When you have what you want, stop looking for it

Do you know that story that goes around the Internet all the time about the fisherman? You know, the one where the businessman comes down and basically tells him that if he would just work harder he could build a multi-national conglomerate which in the end would allow him to retire, hang out with his friends, and fish a little in the morning. Kind of like he already is.

I don't think I've quite learned that lesson yet.

I'm in a very strange stage of my life. I left my full time job in May, my husband finished his PhD last week, and we're moving at the end of the month. Everything about our financial situation (along with most of the rest of the details of our lives) is completely turned upside down from what it's been for the past few years. My husband makes about twice as much this month as he did last month, and next month when he starts his job he'll make more than we've ever made combined, even when I worked two jobs.

And still I find myself chasing the pennies. On the saving/frugal side, that doesn't bother me because to me frugality is a moral choice as much as a financial choice. On the earning side, however, I think I'm crazy. When I'm home during the day, I find myself trying desperately to be "productive," which often means doing things that add very little benefit to my life. I'm researching ways to make extra money, I'm taking surveys and doing GPT offers, I'm worrying and obsessing over every penny that comes in. I think that if I can just work hard enough, build some income streams, pay off more debt, than I'll be happy. I'll be able to afford to just work part time, to live a simple life, to have more time to cook, to read, to write, and to take care of myself.

Y'know, like I do right now.

The more I reflect on it, the more I realize that the lifestyle I've wanted, the lifestyle I've been scrambling for for the past three years, is the one I already have right now. And instead of enjoying it, of taking advantage of the opportunity - even if it's temporary - to really take time to relax, I'm spending all my time still chasing the money. They say that if you don't articulate where you want to end up, you'll never know when you get there. But I have said it, and I still didn't notice I was here. I don't know if it's just habit, or if it's my fear of change and the unknown, but I have not been willing to accept that I met this goal.

There will be time in the future for more financial goals. We want to have kids, to buy a house, and of course eventually to retire. But there's time for all that. Right now, this month, I want to revel in the simplicity of my own desires and enjoy my small and quiet apartment before the chaos of starting another new stage begins.

Because if I don't enjoy it when I have it, what's the point of working towards it?

Frugal Friday: Speeding tickets and mindfulness

My number one frugal tip for this week is this: Don't get speeding tickets.

Earlier this week, I was driving along, on my way to my CSA pick up, listening to the radio and going over in my head my budget, what I was making for dinner, what I needed to review with my tutoring student that evening. All of a sudden, there was a motorcycle cop standing by the side of the road, waving me over.

Startled and confused, I pulled over my car and rolled down my window.

"The reason I pulled you over, ma'am, is because you were speeding."

All I could think to respond was "I was? I am so sorry!" and I really was.

The officer politely nodded, checked my license, said "You were going 38 in a 30, ma'am, and this is a high complaint area," and handed me a $150 ticket. In about 30 seconds, all my careful planning and frugal budgeting went out the window.

So why did it happen? I wasn't in a hurry, I wasn't feeling especially rebellious, I don't particularly like driving fast (and I mean, 38 mph, whoa baby).

It happened because I wasn't paying attention to what I was doing.

Obviously, paying attention when you're driving is crucial, and it could have been a whole lot worse than just a speeding ticket. But giving complete attention to the task at hand is important - and frugal - in almost everything. I can't tell you how many times I've added something incorrect to a recipe and made good food inedible, or picked up something at the grocery store that wasn't part of the sale, or thrown away a form I needed to submit a rebate. When we don't give our tasks the attention they deserve, we make mistakes, and mistakes can cost money.

So my goal for this week is to stop trying to do everything at once and to just do one thing at a time, with the proper attention and mindfulness. And to just slow down - both in my car and in my head.

See more Frugal Friday posts at Life as Mom.

In need of more simplicity

Recently, Heather of Simple, Green, Frugal gave a talk on Voluntary Simplicity and it really got me thinking. The general crux of her post was that you need to decide what things in your life you really like and what things you really hate, and then find ways to increase the former and decrease the latter.

For me, the first group would include things like drinking tea and coffee, preferable with one or two very close friends, in the middle of the afternoon; reading a good book; cooking fresh meals from scratch, and knitting and sewing. The latter group would include working (well. . . not everything about working, but certainly the paperwork, office politics, faculty meetings, grading essays), waking up early, waiting in lines, putting things away and driving. I've been thinking a lot about this lately and ways to do more things I love and fewer things I hate. I think the truth is that a good deal of my time is spent doing things I neither love nor hate, things I nothing, like watching trashy TV shows and aimlessly surfing the Internet in a futile way to self medicate my exhaustion and frustration. I think it's time to start practicing more awareness of what I do with my time and finding things that I can painlessly eliminate.

Thoughts on media fasts, simplicity, and the frugality of sleep

Let me begin by saying that school is starting again. I am in the process of radically turning over my persona, my daily schedule, and my budget, and so I am a bit - how can we say it? Off? (The turning over in my mind conjured up images of turning over the soil on a farm, and I hope it turns up the same kind of richness and freshness.)

I've spent the past week putting together my classroom, in itself a haven of minimalism and simplicity. I have my desks arranged simply, have 2 posters on my wall and a few quotes ("To be great is to be misunderstood" and "We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race") and a shelf full of books, and I am finished. I spent more of my time visiting with my colleagues, each in a tizzy over "getting their rooms ready," and chatting about life, love, and learning, trying to listen more than I spoke. It's been a quiet time for me, and a pleasant one, and a good transition with the coming onslought of teenagers which I have begun to look forward to.

And yet, and yet. When I come home from school, I am tired. I am drained. I am not used to being away for 8 hours, to waking up before 7 in the morning. I am not eating like I was at home, and I feel lost with my laundry undone and my dinner not started. So I come home, I do my chores, start my dinner, and I sit. I sit and stare at a wall, read a book, or work on some knitting, but I sit in the quiet. I want the quiet.

And so, there have been 3 days this week that I have not turned on my computer at all. That thought used to give me anxiety - I'd be so behind, I'd have to catch up, I'd miss something - but really in truth it's given me peace. When I had time last night, I turned my computer on, checked my RSS feeds and email, and was ready to turn it back off again. It's almost like breaking an addiction. When I've been away from it for a while, I craved it not more but less. It was a relief, since I'll have less time now, but a surprise. I just found an extra hour a day to read or exercise or swim. And I just found myself some peace.

And this week, what I'm most inclined to do with that extra hour is to sleep. In the afternoon with the sun streaming in, at 8 o'clock at night, whenever that hour turns up, I just want to stretch out and take a nap. I don't want to spend or go out or do anything that costs me money. And I couldn't be happier doing it.

Peasful morning

I spent a peaceful morning shucking peas:






And listening to The Circle of Simplicity: Return to the Good Lifeon Simple Living Radio


(Can you forgive me my punning?)