Towards simplicity

one flowerless is more

It was a pleasant surprise to read that decluttering is an exercise in identity discovery and that the impulse to simplify life, according to a simplicity expert, is the fruit of decluttering: emotional tranquillity*.

Yet it is not easy to throw away one’s things. In her Sunday Times article “In praise of the things in your life”**, the writer just could not part with her white elephants though the desire to declutter was there. Decluttering is an emotional thing.

But there will come a time when the impulse to simplify gets strong enough for the simplifier wannabes to take concrete action – just like one finally gets one’s will done, and the advance medical directive (AMD) too.

*S.T. Nov. 6 pg A32 ** Sunday Times, Nov 8, pg C6

 

Author: Jassmine Teo

I came to know about the SHC from eNN (Seng Kang). My interests are varied. I write on the forum regularly to improve my writing. In my autumn years, my priority is voluntary service. Hope to meet like-minded people and help initiate a programme/project for the disabled like the hearing impaired.

2 thoughts on “Towards simplicity”

  1. Decluterring comes with age . We go back to basics and enjoy the simple things in life ,ever realizing everything is transient.
    Reminds me of the poem by Percy Shelley I learnt in school..
    “My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;/ Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
    By the time we encounter the colossus, though, it has fallen into ruin. “Shattered” and “half sunk,” the “wreck” languishes in “lone and level sands.

  2. Ozymandias seems to be the same ‘king of kings’ who laments “All is vanity!” (In Eccl). Same theme on the futility of life.

    Simplifying life in old age could also be for an obvious reason: don’t leave a mess behind when one is gone. There is also the subconscious desire for emotional tranquillity.

    [image=ozymandias.jpg]

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