - the body. We've never been an unhealthy group - I, personally, have always had some sort of exercise routine, tried to eat healthy - didn't eat a lot of sweets, etc. Probably like most moderately healthy people. A couple of years ago, I had my first run in with a real health problem and the medical industry that exacerbated my issue. I was put on a steroid medicine to treat adult onset asthma and began developing all sorts of side effects and feeling generally less healthy - although it did, of course, solve the asthma symptoms, while I was taking it. When I would forget, I would gasp for air - and it showed no signs of ever getting better. In fact, the doctors suggested that I'd probably be on the inhalers for life. Two hundred dollars a month and steroids that lower my immune system - for life! The doctors were not trying to cure my illness, they were treating the symptoms and that is mostly what our medical industry does. I thought for a bit on this and determined that not one time have I ever gone into a doctor's office and come out with a cure, except in the case of antibiotics. And they have their own special issues.

I began my search into alternative medicines about the time I developed a steroid related UTI - a quick, sharp and painful one that made me consider a trip to the ER. Sending a friend to get as much cranberry juice as could be found, I typed in "home remedies for UTI" in my trusty google search bar and came up with the unlikely combination of a small amount of baking soda dissolved in a glass of water, but being desperate, I tried it and in moments, all the pain was gone. I began to search for other cures for things that ailed me, and natural cures for the adult onset asthma and found vitamin therapy, ideas about ph balance causing bacterial and viral infections, and information about candida that was suspiciously close to many of the ailments I had. From this information, I decided to make some serious changes in my life. What could it hurt?

I cut sugar from my diet as completely as I'm able. This is no easy task in this world. You cannot eat any processed food without getting sugar or High Fructose Corn Syrup, which works on your body the same as sugar. This one step made me feel so much better that I kept making more and more steps. I put my family on the South Beach Diet and now we eat very similarly to this most of the time. You can learn a lot about how to eat on that website without even buying the books. You can then type in whatever your favorite foods are and "South Beach" in a search engine to find recipes that fit that program. Unlike other diets, this one actually is a sustainable way to eat and the phases train your body to begin to eat better for life. It's the only one I will ever recommend. My family, now, have collectively lost about seventy pounds and have all taken up hiking - I'm up to a regular three times a week. We walk to the store and my daughter and I do yoga at home. We play with hoola hoops and poi and dance and have learned to love the movement of our bodies. And I haven't been on the inhaler in over six months - all the signs of asthma are gone. These things didn't happen over night. They happened by changing one small thing, and then another, and another. I'm not a doctor, and I can't dispense medical advice, but I can tell you that industry supports itself and to all those I love, I suggest that natural cures will usually (but not always) help you to get closer to health than drugs made by companies that make their money by selling you more drugs, and the people they bribe to dispense them.

Now we're getting ready for this new adventure - we're healthy, love to explore, love the outdoors, and can look forward to some amazing hiking on our journey. We eat much less, so we have to carry much less food. We eat a lot of fresh veggies and will enjoy exploring new farmer's markets or maybe even helping farmers pick vegetables and fruit in fields we pass for trade. We have pared down our belongings so much that we will have with us only useful things we love, and will pay to store only a few other useful things we love. There is peace in this journey. There is peace in the preparation for this journey. And there will be peace when we settle again.

I sincerely hope that some of the resources here will bring peace to some of you reading this as well. We're all in this together.

Shhhh... I'm hunting Winebagos

Boy I hope the PC police don't come point out that this is somehow improper by assuming that I'm referring to hunting the "People of the Big Voice". In all truth, I'm looking for something with a Ford engine, class C and likely not a Winnie at all.  I asked my mechanic friend to come look at an RV last night with me and am feeling a little paralyzed by the process. I didn't expect this - there are so many different things to consider when choosing a place you are going to call home for the next who-knows-how-long. First, of course, is the mechanical stability and I have been blessed with meeting a great friend who is helping me determine this part of the puzzle. I have a little knowledge from my own past RV experiences, and have a fairly good intuitive sense about things like this, but it's great to have someone who really knows what all those little scary sounds really are, instead of my sometimes over-active imagination believing beyond a shadow of a doubt that the clunking noise is not the water pump going but the engine literally exploding out of the hood.

