Simply Living
Originally Written October 10, 2010
Dear Readers,
I’m continuously ticking items off the final countdown list.
My latrine is finally all but finished. It still needs a few final touches, but it’s finally usable, and is far more pleasant than that natural disaster that my host family and I have been using for the past two years. Now I can turn most of my focus on getting the library up and running.
But mostly at this point I’m ready to finish up, go home, and move on to a new project. A couple of weeks ago I felt I was going through something akin to Stockholm Syndrome in that I was having thoughts such as “I could stay here longer” or “This is something I can see myself doing again.” However, somehow those notions vanished and I feel more and more like my inner compass is now pointing me in a new direction. I have no idea what that direction might be though.
Which perhaps isn’t as bad as I often fear it to be. Several months ago a wrote an article for the PCV newsletter the Volunteers publish amongst themselves in which I said as Peace Corps Volunteers, we must be adventurous-hearted folk. If I haven’t said it before, and I probably have here, that was mainly why I joined the Peace Corps: to live and experience something adventurous while I traveled and worked. It was to enrich my life, which it has.
But I also am humbled to see that I’m not the Indiana Jones-type adventurer I always dreamt about as a kid. Of course, upon watching all four of the movies I noticed that most of his trips lasted a week or so (although it’s hard to see in movies), not two years. But the fact is, part of me is surprised and a bit disappointed that it’s been so hard for me to adapt to Peruvian life. In my last entry I wrote about how it can be fun to make things a game and pretend to play a role of someone else, especially in the member of another culture, but in the interest of disclosure, that’s not a sure-fire thing for me. Often it can be exhausting. For the past three days my town has been celebrating local anniversary, but for much of it, I’ve felt lonely. Hearing the same music blasted over and over (and I do mean blasted, I can’t stress how loudly the music is played here), or the foods, some which is tasty, some which is not, be mostly just the feeling that even after two years, this isn’t my home. These types of feelings come and go and I don’t even necessarily dread them. After all, it is part of the international lifestyle I’ve been fortunate to have.
And I suppose that is the adventure in life. Where would the fun be if you always knew where you were going? I guess I find though the less baggage I have, both figuratively and literally, make more a happier traveler.
There is something to living simply. But by simple, I don’t mean necessarily mean a quiet life with few possessions or anything like that. I mean in the sense of keeping things as simple as possible and not getting caught up in our minds, which is where a lot of our problems and complaining start.
To be sure, it’s a great relief to purge a lot of my things. I’ll be leaving much of my clothes and possessions behind, simply because I won’t need them or they’d be too wieldy to pack up. I’ve been packing for the past few weeks and cleaned up my room as much as I could, although for some reason it looks just like it did before. I think I’ve written about living simply before, but in case I haven’t, or at least to serve as a reminder, I want to say a few things.
First: To reiterate, living a monastic life with few possessions doesn’t necessarily mean living an enlightened or enriched or fulfilling life. There’s nothing wrong with having stuff. What stuff one that may be is up to one’s self. Living away from current events, without hot water, without internet or a car (or even a bike) or – for the most part – nice restaurants or fast-food alike hasn’t brought me any closer to discovering the secret to life. I certainly do have a better appreciation for all of those things, but one doesn’t need to give up a lot creature comforts to seek out any spiritual truths or live a more healthy life or simply just be a better person.
However, these can also all be addictions and distractions from life. And even if they are not, think about how heavy it feels when you buy item after item and then look around at all the things you have. Some of us aren’t aware of it usually. We feel we need all those shoes and shirts and DVDs and whatever. Often though, we don’t. Patrick asked me earlier this week of all the places I’ve been to where would I most like to live (or maybe it was, which culture I thought was the best, or something like that; I don’t recall it verbatim). I’ve lived in Mexico, Germany, Peru, and for a month, France, whenever I haven’t been home in the USA. I told him that for my part, I don’t think the USA is the best, but I think it’s probably the most comfortable. At least for what I’m used to. I also enjoyed Germany a lot but only ever lived in a student dorm.
