Simplifying Simple

I have a 440-page guide on how to simplify my life, but I haven't found the time to read it.

Like you perhaps, my once-quiet world now clatters with the joy nof a large family. Amid the din, I've had to simplify my quest nfor the simple.

The advent of a simpler life can be launched with a concept so nsimple it takes only a few words, yet its implications and nmanifestations have given birth to entire institutions and nprovided intellectual fodder for philosophers for centuries.

Still, it is better, more accessible, easier to implement - at nleast for me - if I can keep the message simple.

Too much interpretation waters down the message. Too much debatenstrips it of its power. Too much explanation distracts us from nits essence, and gives us an excuse to avoid getting down to the nbusiness of doing it, of living it. And to live it is to change nour lives in sweeping, everyday ways.

It is this: Live in love. Whatever contributes to the love in nthe world, do it.

I suppose I've taken the risk of sounding airy-fairy and nhippie-dippie. But just for a moment, allow yourself to nrecognize that love is the only gift you will always have in nabundance.

Recognize how different you feel when you extend it to others.
Recognize how its unrestricted sharing infuses you with new nenergy in your own everyday life. And allow yourself to see how nsuch recognition could change your life. If, just for today, you made nit your simple goal to wholeheartedly extend yourself in love and nkindness. To love lavishly. Haphazardly. To smear it all over the place.

Once as a junior in college, I found myself in a bar with a ngroup of graduate students. I was the only underclassman in the nbunch and they were debating ethics, lobbing names of dead nphilosophers like bocce balls with not a small dose of nintellectual pride.

I was quiet, soaking in all of the ideas and insights, when nsomeone who had too much to drink asked the underclassman what nshe thought. "Whatever contributes to the love in the world, do nthat," I said.

Silence followed as they waited for me to expand, to elaborate, nto offer proof. "That's pretty much it." I said.

It's not new advice, but it's certainly simple. For me, nsimplifying your life is not to add another "should." It's nsimply to recognize that your degree of happiness equals your ndegree of compassion.

If someone curses you, hold her in your mind and bless her. If nyou feel like cursing someone, bless her, too. Recognize that nthe feeling of overwhelming compassion is available to you any ntime you wish to call upon it.

Leading the simple life is to witness how extending love brings nyou joy in a fundamental down-to-the-marrow sense. A joy you can nfeel in your belly. And then to surrender the rest. To surrendernanything that takes way from that - whether it's an activity, anpossession, a relationship, a feeling, or a simple thought.

Ghandi said, "Renounce and rejoice." It doesn't get much simpler nthan that.

Copyright 2004 Eliza Bloom