On being content
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Go for a walk in a local forest, stop and look around. What do you see? Trees, no doubt, and maybe you hear a bird or two. If you're lucky you might even hear the flowing water of a nearby brook. Everything around you was made not by the predictable calculations of a machine but by the unpredictable calculations of nature where randomness is abound and not scorned. And it's beautiful but why?
It's beautiful because everything around you is unique and novel. You're drawn in and you've become lost in this tiny sliver of paradise removed from the calculated world of today. You are content because you're not thinking of anything else. Not of yesterday or tomorrow. Not of past mistakes or future obligations. You are both lost and grounded in a single moment.
While we rarely get a chance to take walks like this we can find a place of content almost anywhere. It can be while grounded in the act of meditating alone in a quiet room or lost in the act of creativity.
In our world today the act of being content is seen by some as selfish. Thanks to the West's Protestant work ethic we work much too hard and overcompensate with rampant consumerism in a vain attempt to regain our balance. Both acts are equally as destructive. Being content is an act of self care which rebuilds one's self respect which can't be found in working or buying from others. It must come from within.
The way to being content is to shed that which isn't needed be it thoughts or possessions. As an old friend of mine use to say "The more you own the more those things own you." In Buddhism monks and nuns are given a very short list of items they can possess. A couple of robes, a pair of shoes, a bowl, a razor to shave their head and a scant few other items. This allows them not only to travel the world lightly but to travel through life the same.
I know of a person that for lack of better words is a hoarder. While some it is caused by her mental illness much of it is caused by an emptiness that has always been inside of her. She has never been content and will surround herself with anything she can in a vain attempt to fill that emptiness. She simply can not throw anything away be it as simple as a broken dish or her hate filled and greatly misguided religious beliefs. If she had to move from her home today it would be a nightmare. Putting aside the hazmat team that would first have to clear out that which no sane person would touch it would take many moving vans to relocate the tons of mostly worthless items that surround her.
In contrast I try to live by the simple goal of owning as little as possible. My limit for possessions must be able to be contained within two suitcases, one carry-on bag and one "personal item" bag. Everything else must be able to be disposed of without thought or regret.
"The more you own the more those things own you" be it thoughts or possessions and the path to being content is a path of many steps. It means simplifying your thoughts and your possessions. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Start today with a short walk in a quiet place or meditating for just a single minute in a quiet room and disposing of one seemingly worthless and unneeded item from your life. Tomorrow do the same and continue. Before you buy anything ask yourself why are you buying it? Is it needed and will it be used in everyday life or are you buying it for a bit of instant gratification. If you're not sure wait a day or two and rethink your choice. Soon you'll arrive at that place where you are content.
Is this path to minimal thoughts and possessions just a nonfiction story we tell ourselves like my friend the hoarder who follows a very different story? Yes but one leads to happiness through being able to flow with the changes of life and one mires oneself in the past. While we like to think of ourselves as rational actors in a story where we can balance all the good and not so good we've done inevitably all we can think about are our past mistakes. Every item my hoarder friend sees in her deeply cluttered home and has in her deeply cluttered mind not only gives her comfort but also reminds her of her mistakes. "The more you own the more those things own you" whereas the minimalist has a greater opportunity to see a better and more content tomorrow by having a less cluttered mind and fewer possessions.
Image: Walking path in Fujifilm Velvia. Hadwen Park, Worcester, Massachusetts. Fujifilm X-T1. image: ©Brian Beeler