I seem to have the best luck with meeting the right people at the right times in my life. I guess that's my gift - attracting good folks. This day's update will be short - I need to get back to the hunting now. Shhhh...

Dance With Your Inner Slacker

When you read about the journeys people make from not doing something to doing it successfully, you rarely read about the slack days - those days when the soon to be successful person just can't get motivated. I'd like to read a whole book devoted to this subject, if only so I don't feel so bad about my own slow times. For me this usually comes right after some big push involving a lot of brain-work and preparation. This week, that was preparing for the Soiree and today is my unnerving day of foggy wandering, without a clear destination in my sights. So I figured I would share here some of the techniques I use to get myself in gear when I have no time to slow down, but my body and most of my mind are not fully aware of this. Most of these techniques are not my own invention, but I've long since forgotten where I sourced them. I've read hundreds of productivity and organizational books as a young artist trying to get a handle on the chaos; life from the perspective of many artists seems to be one chaotic event after another and to move to actually completing what you want to offer the world, you have to learn some new methods.

One thing that helps me to get back on track quickly is that I've already simplified my life dramatically (and continue to do so more and more) - my belongings no longer fight for my attention and so my mind has more peace and is able to concentrate better because my visual perception isn't clotted with distraction. So I'm clearer than I was, even on days like this, when it is not working at peak performance. Second, I give myself a little slack. I already know it's not going to be a high productivity day and so I won't fight against it too hard. In a strange way, this makes it more productive because whatever intuitive part of my mind is now in control breathes a little sigh of relief for not having to fight a war for a little down time. I'll take a little extra time with my coffee this morning, read a few more articles on the web and generally lazy about a little longer than usual.

But then, I'll periodically get up and putter. I use the fifteen minute rule - I choose a project - any project I see that needs doing on days like this - and I set a timer for fifteen minutes and just work on it that long. This often (but not always) leads to me just working through the fifteen minutes and finishing the project. If it doesn't, I stop and switch to something else. Another thing I do on days like today is something I first learned from Leo Babauta from Zen Habits http://zenhabits.net/ - I go through my to do list and choose just the three most important things that need to be done today. I tell myself that all I need to do are these three important tasks. I will, of course, end up doing more. But on these days, I lie to my own mind and it believes me every time.

I have all my current projects in one of three places - I have an idea file for things that haven't really begun to look do-able to me yet, and a project folder - for things that don't have a lot of steps or reference material associated with them, and then project boxes (everything from shoe-box to bank box or more) in which I keep those projects that have lots of stuff I need to reference. I keep these all together so that I can just grab the appropriate item and not have to think too much about the steps. When I get an idea for one of the projects, I put it in the appropriate box. The individual boxes are a swirl of chaos if you dare to look inside,  but knowing that all the chaos associated with that one project lives in that box is a lifeline on days like this when I may only be using one percent of my brain power.

I think the thing to remember is to not be too obsessive about anything. If there's a down day, even when it's imperative that the work be done, not pushing too hard seems to have an overall better effect than our often touted high-productivity work-ethic. Down time likely has an unknown necessity just like sleep. So cheers to you reading this during my sleepwalking day. May all yours be mildly productive and satisfying in some deeper mysterious way on your path to your own dreams.

Give More Than You Take, and Leave It Better Than You Found It

Throughout my own journey and the part that included parenting two people into adulthood (one down and one almost done), I've tried to think of pithy mottoes I could offer that they might remember and that will make their lives easier. I remember the realizations I've had in my life - discovering that getting into work five minutes early and leaving five minutes late might initially feel like the employer is getting something undeserved from me, but it made the rest of my life a whole lot easier. One of the things I tell my kids is to give more than you take and this ended up as a directive on my art project too. I've wrestled a lot with whether this sets them (and me) up for some sort of martyrdom, and have come to the conclusion that it does not. In the same way that giving that extra ten minutes to an employer makes them look the other way when you have an inevitable delay, when you routinely give more, even the coldest person has a moment of pause when you are in need. And let's face it, none of us will ever attain pure autonomy.

