It has been a HOT MINUTE since I last posted on this blog. There are reasons for that. Many reasons. Reasons I’d like to get into, but today is not that day.
TODAY is the day when I take the last (and only) post in my drafts and COMMENT on it. Because it was written about halfway through 2020.
I was going over this post today to see if there was anything that I could salvage for a brand new post about my ongoing journey toward living a simpler life with purpose. You see, it’s *still* a topic that I care about, and one that I feel is a worthy, if lofty, goal to have.
But this old post was just. so. darned. cute. So I thought it would be more fun to keep it, but provide some commentary (in bold) from today’s perspective. The truth is, a lot of what I wrote in 2020 still resonates, just from a “well that didn’t turn out the way I thought it would” point of view. But if I’ve actually LEARNED anything from these past three years, it’s that we don’t always have to throw absolutely everything out in order to move forward and grow.
So I hope you enjoy this little blast from the past and find it as adorable as I did. Comment below with some of the best lessons YOU’VE learned from the start of 2020 until now!
The Post
When I started this blog, my intention was to write about my attempts at simplifying my life, making room for what I deemed as my priorities – my children, my husband and my home. Of course I started this new journey at the beginning of 2020, otherwise known as the “year of broken dreams” (2023 commentary: LOL). Six months in and we’re I think now just coming to the realization that we won’t see “normal” again for a long time.
2023: We did not, in fact, ever return to what we considered to be “normal”. Like the aftermath of the 2016 wildfire that destroyed part of my town, we’ve only been able to find a “new normal”, for better or worse.
This looks different for everyone, and this year is much scarier for some than others. My heart breaks for the families of those who’ve lost their lives to COVID-19. I fear for those who have to go to work for companies who put profits over the health and well-being of its employees. People are having to make choices they should never have to make. We cannot minimize their suffering.
If anything, the pandemic is exposing the oft-ignored injustices experienced all over the world. People of privilege are finally beginning to see the damage that our profit-driven culture has done to those around us.
We’re realizing with horror what our society really thinks of our elders, and we’re experiencing the fruits of voting for governments that devalue public education and healthcare.
In the midst of all of this, life is continuing to go on. We still have to make meals, clean the bathrooms, do the laundry and go grocery shopping. For those of us who are fortunate enough to not be drastically affected by the pandemic, this is a confusing time of simultaneously having less to do yet still feeling overwhelmed and anxious.
2023: Without getting too far into the weeds or being too pessimistic, I think it’s safe to say that all these issues continue to this day. Three years later, we’ve given up on almost all public health protocols designed to mitigate infections disease like COVID-19. We saw the devaluation of elders, healthcare workers and teachers, and we decided to vote for it all again and worse. We became chronically online. We fell down the rabbit holes of misinformation. Instead of analyzing and addressing the systemic drivers of these issues, we did what was easy – blame one person or blame each other. We took comfort in “us vs. them.” I’m still trying to wrap my head around it, and that is a process I will be exploring in future posts.
When I am feeling this way, it helps me to do a sort of “brain dump”, where I get all my thoughts out of my head and on paper (or computer). So here are some of my thoughts on what simple living looks (looked) like for many of us in 2020, the good AND the bad. Because not even simple living is simple right now.
Rediscovering the importance of skills we have largely left in the past.
If you’ve gone to the store and been unable to find yeast, that’s probably because there’s a bit of a fear in all of us that our world has drastically changed, and we’re not prepared for it. We’re just beginning to realize the importance of sustainability and self-sufficiency.
Things like planting a garden, baking from scratch, home maintenance and having hobbies. Before the pandemic, who had time for all this? We became so busy despite all we had to make life easier that we were caught unawares and unprepared.
This isn’t a movie, we’re not in an apocalypse (I hope). It’ll be interesting to see what sticks and what doesn’t as the world gradually rolls towards a new normal.
2023: It was the apocalypse.
I’m kidding. Sort of. I feel like there is still a lot of truth here. Sure, yeast and flour are back in stock, and I still see an interest in things like gardening. But I also think the pandemic doled out a HUGE blow to sustainability and it will take some time to recover that.
It also needs to be said that right now, due to greedflation (where giant corporations are reporting record profits yet continue to pay their workers poverty wages while jacking prices beyond affordability), some of these things we did in 2020 because there were germs in buildings are now things we are doing because we cannot afford to otherwise. I still am baking our bread from scratch, and am adding homemade granola bars, tortillas, even pasta to the mix in an effort to keep our grocery bill within a reasonable budget. And for many people right now, that still isn’t enough to keep financial insecurity at bay.
