Organize Your Thoughts

Whether you are contemplating downsizing your life or making dozens of other life decisions, you need to organize those thoughts that buzz around in your head.  

***You can begin by thinking of what you REALLY want, what you would like to happen, the answer you wish you could hear. Yes, you are allowed to consider how you feel about a decision. You can have your dream.

***Once you know what you want, get real and honest with yourself.  Is there a realistic starting point to accomplish what I want?  Is it possible to do what I want? Most importantly---what are the consequences of this change, both good and bad?

***Make a plan

Dreams are supposed to be lofty and big. It's okay to form that perfect scenario in your mind. Oh, I would love to live in that teeny portable house, be able to move around. Oh, I would love to live on a houseboat. Oh, wouldn't it be grand in the mountains? on the lake or river? I would love to have no yard work, no maintenance, no mortgage. Just be sure that it's your dream, not one that you saw on TV or heard from someone else and it sounded good.

When you get honest with yourself, start narrowing down your possibilities to a version of your dream that might actually be do-able and right for your situation. I'm sorry, but I just don't believe that those folks that enthusiastically move their family of five into a 250 sq, feet house are happy a year down the road---if they even survive for a year! What are your priorities?  Money, freedom from responsibilities, just being able to enjoy some of the simpler things in life?  You can do it. Do it the way that is right for you, though.

The hubby and I have never been city folk, we like nature and we don't like the metro life. However, I won't kid you. We like our conveniences and are not interested in living miles away from necessities and indulgences.  We like our television, we like our Wi-Fi, we don't want to drive an hour to get a gallon of milk, we are old and want some type of medical care to be reachable. We live outside of the city (in both of our locations) but we don't live isolated.

When you've examined the pros and cons, you will discover a reasonable path to follow. Make a plan now. It might be as simple as "I'm going to start getting rid of a lot of stuff that I don't need" as a beginning. Any small action that will move you toward your goal is worthwhile. Get that destination of change in your mind and move persistently toward it. Move an inch at a time or leap, just move.

Have a dream, get realistic and make a plan. That's always worked for me.

A Simple Summer

The summer season, for the hubby and I, begins with our arrival at the Colorado cabin. It's still winter on the high Spanish Peaks, our view from the front porch. Yesterday evening the hail peppered the deck and the temperature this sunny morning was 41 degrees. Everything is so green and the purple sage is already blooming beautifully.

We have been escaping the Texas heat and coming to the little green cabin for over ten years now. I have

to say that it was probably the beginning of us realizing that we could live a much smaller and simpler life and be completely happy. The cabin is a little less than 1,000 square feet. It has everything we need, including a second "potty" and small guest bedroom. After staying here for 4 or 5 months at a time, it dawned on us that we never missed a bigger house or a busier life.

So, during the past few years, back at home in Texas, we have downsized from 5 acres and a nearly 3,000 sq. feet home---to a house in town that was about half the size---to a travel trailer and then this past year to our Tiny House in the rv campground on the bay of a large lake.

There are some obvious but great advantages to downsizing your life:

             FINANCES---Whether you are older and retired or younger and moving toward that day, you can live smaller.  If you aren't maintaining, paying taxes and all that is involved in owning a big house, you have much more of your funds for the things you enjoy. We are lucky to have two houses in beautiful places for cost less than many spend for one home.

             PEACE of MIND---Trust me, your grown children, grand-children and friends are much more independent of you than you might think.  If you don't have the big house where everything happens and everyone stays, you can still have your relationship with all of those you love. With cell phones, text, e-mails and all the easy communications these days, we stay in very close touch with our family and friends. They enjoy visiting us in our smaller houses. When we are near to our family, we all appreciate each other and treasure our times together.

Moving to a tiny house or living in a far away location, even part time, is not the right thing for everyone. You must search your own heart. There are multitudes of ways to make your life a little simpler and smaller.  If your mind is closed though, on this or any other change in your life, you are possibly missing some of the most special times of living.

Ever Changing Life

Living/kitchen area of our new Tiny House

In my many years on this earth, one of the big things I've learned is that life is always changing. That is an absolute.

Over the last five years or more, my interest and passion has been in the writing of eleven novels and in the prepper self sustaining philosophy. I loved writing the books in the apocalyptic dystopian genre and still am amazed that folks read them. I also have not weakened on my belief that we live in a dangerous and unpredictable world. Many events, both manmade and nature made could happen to our complicated world and I very much am of the mind that everyone should have some preparations for catastrophe.

While I haven't lost my interest in these two basic things, life does move along and if a person doesn't have the desire or ability to adapt to those changes, I personally think it is a very detrimental to our physical health. It is most certainly damaging to our mental strength and peace of mind to not be open to new things in our lives. If you are open, change and moving on to new endeavors is probably the single most revitalizing thing that can happen to you.

It's not that far from the prepping and I certainly just could not quit writing, so my new passion will be the subject of my ramblings for now.  That new interest is living smaller in this big world and simplifying my life. I will be writing about the downsizing that my hubby and I have accomplished over the last two years on this blog site. Hopefully, I will be able to share some of the good and bad and pass along some lessons learned to anyone that is interested in streamlining their life in this big busy world. Looking forward to new horizons.  JO

Ain't it the Truth...or is it?

Yep, I'm still alive folks and not so unusual---I'm very frustrated. Where in the wide world is the truth?  There is so much information out there and it is so available. Indeed, it is pushed in our face constantly! You would think that meant we could always find out the truth. That's far from true. We are being drowned in untruths, half-truths and flat out lies.  All dressed up, stretched out and presented as irrefutable facts.  How can we possibly dig through all this stinky poop and find one little chunk of truth?

The hubby (my favorite old philosopher, by the way) says "The truth is always somewhere in the middle" and  "Somebody's lying!".   Now those words are reality. 

The scandale du jour is Bill O'Reilly.  He is being completely crucified in the media. Does he deserve it?  Is he a raving sexist pervert?  I, like most folks, would love to know the truth.  I am sorry, but several women who received millions of dollars just don't prove his guilt to me.  There are plenty of cases of sexual abuse, rape, sexual harassment and other injustices that are very legitimate. I don't deny for a moment that it is possible for a male in a position of power or authority to place a woman an impossible situation.

HOW-EV-ER---I am very weary of females who are supposed to be strong and empowered, whining and bitching because a jerk of a male said something nasty to her or inappropriately touched her. Really?  What happened to a slap, a kick to the cohones.  Whatever happened to a loud voice that says NO, says don't you ever talk to me like that again or don't you ever come near me again? We are not talking about physical attacks here, we are talking about the big Taboo of our time---someone offended me.  And the thing that really makes me angry and question these injured ladies is why do millions of dollars make it better?  I've been around a long time and  I've had nasty minded and mouthed men say disrespectful things to me. I think quite a bit of myself, but never in all my nearly 70 years has someone said something that I thought big bucks would fix.

I so wish that I knew the truth. Like so many hyped and spinning stories these days, it's practically impossible to get to it.  I do know that the politically correct, over sensitive and sue for money crazy atmosphere that we live in, is part of the reason that Donald Trump is now our president.  The freedom of speech and all of our rights can't exist if the rule becomes no one can ever say anything that is offensive to another person. Of course, this is just one old gal's opinion.