But for all the nice things about Western culture I think it can be very toxic to us as well because it’s so easy to abuse nice things. That’s why I say that it’s not bad to have things. But the accumulation of clutter, attaching to it, treating it as a status symbol, or whatever is the danger. It’s easy for us because there are so many possible distractions. I don’t consider Peru western culture, but that’s probably because I spend so much time in the country side. In the cities it can be very westernized. I went to a Walmart-ish department store in Piura and for a second was amazed at the music playing over the speakers. It’s like we are addicted to this white noise in our life. Try to picture driving in your car with nothing coming out of the radio or CD player. Even in our minds there is usually some running commentary that (I’m told) we are actually able to turn off.
The point of this is not to harp on capitalism or possessions. I guess I’m just trying to make the point that comfort easily becomes an addiction that we don’t even realize because it’s all around us and so easy to obtain. That might be why some people have said that to be free we need to get rid of our material goods. I don’t agree with that, but I have to admit that throwing things out can feel quite freeing. I guess the bottom line: self inflicted suffering is not necessary to living a life more deeply and stripped of distractions. It’ll probably end up creating more distractions anyway. But it seems to me that life seems to have a better resonance with there’s less junk blocking its tune.
Nothing in my blog is meant to act as a life coach. I’m only writing from my opinions. I’m writing this because I see it in myself, how certain things have become addictions to help me deal with the dullness of life. Even the notion that life is dull or painful implies that there perhaps some conditioning that has been going on; in other words concepts are being applied to aspects of life. As Patrick so often reminds me, words have to have meaning. And so they do. But the absence of words and the absence of concepts doesn’t mean that things vanish. A rose by any other name is still a rose. But imagine what it would be without concepts. Imagine it without calling it a rose, a flower, a plant, or anything else. What is it? It’s not even an “it.” It simply exists.
I think therein lies perhaps the essence of life. I suspect this is a truth because so far to me it feels to be true, like gravity feels to be true. And like gravity, this is available to everyone, haves and have-nots. But if we are drugging ourselves with things, than truths, including sometimes gravity, seems to not be so clear.
Anyways, God knows I’m caught up in my mind a lot, but with practice of noticing it, things seem to be getting clearer. That doesn’t mean I know what’s next though.
Till the next writing,
Tristan
Dear Readers,
I’m continuously ticking items off the final countdown list.
My latrine is finally all but finished. It still needs a few final touches, but it’s finally usable, and is far more pleasant than that natural disaster that my host family and I have been using for the past two years. Now I can turn most of my focus on getting the library up and running.
But mostly at this point I’m ready to finish up, go home, and move on to a new project. A couple of weeks ago I felt I was going through something akin to Stockholm Syndrome in that I was having thoughts such as “I could stay here longer” or “This is something I can see myself doing again.” However, somehow those notions vanished and I feel more and more like my inner compass is now pointing me in a new direction. I have no idea what that direction might be though.
Which perhaps isn’t as bad as I often fear it to be. Several months ago a wrote an article for the PCV newsletter the Volunteers publish amongst themselves in which I said as Peace Corps Volunteers, we must be adventurous-hearted folk. If I haven’t said it before, and I probably have here, that was mainly why I joined the Peace Corps: to live and experience something adventurous while I traveled and worked. It was to enrich my life, which it has.
But I also am humbled to see that I’m not the Indiana Jones-type adventurer I always dreamt about as a kid. Of course, upon watching all four of the movies I noticed that most of his trips lasted a week or so (although it’s hard to see in movies), not two years. But the fact is, part of me is surprised and a bit disappointed that it’s been so hard for me to adapt to Peruvian life. In my last entry I wrote about how it can be fun to make things a game and pretend to play a role of someone else, especially in the member of another culture, but in the interest of disclosure, that’s not a sure-fire thing for me. Often it can be exhausting. For the past three days my town has been celebrating local anniversary, but for much of it, I’ve felt lonely. Hearing the same music blasted over and over (and I do mean blasted, I can’t stress how loudly the music is played here), or the foods, some which is tasty, some which is not, be mostly just the feeling that even after two years, this isn’t my home. These types of feelings come and go and I don’t even necessarily dread them. After all, it is part of the international lifestyle I’ve been fortunate to have.
And I suppose that is the adventure in life. Where would the fun be if you always knew where you were going? I guess I find though the less baggage I have, both figuratively and literally, make more a happier traveler.
