The Most Surprising Thing I Found in My Suitcase

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about life.  I suppose it could have something to do with recently turning 40 and realizing I won’t live forever.

Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy my life. I followed the prescribed path to success and achieved the American Dream.  I went to college and graduate school, and have a rewarding career. I married a wonderful partner. We bought a house in a nice community. I’ve worked hard and made good decisions. And the result is a privileged life that I’m truly grateful for.

But what do I really want?

Duh. Happiness, of course. Like everyone else.

And so recently my mind has been lost in a meta-analysis of my life, past, present, and future, trying to crack the Happiness Code. (I’m an over-thinker.)

What exactly makes me happy? What do I want out of the rest of my limited time on this planet?

To find the answer, I thought back on my happiest times and tried to find the common denominator.

Two major life events stood out.

The first was graduate school.  Hubby and I were newlyweds. We lived in crappy apartments and used coupons to buy groceries at Walmart. We drank Boone’s Farm and hardly ever bought new clothes. But we were happy.

The second was our sabbatical. For seven months, Hubby and I traveled to twelve countries, which, of course, was awesome. Truly life-changing.

So what do these two experiences have in common?

In a word: FREEDOM.

I vividly remember coming home from our sabbatical. I stood at my front door, with the carry-on suitcase that contained everything I needed for months, and felt heavy. The possessions and the responsibilities they carried literally felt like a weight on my shoulders.

We clearly didn’t need anything in our house, as we hadn’t used, or even though about, any of our possessions for months. And yet we had spent money and time purchasing and maintaining all of them.

Even our modest home felt like a burden. After spending months living in hotel rooms and campervans, our house seemed ginormous for two people. All that extra space has cost us valuable time and money over the years. There are soooo many costs…. There are the obvious  monetary costs, like the mortgage, taxes, insurance, utilities, maintenance, etc. etc. etc. But there are also time costs, like cleaning and yard work.

And then there are the mental and emotional costs. That weight I felt on my doorstep were the responsibilities of the American Dream. Of home ownership. Of keeping up with the Joneses.

It also explains why Hubby and I were so happy as poor graduate students. Yes, we were head-over-heels-in-love newlyweds. But we did have responsibilities. We were graduate students, after all. What we didn’t yet have were the responsibilities of the American Dream’s rampant consumerism.

We felt free living in a tiny apartment, and living out of a suitcase traveling the world. And that freedom made us happy.

Following Our Own Path

Our society is built around an unwritten Life Recipe. Go to college. Get a good job. Get married. Buy a house. Have kids. American Dream achieved.

Those things are all great, if that’s what you really want.

The rules of how to live life were embedded so deeply into my subconscious, that I honestly didn’t even realize there were other options. That I had choices, beyond what college to attend, which career to pursue, and who to choose as a partner.

Hubby and I followed the recipe until the last ingredient. I never wanted kids. Ever. I was never into babies, and honestly I didn’t like kids even when I was one. It wasn’t easy swimming against that tide. Women are expected to want children.

I’m so thankful we bucked the trend and didn’t succumb to the incredible pressure to have kids. We made the best choice for us.

But now we realize we might have substituted other ingredients in the Life Recipe. Or maybe even chosen another Recipe entirely.

For example, we regret assuming that purchasing a home was the best decision for us. Owning a home is THE quintessential part of the American Dream. Plus, renting is throwing away money, right?  It turns out, we may have been better off financially if we had rented. Houses might not be the terrific investment Americans are told they are.  (In fact, we lost a lot of money on our first house due to the Great Recession.) Plus, renting is way less stress. Fewer responsibilities. And if something breaks, just call the landlord!

And maybe we don’t want to wait until we’re 65 to travel the world full time. We currently spend our time working to earn money. We then use money to purchase various needs and wants. But what we really want is freedom.

The most valuable currency to us isn’t money. It’s time.

We don’t want to live to work, or even work to live. Our real desire is the freedom to choose how we spend our precious time.

Our Plan to Achieve Freedom

So how can we achieve that sense of freedom we so desire in the “real world”? Where we have responsibilities like careers and a house?

Through awareness and personal choices. Through living consciously.

Setting the goal of happiness through freedom was incredibly empowering. Now, every decision we make about how to spend our time and money is an opportunity to help us achieve our goal.

Once this realization was made, we made several changes.

First, we reduced our consumption.

American society is built around consumerism. We buy fancy cars and clothes for work, and work to buy fancy cars and clothes. It’s a vicious cycle. We’re overworked and stressed, so we go out to eat at fancy restaurants and buy shiny jewelry because “we deserve it”. We don’t have time to enjoy ourselves, so we blow money on expensive vacations to hurry up and relax. We spend our valuable nights and weekends taking care of all of our stuff. We use consumption to self-medicate. To make ourselves feel better. To fill the void.

