Radical Ideas

Alright, I am a crazy idealist. I'm also overly ambitious (redundant, I know), but this foray into the world of limitless possibilities (i.e. unemployment) is inspiring me to discover just how much I can do with what I have been given.

Almost a year ago I started my No More Grocery Shopping experiment. If you want to know why I did it, click here. If you want to know how I did it, click here. Since then we have tried to simplify further, prepare for the uncertain yet bright future and have plans in place in case of rain.

Well, the warning came, sirens sounded, clouds rolled in and it started pouring. In a 48 hour period we lost our job, we lost our car, my sister was in the hospital, my nephew had a serious medical emergency while we were all at the pool, my youngest daughter woke up with strep throat as we were preparing to leave town and everything around me seemed to want to be part of our crisis. We were overwhelmed to say the least. I think I only cried once because I was mostly in a semi state of shock. Still, I knew things can always be worse, and most of the world lives in constant crisis, so I picked myself up

Thankfully, that all passed. I mean everything but the "we lost our job" part (why couldn't I be born a country singer and write a song about that?). Now we have a new kind of rain bringing the potential for abundance to our lives and radical ideas are flooding my mind. It feels like we have lived our entire marriage (17 years) inside the matrix, content with the conventions of corporate culture and consumerism. But now we are attempting to unplug and the feeling is something akin to euphoria.

I know, you're reading this and thinking, "She is in denial, her husband just lost his job and she is in La La Land" and you might be right. Like I said, I only cried once, and other than a couple of days of horrible headaches I've been coping better than I expected. But, I would argue that I understand (at least cognitively) the reality of our situation and I have some ideas on how to thrive despite the challenges before us.

So, here are some of my radical ideas. I'm not sure which ones we'll do. Since they all require a whole family effort we have to have a family meeting before I can commit to our next plan of action.

• Live only on existing funds as long as we can go
• Keep emergency fund for a true rainy day
• Put any new income towards savings/debt reduction (house, car, student loan)

Not so crazy so far, that's WHAT we want to accomplish. Here's the how:

• Fully embrace the adage "Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without."
• I already know I can go six weeks without grocery shopping, why not make it a full two months.
• Learn how to go beyond "reduce, reuse, recycle" as a means of building greater peace and plenty in my life and home
• Go a prescribed period of time (one month, two months, a year) without buying anything new (except stuff like food and underwear)
• Simplify to the point of optimal satisfaction (i.e. discover what things will actually make us happier if we give them up)
• Unplug (with a few loop holes) from the grid (literally) for certain hours of the day/week; maybe hand wash dishes, air dry clothes, or only use the oven one day a week.

To get an idea of the extremes I've been studying lately go see this guy's blog, The No Impact Man, and this girl's San Fransisco Compact blog. Please understand that for me, these lifestyle change ideas are less about CO2 and more about being a good steward of all of our resources. I'm not going to their extremes, I'm going to find my own. But other people's extremes are instrumental (even if it is just for nothing morbid facination).

One of the greatest lessons of No More Grocery Shopping was that very often less is abundantly, unquestionably more. I can only imagine that taking it one step further will lead to new discoveries about who we really are and what we really need to live a fulfilling life.