What I don't miss

I was talking with my son's teacher the other day about the fact that although we own a television set, we do not subscribe to cable or watch any TV channels at all. Living in the mountains makes antennas useless, and without paying for cable or satellite, we can't pick up any stations in our area. This is just fine by us, as we prefer to be totally in control of what we (and especially our kids) are watching. So we only watch the videos we own, or ones we check out at the library for free. It has been years since we have paid to watch anything.

On a recent vacation with relatives, the hotel had plenty of television channels to pick from, but we weren't interested. Flipping through the channels only reminded me of what I dislike the most about television programming. During the day, there is mostly soap operas and talk shows to pick from, which I believe actually lower your IQ the longer you watch. I mean, why would we want to know the life story of someone who requires a paternity test to know who her baby's father is? I think the only reason people watch these shows is to make their lives seem normal by comparison.

Even watching movies seems like a waste of time lately. I sit there and think of all the more productive things I could be doing. Only about one out of every ten movies I watch do I consider really worthwhile anymore. Anyway, that's my two cents.

Deprivation

Sometimes people question my family's frugal lifestyle because they don't understand why we would "deprive" ourselves of everyday luxuries that most families enjoy. Just because we don't watch television, only have one car, and limit our belongings, we are anything but deprived! We enjoy saving money and the environment with our daily choices. And since we have a habit of saving any extra money, we can afford to take vacations at least once a year.

Although we have traveled more than many families, there are still many places we have yet to explore. The east coast is one such area. It would be so much fun to book some Outer Banks rentals and get a large group together to share the vacation. Even the smaller rentals have enough space for 8 people to sleep. Why not share the cost and the fun?? We have also never been to the west coast, and would love to visit Sequoia National Park in California, then on up to Oregon and Washington. A way-in-the-future dream is to visit Europe, and if we continue along the path of simple living, we may just get there someday.

A New Earth

I just started reading A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle, as I have heard from many people that this book has transformed their lives and the way they experience the world. Of course a statement that bold intrigued me, so now I am on my way to be forever changed for the better. I am only on page 30, but so far he has talked about how we are controlled by the ego and that from a very young age, we attach ourselves and our worth to the things that are "ours."

I have been yearning to detach from many of our belongings for a long time, and have been succeeding slowly. But there is a long way to go, especially in the way of convincing the children to let go of so many of their things. This is not a money issue at all. There are many people who have plenty of money, but choose to live a simple, minimalist life. In fact, the people with the most money who are not in the habit of sharing their wealth with the less fortunate seem to be the most depressed, spend the most time in drug rehab, and often commit suicide. If money were the source of happiness, these things would not happen.

On the contrary, the people who make lots of money, but donate most of it to charity, like Oprah Winfrey and Bill Gates seem to be genuinely happy people. There are many other folks who are not considered "rich" by our standards, but because they volunteer their time and give of themselves and their money whenever they can, they live very satisfying lives as well. But since they are not famous, they don't usually make it into the news - and they are probably perfectly happy with that as well. The truly generous don't do it for recognition and prefer to remain anonymous.

Blogletting.com

I have touched on the subjects of financial freedom and being debt free a bit on this blog, but if you are interested in reading more on that subject, I have another blog dedicated to voluntary simplicity and financial freedom. It is called Blogletting.com and the page was designed by my wonderful husband.

Stop by if you get a chance and let me know what you think of the design or any of the posts. I love comments!