But it doesn’t work. At least not in the long run.

That jolt of happiness you feel when you buy something new doesn’t last very long. But it felt so good that when it wears off you go back for more. And on and on and on.

Companies have sneaky tricks to part us from our money. They mark items on “sale” to make us think we’re getting a deal, but we’re still spending money. They convince us our clothing, or furniture, or car is out of style. They make products destined to break. So we keep going back for more.

We’re much more aware now of the things we bring into our lives. Items we purchase have to pass the “Love Test”: If we don’t love it, we don’t buy it. We also choose quality when possible, because even though the initial price is higher, we save money over the life of the product.

We’ve also found that by simply changing the word “need” to “want” before making a purchase results in buying less. I don’t “need” a new coat. I have several. And by saying “need” I’m minimizing the situations of those who truly are in need. In reality, I “want” a new coat. That shift in mindset is powerful.

While some may consider us frugal, we prefer the word “mindful”. Through this mindful consumption we are able to make better choices to reach our real goal of freedom.

Minimizing our consumption has had additional benefits, as well. We’ve reduced our environmental impact, and we are more grateful for the things we have. Win-win.

Second, we decluttered.

Based on the current celebrity status of The Minimalists and organizational gurus like Marie Kondo it would appear that we’re not alone in our quest to simplify our lives.

After returning from our sabbatical, we sold and donated carloads of crap. We purged the seemingly endless piles of stuff we had accumulated over the years that was weighing us down. (I know, first world problem. LINK) There were DVDs and books, sports gear, random dishes, make-up, single-use kitchen gadgets….and a partridge in a pear tree! We had so much stuff we didn’t even know what we had, and couldn’t find things when we needed them.

I know what you’re thinking… We’re not hoarders. If anything, we had less crap than most. Many Americans can’t even use their garages to park their cars because it’s so full of crap.

But decluttering made us realize that less is truly more.

Consider my closet. I love clothes. And shoes. And I had a lot of them. I bought beautiful, interesting pieces that sat unused in my closet because I couldn’t figure out how to wear them. Women’s fashion is complicated and ever-changing, purposefully so, to force us into a constant cycle of consumption that drains our wallets and harms the environment and the people who work in the industry.

And so I purged. I realized, like most women, that I only wore about 20-30% of my clothing. Gone was anything that didn’t fit perfectly, or that I hadn’t worn recently, or that I didn’t love. I felt guilty getting rid of beautiful clothes that cost good money. But what value did these items have in my closet?

On my seven month sabbatical, I wore the same clothes over and over. And over. And what I discovered was…. It was liberating. I finally understood why many successful people have uniform wardrobes.  Not having to think about what I was going to wear freed up valuable time and mental energy.

So I thought about what I wore and why. I feel confident in clothes that look good on me and fit me well. I’m not good at putting together complicated outfits. I now essentially have a capsule wardrobe that consists of fewer, quality clothes, that fit well and work well together with little thought. I honestly feel like I have more to wear with fewer clothes. Who knew?

Finally, we aligned our spending with our values.

It’s really easy to spend money. Too easy.

But money spent on things that aren’t important to us means less money for the things that do matter.

For example, many people ask us how we can afford to travel as much as we do. The short answer? We value traveling, and we’ve aligned our spending to reflect our values.

Let me be clear: We do recognize how privileged we are.

But often the question comes from others as privileged as we are, who have instead chosen to spend their money in other ways. Big houses. Fancy cars. Eating (and drinking) out at restaurants. The latest electronic gadgets. Plus the countless things American kids seem to “need.”

This mindless consumption hides the fact that all of those purchases are choices. We’ve simply made different choices.

Consider that the average American spends over $8,000 a year on a vehicle. Hubby drives a 1998 Toyota Camry. I drive the “new” car….a 2006 Toyota Corolla. We haven’t had a car payment in almost ten years. As a bonus, older cars have lower taxes and insurance rates. While we could afford new cars (Hubby really wants a Tesla!), we would rather put that money towards the things that bring us real joy.

We also take our lunches to work every day. Going out for a $10 lunch may not seem like much, but that’s $50 a week, or $2,600 a year. Little things do add up. (USA Today calculated that eating out twice a week, instead of investing the money, costs almost $90,000 in lost savings.)

I spend too much of my life energy making money to spend it on things that don’t bring me real happiness.

The most valuable things to use are time and freedom. And so we’ve aligned our values with our spending.

Finding Happiness in Freedom

Traveling woke me up. It forced me to see my life differently, and to question deeply held assumptions about the way I was “supposed” to live. I was on auto-pilot, not paying attention to how I spent my time or money.

I want to make the most of my precious time, and to live a life of my own choosing. I feel happier and more free when I’m not bogged down by unnecessary things and responsibilities.

And I discovered that freedom in a suitcase.

 

 

What do you think? What really makes you happy?