There is something to living simply. But by simple, I don’t mean necessarily mean a quiet life with few possessions or anything like that. I mean in the sense of keeping things as simple as possible and not getting caught up in our minds, which is where a lot of our problems and complaining start.
To be sure, it’s a great relief to purge a lot of my things. I’ll be leaving much of my clothes and possessions behind, simply because I won’t need them or they’d be too wieldy to pack up. I’ve been packing for the past few weeks and cleaned up my room as much as I could, although for some reason it looks just like it did before. I think I’ve written about living simply before, but in case I haven’t, or at least to serve as a reminder, I want to say a few things.
First: To reiterate, living a monastic life with few possessions doesn’t necessarily mean living an enlightened or enriched or fulfilling life. There’s nothing wrong with having stuff. What stuff one that may be is up to one’s self. Living away from current events, without hot water, without internet or a car (or even a bike) or – for the most part – nice restaurants or fast-food alike hasn’t brought me any closer to discovering the secret to life. I certainly do have a better appreciation for all of those things, but one doesn’t need to give up a lot creature comforts to seek out any spiritual truths or live a more healthy life or simply just be a better person.
However, these can also all be addictions and distractions from life. And even if they are not, think about how heavy it feels when you buy item after item and then look around at all the things you have. Some of us aren’t aware of it usually. We feel we need all those shoes and shirts and DVDs and whatever. Often though, we don’t. Patrick asked me earlier this week of all the places I’ve been to where would I most like to live (or maybe it was, which culture I thought was the best, or something like that; I don’t recall it verbatim). I’ve lived in Mexico, Germany, Peru, and for a month, France, whenever I haven’t been home in the USA. I told him that for my part, I don’t think the USA is the best, but I think it’s probably the most comfortable. At least for what I’m used to. I also enjoyed Germany a lot but only ever lived in a student dorm.
But for all the nice things about Western culture I think it can be very toxic to us as well because it’s so easy to abuse nice things. That’s why I say that it’s not bad to have things. But the accumulation of clutter, attaching to it, treating it as a status symbol, or whatever is the danger. It’s easy for us because there are so many possible distractions. I don’t consider Peru western culture, but that’s probably because I spend so much time in the country side. In the cities it can be very westernized. I went to a Walmart-ish department store in Piura and for a second was amazed at the music playing over the speakers. It’s like we are addicted to this white noise in our life. Try to picture driving in your car with nothing coming out of the radio or CD player. Even in our minds there is usually some running commentary that (I’m told) we are actually able to turn off.
The point of this is not to harp on capitalism or possessions. I guess I’m just trying to make the point that comfort easily becomes an addiction that we don’t even realize because it’s all around us and so easy to obtain. That might be why some people have said that to be free we need to get rid of our material goods. I don’t agree with that, but I have to admit that throwing things out can feel quite freeing. I guess the bottom line: self inflicted suffering is not necessary to living a life more deeply and stripped of distractions. It’ll probably end up creating more distractions anyway. But it seems to me that life seems to have a better resonance with there’s less junk blocking its tune.
Nothing in my blog is meant to act as a life coach. I’m only writing from my opinions. I’m writing this because I see it in myself, how certain things have become addictions to help me deal with the dullness of life. Even the notion that life is dull or painful implies that there perhaps some conditioning that has been going on; in other words concepts are being applied to aspects of life. As Patrick so often reminds me, words have to have meaning. And so they do. But the absence of words and the absence of concepts doesn’t mean that things vanish. A rose by any other name is still a rose. But imagine what it would be without concepts. Imagine it without calling it a rose, a flower, a plant, or anything else. What is it? It’s not even an “it.” It simply exists.
I think therein lies perhaps the essence of life. I suspect this is a truth because so far to me it feels to be true, like gravity feels to be true. And like gravity, this is available to everyone, haves and have-nots. But if we are drugging ourselves with things, than truths, including sometimes gravity, seems to not be so clear.
Anyways, God knows I’m caught up in my mind a lot, but with practice of noticing it, things seem to be getting clearer. That doesn’t mean I know what’s next though.
Till the next writing,
Tristan
posted by Tristan | 2:54 PM
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