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A few weeks ago, Oprah aired a repeat show about two families who live lives of excess and take the challenge to cut back called "What Would You Date to Live Without?". While the show was a bit overly dramatic in terms of what the families gave up right off the bat, it was an interesting peek into the conversation around stuff, spending, and what you can discover about your life when you strip away the noise.
As I watched the show I marveled at the fact that it never dawned on these folks just how out of whack some of their spending was. One woman had a closet full of granola bars and another had re-mortgaged the house to pay off a car to buy another car. Now you can look at this and think - what the heck? Or realize that this sort of decision making is more common than you might think. Perhaps you may just sit back and wonder, hmmmm, I wonder where my own spending blind spots are?
The better measure of financial success is not necessarily how much you make but rather how much you keep. There are a lot of dirt poor, financially sketchy people out there who make good money. One only needs to watch when Suze Orman shows up on Oprah's show to see numbers that are shocking. On more than one occasion you get to bear witness to people making six figures or more who have more debt and less financial security than people making a fraction of that.
After watching this show I went in search of real everyday people in the blogosphere who are talking about this very topic. What I found were some neat experiments and thoughts on the matter of stuff, excess, and saving money without sacrificing joy. In fact, as the television episode demonstrated, most times when you voluntarily choose to walk the path of more simplicity the richness of your experiences (and relationships) grows exponentially. What starts as spoiled children throwing fits over not being able to have all 80 of their toys turns into children who learn how to tap into their creativity and actually pick their focus up from a computer or television screen to relate to other people. Novel idea for children and adults alike.
I love the idea of Discardia.
Discardia is celebrated by getting rid of stuff and ideas you no longer need. It's about letting go, abdicating from obligation and guilt, being true to the self you are now. Discardia is the time to get rid of things that no longer add value to your life, shed bad habits, let go of emotional baggage and generally lighten your load.
Now this is a beautiful thing on many levels. From clearing clutter in your physical space to letting go of beliefs, obligations, habits, and feelings that do not serve you. You can adopt it as a lifelong practice.
I can remember a summer or two ago, my partner and I headed up into the attic crawl space and starting throwing stuff out like crazy people. Boxes, items, and other things we thought we should keep because we might want it when we move to a different space. Yeah, right! With the exception of a few special items we really would like to use but don't have the space for, the rest was just an excuse to keep stuff because we didn't want to feel guilty about donating it or throwing it out. I said it was time to toss it out now so we didn't need to deal with it if and when the time to move arrives. We'll be busy enough.
You can read about two sisters' holiday gifts to each other -- throwing each other's crap away by reading Badgermama's and Minnie's experience of Discardia. What have you discovered when you voluntarily throw out the unnecessary stuff?
One area that really trips many women up is the area of clothes. For some buying clothes is a joy. Shopping is like a competitive sport. Fortunately I never fell into that trap, but rest assured I have my own vices. If you are a fashion freak but want to adopt a more environmentally and wallet friendly approach to the next great look, consider participating in the Wardrobe ReFashion. Unfortunately for me, I have been just short of terminal with a needle, thread, scissors, or sewing
