How much is enough? Do we always need to be making more? And if we do, do we have to consume it or should we give it back? How do you give it back and to whom? What about retirement and savings? Should we travel more? Prep for kids college funds?
Often the idea of limiting a household's income is framed in the context of traditional major life changes. Buying a house. Having kids. But, what if it was framed as a conscious choice to consume less and give more.
After you purge the belongings you really don't need; eliminate consumption minded spending (or really limit it); create a core plan for savings for rainy days and retirement; anticipate necessary increases in your budget for the future...what about the job choice?
Can you walk away from readily available income because the idea means more? The opportunity to authentically contribute to a real change in the world?
Should the aspiration be to redefine career and life success on our own terms? We've said for years that we make our decisions based on the love of the job and not the money, but it's easy to say that with two stable incomes.
Should our legacy as individuals and a generation be our Pottery Barn decorated houses and our Target filled closets? What if we cut back or walked away entirely? How could we alter the consumption economy?
Our tendencies for societal defined roles is not limited to domestication, we readily embrace a manner and style of consumption based on our station in life. We might feel better about it because it's organic or from lululemon, but it's still just consuming.
Where's the balance? How do we balance? Making money isn't evil, buying beautiful things isn't either. But I feel like it's easy to subscribe to a lifestyle of consumption based on convenience. We specialize in justifying our choices without hesitation.
Over cocktails this is always a favorite topic of conversation and it often comes (in recent years) with a "well, you feel that way now, wait 'till you have kids." Perhaps I'll eat my words some day, but for now we're trying to figure out how to live more authentically with less and what that really means when applied to every aspect of our lives.
there are just as many folks who have kids and that drives home their desire to live small, efficiently, and with an eye to the future and knowing they are teaching their kids big lessons about caring for their communities and acknowledging their broad impact. i think the fact that you are so actively considering all of this now means that you will continue to actively consider it when you have kids, as well.
ReplyDeleteOn the "well, you feel that way now, wait 'till you have kids" comment:
ReplyDeleteWhile we're looking at societal constructs and expectations, consider, too, that we search for common ground with others and are threatened when we can't find any to stand on (which isn't to say it isn't there, but we're looking at it the wrong way). When you say, aloud, that you have made a conscious choice to live a certain way, another person may internalize that as a commentary on their lives...particularly if they feel they weren't entirely deliberate about their own outcome. You say, "We want do _______," and they hear, "We want to do __something that is not what YOU'RE doing__," particularly if there's a question of whose "way" carries more social value/virtue.
(speaking of justifying our choices...)