But more than some quid pro quo ziglaresque approach, giving more than you take makes the world better - even if you're the only one doing it and it's just your small share floating out there all alone - I believe it makes a difference. And when I realized this and began living my life this way, I started to really attract better people into my world. And that led to feeling like I could set up some boundaries that kept those who don't play by those rules at the right distance from what I was doing. And that changed everything.

So today I'm cleaning this home I've been renting. I've approached all my interactions with my landlord from the perspective of giving more than I took, and he recently told me that this has been the easiest rental he's ever had - I agreed. I'm cleaning from the unseen tops of the ceiling nooks down to scrubbing the corners of the baseboards - a little every day until will leave. I'm replacing the toilet seat, even though it had a crack in it before we got here, and the towel bar that was missing when we arrived. And you know, these things cost me pennies where I picked them up at garage sales and thrift shops but they won me more than a good reference, they've won me a friend. When I want to settle down again, I know who to call. And I know that he will help me. And he knows he can ask for my help too - perhaps with a job he has cleaning out rental units that were left in bad condition.

So I'll pass on here these two mottoes that my family lives by now - Give more than you take and Leave it better than you found it. If the world worked that way, everyone would have plenty, and everything around us would be better and better every day. Since not everyone practices this, those of us who do keep it all from going horribly wrong - because if everyone practiced its opposite, we'd live in a dump and feel terrified of everyone all the time.And I just can't live that way.



Update on the Soiree:
Lovely people turned out and took a whole bunch of my stuff. I purposefully did not take any of the things they brought since I'm trying to get down to just the belongings that can fit in an RV and the smallest storage unit available - that's the goal.

The bread turned out way better than I expected and everyone left with a full belly, although the Stone Soup did end up with a lot more onions than anything else - still, it was very good. On a personal note, Sangria is very very easy to get very very tipsy on. Must remember this. It's just so smooth going down that you keep thinking you're drinking juice. It's a whole lot more fun watching people look through your stuff when you are giving it away for free than it is when you're selling it. Everyone is happy like it's Christmas morning. I'll definitely do a fun swap instead of ever suffering through the petty competitiveness of a yard sale ever again. 

Of Bread and Soup and Gifting Trees

A big part of the inspiration to start this adventure was a project that I was working on and thought I might get a grant to take around the country. I build these Abundance Trees, which are essentially gifting trees that also act as a room in which to discuss the world around us - my hope is that these trees will eventually be built in every city and people will use their interior sitting area to discuss creative solutions to the problems that plague our society. The trees themselves are made from discarded branches and other recycled pieces and it was our intention to install the trees in areas that were hardest hit by the recession - following a list of places where home foreclosures were highest and hitting a few tent cities and such along the way. Homelessness has always seemed such a bizarre issue to me. We have empty houses and buildings that sit that way because there is more to be made by the owners in tax write-offs than by renting them to those in need for less than market value.

So it's sort of fitting that we're beginning this adventure with a Stone Soup Swap and that's just what we're doing today. Everyone is bringing one piece of fruit for the drink and one veggie for the soup and stuff to swap to start our entry into homelessness. I keep thinking to myself that this cannot be that hard - finding creative solutions to problems. I think we've just been brainwashed into thinking there are only these few, very competitive ways of doing anything and so perhaps the first steps to creative thinking is exploring any other way than the first thing that comes to our minds as a solution. Perhaps I should have had a swap meet before I had a sale.


Note:
For anyone who likes baking bread - check out the More With Less Cookbook - it's a Mennonite cookbook that not only has a bounty of bread recipes, but also has some great how tos on making all sorts of stuff you never thought you could from scratch, like ketchup, mayo, grape-nuts and English muffins. None of this stuff is particularly difficult. Try it. You can get the book on Amazon for a song. Well, a few dollars and a song. They probably wouldn't actually take the song either. But I would - come sing for me and I'll trade you my book as soon as I write down my favorite recipes and take your number in case I forget some.

