Minimalist

[close] Freedom represented by the freedom to choose, and the freedom to change. When one is under stress, that stress occurs because of a conflict between what we crave and what we are facing. Debt is the biggest millstone confronting most of us, and debt often occurs because the choices we have made have reflected short-term wants, without adequate consideration for long-term impact. My wife and I have chosen a lifestyle that gives us the freedom to choose. Our choices work for us. They may not for you, but the principles that we have employed should. Our house of freedom is built on four corner posts. We live economically and minimally, but not frugally or stingily. We respect the world around us, and, specifically, the environment that sustains us. We use less processed goods, and more of what the earth offers us naturally. We live within the smallest footprint that we can comfortably embrace, including our home – a yurt that we designed and built ourselves. By relinquishing our need to leave a mark, we are freeing ourselves to savour the marks made by life around us, and on us. Our four posts, therefore, are as ethereal as the air around us, yet so solid that we can lean on any or all of them, and count on them to support us as much as we require. That is freedom. I feed a series of blogs each week, on topics such as “Moving To A Yurt,” “Eating Wild,” “Lean and Green Living” and “Enviro-Revolutions and Eco-Inventions.” Each of these blogs discusses our path to freedom from debt and from stress, while embracing the world around us. I invite you to join me, subscribe to my blogs, participate in this discussion group and begin your search for your personal freedoms. This group will look at the ideas that feed these fredoms, and the Goodreads books that guide us.