Taking inventory and using what you have
Some of us may have actually ADDED a bit too much to our pantries in the early days, when we weren’t sure what effects the pandemic might have on the supply chain.
Now, we’re seeing a surge of “pantry buster” recipes meant to help us use up our pantry staples. Let’s face it, the grocery store can be a scary place that I’m avoiding. I personally haven’t brought my kids inside a store since this all began, instead preferring to pick up our weekly produce and other perishables through my store’s curbside pickup service.
We’re also “taking inventory” of just how much stuff we have in our homes. Because we’re there so much more, clutter and overabundance is so much more noticeable. While decluttering has been one of my main goals on my journey towards a simpler lifestyle, such largescale “de-stuffing” is having a massive impact on the environment. It’d be interesting to see data on the amount of stuff sent to landfills during this time. It’s already well-known that thrift stores are at capacity and can’t sell things fast enough. So much of what we send there with good intentions just ends up in the landfill anyway.
My hope is that our culture gradually shifts its attitude towards minimalism and away from mindless consumerism. Our heightened awareness of systemic injustice will hopefully help with that as we recognize the awful conditions that people are forced to endure in order to feed our appetite for cheap abundance.
2023: The culture did not in fact shift its attitude towards minimalism and away from mindless consumerism.
The biggest evidence I have for this is the rise of Shein haul influencers. People who buy hundreds of pieces of clothing each month so that they can show them on their social media platforms and causing, in part, corporations like Shein to become unimaginably profitable while their workers are paid starvation wages in unsafe conditions, not to mention stealing the intellectual property of artists without recourse. And again, we are in 2023 facing an affordability crisis, leading people to turn to these corporations, often knowing it contributes to the problem, but believing there is no better way.
Taking a glimpse into a culture and lifestyle not seen in decades
Only a few decades ago it was uncommon for people to travel further than their own town. Many families settle not far from where they grew up. I am one of only a couple of people on either side of my family to move outside my province. Now that travel is difficult and risky, the distance seems more extreme than it ever has.
People are avoiding international travel, cancelling their vacation plans and sticking close to home. They may be discovering areas of their town they’ve never explored before. A couple of weeks ago, we took a Sunday drive for something to do. How retro!
In a time when entertainment facilities are closed and we’re forced to make do with what we have, people are getting creative. We’re rediscovering simpler ways to occupy their children and themselves. Crafts, bike rides, picnics and running through the sprinkler are new playdates at the indoor playground. Not that there was anything wrong with that before, but I think it’s probably a good thing that we’re teaching our kids and ourselves how to be content with what we have.
2023: This one is tricky. I kind of feel like we got a taste for simpler times and decided as a society that it wasn’t for us. We will never be inconvenienced again. We will LIVE OUR LIVES. And I won’t lie, I had to reach a certain point of “it is what it is” in order to salvage and repair my own mental health. It’s hard, because there are people I know personally for whom the pandemic is still very much not over, be it from Long COVID or the ongoing threat infection poses to their fragile or diminished immune systems. But I have brought some lessons with me. I don’t think I’ll ever travel on a plane without an N95 mask, pandemic or no pandemic. I continue to simplify how we live our lives, drawing on values of togetherness and appreciating what’s in our own backyard.
So what does simple living look like, really? It’s not so simple, after all. Some things are concrete, and a great many are fluid, up in the air and changing with every moment. There’s nothing to feel guilty about if your life is relatively unchanged, but try to make space for those who are experiencing great upheaval. If we learn anything this year, if we allow anything to grow in our hearts, may it be greater empathy for those whose experiences differ from our own. Let that be what we rebuild our world on.
So much of what I felt in 2020 still rings true. And yes, a LOT has happened since then. In many ways I feel like I’m still emerging from a quagmire, some days I feel like I’ve fallen back in. But I have learned some very important lessons over the last few years, and I want those lessons to form the path ahead. One such lesson I’ve learned (and relearned, and relearned again) is that I don’t have to have it all figured out ahead of time in order to share these lessons with my readers (few as they may be). Living a simple life with purpose is still a goal I hold dear, and a great foundation for the rebuild.
Thank you for reading.
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