Step One - Burning Down the House

So here is how I'll be doing this blog thing: First I will write something well-researched and packed with information once a week - on Wednesdays. My intro was on Wednesday (yesterday) and next Wednesday I will be exploring all sorts of useful information about buying and stocking an RV for this sort of adventure. I'll give you everything I know, and have collected, unless there is too much information and I have to split it into two parts.

Second, I will be doing small blogs throughout the week (like this one) recapping what new steps have been taken and need to be taken in the coming and last day. So expect a daily journal of preparatory steps that will morph into a daily journal of our adventures when we finally go homeless, alongside a more detailed and in depth analysis, philosophy or informative blog once a week. I'll have some guest bloggers and occasionally let the kids have the wheel, so to speak.

This weekend we're beginning our journey by "Burning Down the House" - not literally, and my landlord will likely read this soon, so let me be clear with my disclaimer: there will be no actual burning. But one of the important steps to being able to make this happen is simplifying our lives and so I have already had a yard sale and now will take what is left and throw a Saturday Stone Soup and Sangria Swap Soiree. People will bring something for the soup pot, a recipe, something for the Sangria pitchers, and stuff to swap - should be loads of fun. If you'd like to join us and didn't get an invitation and you'll be in the Mesa, Arizona area this Saturday, drop me a line and I'll send you an invitation. We'll be throwing a last one just before leaving near the end of April. Today I'm baking bread, cooking soup stock and preparing for the feast.

As a part of this Great Inspiration project, we're committed to finding creative solutions to all our problems. Problems are the mother of invention in our world. This is the first step.

Forget the Great Depression - This is the Great Inspiration

I have a dream - it's a dream not only for myself and my family but for everyone else out there afraid of what is to come, what is happening in the world right now. When my family first realized what a scary time we were entering, we did what everyone did - we panicked. We fought with each other and we looked ahead to a future of doing without, of our dreams being squashed under the weight of what this really meant. But then something happened. We started to plot and plan, figure out things we'd barely paid attention to before. We'd never really had to band together like this and something amazing happened. We became inspired - not afraid. We looked at all our habits, all our stupid belongings with fresh eyes, and we started to research - what are other people doing? How would we handle the worst-case-scenario? And we found that when you face these fears, they aren't really as scary as they seem out of the corner of your eye.

In one month, my son (and possibly grown daughter) and I will be embarking on an exciting new adventure: we'll be purposefully homeless - buying an RV and traveling to new areas to set up Abundance Trees - an ephemeral, interactive art installation that we hope will inspire the lost art of giving and collaboration in the communities we will call our temporary homes. We'll be learning to live frugally, to make money without jobs, to volunteer regularly - to give. And we'll share here the preparation that got us to this point, as well as our adventures along the way.

We're looking forward to a future in which we can live and not work our entire lives away for a corporation - where families, friends, creativity, and collaboration matter. The world is waking up to the limitations of competition, to over-production and wasted hours and lives. The world is waking up to what is important. This isn't a Great Depression - this is the time that we would like to remember as The Great Inspiration - if only we can all agree to make it so.

This may seem idealistic, and it is. It's easy to get cynical and dismiss idealism, but what are we left with when we do that? We're each faced with a decision: we can go backward in fear - retreat and lick our wounds, accept that there is nothing we can do and scrap everything we've learned, or we can go forward with hope and commitment and inspire each other to find creative solutions. My family is heading toward our future and sharing it here for anyone else who can benefit from our story. I hope to make this a place where you can share your goals, ideas, and inspirations as well. And where we can move together to find the silver-lining embedded in our current situation. We'll be sharing all of the interesting people, places, and ideas we come across, which of our experiments work, and which do not. We'll be tapping all of your great minds for advice and keeping the faith when times get tough. Welcome, friends!