Micro-life

 How we spend our time depends on our stage of life.

I like that phrase — "spend our time" — because it brings to the fore that time is one of our key resources, the other two being money and energy. What we can reasonably hope to do depends on some kind of accommodation/balance of those three aspects of life.

When I look back on earlier decades of my life, my mind boggles at what I thought it would be okay to attempt. Running a church and raising a family and writing books and speaking and teaching and preaching. When I say "raising a family", in common with most mothers I lived the reality that the person who noticed when someone needed new clothes (and sourced them) and found the right Christmas presents for everyone (including the extended family) and took charge of all hospitality and made sure the house was clean and the laundry done and planned the budget and the meals and went to school parents' evenings and end of term concerts and ensured the pets got vaccinated and welcomed the waifs and strays who needed our shelter — was me.

We had a lot of fun, even after our massive life crash. 

But nowadays, after five years chronic illness and in my 70th year, I'm slowing down.

This morning, I picked up some of our family from their various dwellings to visit a housewares store on the edge of town (too far for them to walk), and then on the way home we swung by the supermarket for a few groceries and a cup of coffee in the new Costa café they've just finished installing.

That's about my level these days, for energy and for money. I get tired, the budget has to shelter other people than just me, the days are past when I might have driven up to Tunbridge Wells for a morning shopping, or go to London on the train to see a show — or even go out for dinner or have a dinner party at home. Even thinking about it makes me tired.

But these little nano-trips are a source of happiness. I like being able still to make a contribution — use my car to offer a lift to family members who have no car — and I love seeing my people, and I enjoy looking at things together (that I have no plan to buy). 

For me, it's all part of the minimalism, a kind of micro-life that extends happiness and possibilities, cheerfulness, relationship and even joy. It doesn't break the budget, it's simple and accessible and doesn't over-extend anything (time, money or energy). At the end I'm home in time to cook lunch for my husband. 

I don't aim for asceticism: it's nice to go out, and enjoy seeing the range of goods in the shops and the colours, and look at the people going about their lives. It's also handy to keep up the ability to drive a car, because that does atrophy if you stop. Not only that, but the only chocolate I ever have nowadays (because it's very high in oxalate) is the sprinkle they put on the top of my cappuccino in a café; that feels like a treat.

To own little, to aspire to little, to spend little — there is a great deal of contentment in this micro-life.

Here's someone else exploring the simplicity of micro-life, and associated issues — in Japan.