It’s not good to do that, instead I should/need to just concentrate on doing one thing at a time.

What is enough? I’ve read a whole book on it (exert here). We’re conditioned to want more and more. More things, more experiences, pushing ourselves ever faster, harder.

It’s just this evening, I think I managed to catch myself wanting more. I rued the fact that I was getting enough, before I actually realised that what I had was actually quite enough. The way I was feeling was telling me I didn’t need it.

Maybe sometimes, we should think about that, that these things are enough.

(Another ill thought out post! :D)

I meant to write about how difficult I was finding sorting all my things out but this picture kind of sums it up.

It seems very common for Western Buddhists (and others) to take their rejection of materialism to mean that one must go from thinking “I’ll be happy when I have more” to “I’ll be happy when I have less”. The fallacy of course is the “I’ll be happy when…” anything. Thinking about these objects and whether they are in your possession or not is tying you to them. Leave it. Be happy now.

via ask.metafilter

Eliminating clutter and streamlining processes to free up time and focus on my passions.

The thing is, from the few blogs I’ve been reading (http://mnmlist.com/ is good) it’s not just about cutting down on the things you have, it’s about making more of what you do have, especially time.

This last couple of weeks, I’ve tried to just take more time to myself. In my job it is so easy to be swallowed up by it. To spend each and every spare minute thinking about it or doing work towards it. I’ve realised that while I love my job (mostly!) I am not prepared to give all time and energy to it. I’m just not. There are other things that are equally deserving of my time. At the moment, it’s a work in progress but I’m starting to spend more time cooking and just taking 20 minutes to walk to the shop down the road and less time on the computer or phone.

The power of minimalism lies not in adding to the things you own and do for the sake of improving your life. It’s about enabling you to subtract clutter and noise and focus your time, energy, and passion on whatever makes you most happy and alive.

Now it’s getting late and I need to get up early.

This post started because of this quote>

“I believe the key to success is being flexible enough in your life to be able to search out that which you can be successful at. A lot of people build up their lives to a level where they’re just not sustainable unless they ’settle’ for a job that they aren’t happy with.”

It’s easy, as you earn more to end up spending more but not necessarily being happier with it. I just want to be confident, happy in my own skin. That’s all.

The problem has always been that I’ve felt the need to keep two separate blogs, because there are things I’m happy to share and things I only want to share with a limited number of people – or at least to keep it away from certain people. Basically it’s a right pain, keeping them apart. It’s meant that one is that and one is that and neither of them is really me (which I kind of want them to be).

So I thought that I had decided to come back to this blog after trying out Tumblr (it didn’t feel like it was working), at the same time I started a new private Tumblr because I like it does things and because there’s often things that I just want to put down. Anyway that Tumblr has now become my main blog where I put everything… Which is the problem.

We will see how it pans out and it’s the reason that I haven’t been blogging here lately.

About

[Ok, I just spent 10 minutes reading a load of rubbish]

A one week digital cleanse with these guidlines >

Guidelines:

*email only from laptop or desktop computers

*cell phones can only be used to make calls, and no text messages or e-mails are allowed – if you receive a text, you must reply in voice over the phone. E-mails must be returned from a laptop or desktop computer.

*no use of Twitter or any other social networking site – this includes reading as well as posting.

*no visiting of any entertainment or gossip sites. (No need to detail which ones – you know what they are.)

I think it’s a little ambiguous about whether news sites or Flickr are acceptable…

In any case I’m going to do it. See what happens, so no texts, or internet for a whole week. Calls and emails only. We’ll see how it goes. It’ll be nice to stop for a bit I think.

There are lots of other things I will be doing instead.

(May still blog… undecided at the moment.)

Once you start procrastinating pleasure, it can become a self-perpetuating process if you fixate on some imagined nirvana. The longer you wait to open that prize bottle of wine, the more special the occasion has to be.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/29/science/29tier.html?_r=1

They reference the bit in Sideways that I’ve always liked too…

I’ve always liked the bit in Sideways 20:14
Where they’re discussing one of his ‘best’ wines in his collection 20:14
and he says that he’s waiting for a special occasion to open it 20:14

and she says to him – the time you open it is the special occasion 20:15

I used to be awful for this, getting better. Slowly…

(Adding seeing things in Manchester that I haven’t yet to my growing list of things i’d like to do in the New Year.)

via

We love the place we hate, then hate the place we love
We leave the place we love, then spend a lifetime trying to regain it.

http://thisisnthappiness.com/post/300096304/we-love-the-place-we-hate-then-hate-the-place-we

(Some NSFW content on that blog. Sometimes when you trawl the internet you actually find something that’s interesting!)

(Source of quote)

18:19:07 Rob G: “the lifehacker paradox” All that useful info and tips and links and software in fact spoiling your life through the sheer quantity of them and time spent reading them…

Anyway, I’m enjoying this time right here as it’s giving me time to assess things, to think things through, to consider things. How they are, how I would like them to be, how I might do that. From the simple little things like taking the time to eat to the bigger things like what I’ll do for work next year. Obviously the prospect sounds scary but you’ve got to start somewhere…

It’s just coincidence that this time falls at the end of one year and the start of another. I’ve never seen the point of that – isn’t tomorrow as good a time to start?

These thoughts are being slowly circulated as I read ‘Enough – Breaking Free From the World of More’ that JH got me for Xmas and which you can read a nice extract here > http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/body_and_soul/article3171583.ece.

It’s also coincidence that I linked to this http://www.43folders.com/2009/12/14/enough a week ago on the same subject. I mean to write about it at some point when I’ve gotten around to finishing it. There’s a whole lot I like about ‘enoughism’ though, the idea we should ‘savour every bite’. Especially as it ties in with living in the moment.

Anyway, I also wanted to link to this little series http://www.43folders.com/series/wwld-what-would-leslie-do that I rediscovered yesterday. Written post-humously, it’s a little collection of wisdom of someone. Hey more advice! Still, this time it’s small little things that make sense and which, I think, will make things for you and with the people around you a little bit nicer…

I’m cherry-picking the ones I like but there’s more about each on the site.
-When you come across something you know would be perfect for someone else, buy it for them.
-Send Thank You notes.
-A place for everything.
-Make your bed.
-Schedule the simple tasks.
-Enjoy your vices.
-Take a break. Often.

(As a start I have deleted Tweetdeck, removed 40 or so bookmarks and am going to hit the feeds soon…)
(A start to what, I don’t know.)
(It doesn’t matter though does it?)