For years I have tried to live out a simple life. To shake off the unnecessary, the excess. To sift through the stuff, to purge. This is a daily challenge, I have found. The journey of a lifetime. Often I have strayed off the narrow path of enough onto the paved highway of too much.
What is becoming clearer to me is that there is more to a simple life than the making of one. That the process of reduction is not the life itself. There is a beyond.
Because after the simplifying, the sifting, the making smaller … there is something left. There is that which was deemed important and valuable and necessary. And the step beyond, the beauty of simplicity, the living of the simple life … is the caring for that which has been kept.
What is left is named treasure and the care of it is what makes a life.
My task is to simplify and then go deeper, making a commitment to what remains. That’s what I’ve been after. To care and polish what remains until it glows and comes alive with loving care. – Sue Bender, Plain and Simple: A Woman’s Journey to the Amish
A commitment to what remains. Polishing what remains until it glows and comes alive with loving care. This is the living out of the simple life. This is, simply, life.
Reposted from the archives. Thank you for reminding me of this, Jen Fletcher of Pursuing Enough.
My Men and Me 
June 4, 2012 at 9:24 am
Oh Janelle, I love this! I often fixate on small things, lovingly making them perfect. Sometimes
It’s the salt shaker, I make it shine.
I’d love to explore this idea of a simple
Life in terms of mental stuff. Clearing
The assumptions and the judgements. I want to just be.
June 4, 2012 at 9:30 am
You need to write a post called “Shining the Salt Shaker”! I do appreciate your ability to take a simple moment or activity and make it meaningful. This is the essence of living a simple life, yes?
June 4, 2012 at 9:50 am
“And the step beyond, the beauty of simplicity, the living of the simple life … is the caring for that which has been kept.
What is left is named treasure and the care of it is what makes a life.”
Good stuff. Thanks for this.
June 5, 2012 at 2:27 pm
Your words and photos are a treasure, Charis, and your care of them blesses me.