A Celebration For Everyone

I usually celebrate this special day by getting out into nature, in this case a long snowshoe in the woods.

Winter solstice is one of my favourite events of the year, perhaps because I was born on this day almost 6 decades ago (that was fast). If I had delusions of grandeur, I might have thought that the light returned because I came into the world. 

"Did I do that?" Even if I am not responsible for this wondrous photonic turn of events, it is still a time of year that I cherish.

First of all, solstice is a celebration that is based on observable facts, and I find that comforting in its solidity. One does not "believe" or "not believe" in this well established annual celestial occurrence.

It is a celebration based on science, which can also be just as magical and amazing as any fabrication of the imagination. The rational part of my brain likes that this event is as real as it gets. 

Best of all is the fact that this is a celebration for everyone, and in a world that is increasingly fractured along religious, political, and tribal lines, such an event is of infinite value. 

Today we celebrate something that is 100% inclusive, even if our Southern Hemisphere brothers and sisters are celebrating the longest day of the year while we celebrate the shortest. 

It is solstice everywhere on the planet, and the wonder of nature joins us all together in one great human family on the best home in the known universe. 

Now, the light returns, and I find that pretty amazing, even if I didn't do it. Happy solstice, my human family, wherever you happen to be. This is a celebration for everyone.

Note: In lieu of sending a birthday present, please donate to a charity of your choice. I don't need, or want, anything (although a cure for multiple sclerosis would be nice, and the permanent end of war would be brilliant).

2 Million Page Views

In 2015 the Not Buying Anything blog surpassed the one million page view mark. It was 7 years after our inception. In no way could this be described as viral, but it is not insignificant.

We like to think that we have made at least a small impact with our work promoting ecologically sensitive lifestyle choices, and living in joyful, fulfilling simplicity.

Now, 3 years later, we have just recently passed the two million mark. This means something to us, and I assure you it has nothing to do with "monetizing" our site. At no point would that be conceivable, considering our anti-commerce approach to life. 

We prefer mutual aid to money.

I like to check our numbers occasionally to see what is happening with our audience. It is also nice to see that our stats put us in the small to medium size category. Small is beautiful after all.

Still, it is good to have goals, and our next blog goal is to get the next million page views in a year and a half. 

Thank you for visiting, and helping to make the NBA blog a place of learning, support, and refuge for Linda and me (and many others) since 2008. 

Virtual Communities of Mutual Support

Any time a person wishes to stand in opposition to mainstream ideas, it is essential to also have a community for mutual support. So it is with those opting out of mainstream consumerism through voluntary simplicity.

How many North Americans have quit consumerism? It is hard to say, but one study found that only 3% of Americans meet the basic qualifications for living a "healthy lifestyle", and I imagine that living simply and living a healthy lifestyle are somewhat related.

Suffice it to say, the percentage of citizens that consider themselves as engaging in voluntary simplicity is tiny (but growing). That makes mutual support even more important.

Such support takes many forms. Like hugs, for example. But the form I would like to highlight are virtual communities of mutual support (not that there is anything wrong with hugs). 

Blogs are one example, and one that has been very important for me and Linda. In our quest to offer support through the Not Buying Anything blog, we have found support, and we appreciate being able to both give and receive help here.

Another virtual community of mutual support that I have been involved in is Reddit. There are a seemingly infinite number of different kinds of groups to be found there, but my favourite is r/simpleliving.

I participated in this community a few years ago when it was still in its infancy, and I was starting this blog. The two went together well at that moment in my writing, and my practice of simplicity, and I still check in from time to time.

When I initially became involved, the group had 309 subscribers (or members), and the moderator that originally started the group had just quit. I took it over, and helped moderate the small group of consumer resisters that wished to help each other out while celebrating the joys of the simple life. 

After a while, the numbers began to grow.

Since I took over as moderator in 2010, the number of subscribers has grown from 309 to over 126,000 simple souls celebrating their shared passion for authentic living outside mainstream consumerism. What a pleasure it has been to see this group grow over the years.

There is strength in numbers, and in being organized, and in being a strong support for each other. After I stepped aside as moderator after a few years, a group of excellent people took over and continued to improve the community to the point where it is today.

For some good discussion, practical ideas, and a supportive community, I recommend you check it out at: 


https://www.reddit.com/r/simpleliving/


If we are going to get the Simple Living Revolution fully out of the box, we are going to have to stick together and help each other out in any way we can.

Virtual communities of mutual support are one way to make that happen. 

Thank you for your participation in building Not Buying Anything into one such community. We are coming up to 2 million page views! That is a lot of support, and it gives me hope.

Emergency Solidarity

I have been watching footage from hurricane Harvey, starting in real time when the storm made land fall. In spite of the horror of the storm and ensuing fallout for the people of Houston, I saw more good news stories than I have in a long time. Emergency solidarity was everywhere.

I didn't have time to recover from my "bystander PTSD" from Harvey before Irma cranked up to a Category 5 storm. Now we are seeing emergency solidarity arising in Florida, and the Caribbean, and who knows where next. Such beauty in the face of overwhelming struggle and hardship.

Rebecca Solnit calls them "disaster communities" in her book, A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster. They are groups of people that spontaneously come together in mutual aid and support in hard times.

“The map of utopias is cluttered nowadays with experiments by other names, and the very idea is expanding. It needs to open up a little more to contain disaster communities. These remarkable societies suggest that, just as many machines reset themselves to their original settings after a power outage, human beings reset themselves to something altruistic, communitarian, resourceful and imaginative after a disaster, that we revert to something we already know how to do. The possibility of paradise is already within us as a default setting.”  

- Rebecca Solnit

Emergencies wipe away all the artificial ways that we get separated from each other - there is no time for silliness like that. We are forced to face the simple facts of survival, and the outcome is cooperation and solidarity. Our true nature is revealed, and it looks much different than our selfishness-based economic system.

Emergencies blow away all considerations of race, gender, wealth, orientation, class, and religious or political affiliation, and we realize that we are all members of the same community. We are all part of the human community. 

Because we have been trained to think in self-serving, competitive ways in order to fulfill our role as cogs in the consumer machine, we are amazed at the outpouring of help from total strangers. All of a sudden people become much less materialistic. Who cares about stuff when you are thrilled just to be alive and feeling connected to something bigger than yourself?

Profit as a driving concept simply does not exist when we come together in a common cause, like a disaster. Quite the opposite - abundance rules the day. Just look at the tons of donations, the money that is donated, and the volunteerism that follows adversity. I didn't see any rescuers charging people to be rescued. Why not?

It seems that capitalism does have limits, and it dares not enter into disaster communities. If it did, it would seem exactly as it is - crass, self-serving, and opposite to our natural desire to work together with our neighbours for the betterment of our communities. For free.

What if every day life was as altruistic and cooperative as what occurs every time we are met with extraordinary, life-threatening circumstances? What if we were satisfied with the magic of being alive, and saw our stuff for what it really it - piles of distracting crap?

The way we come together in isolated emergencies the world over, is the way humanity needs to come together on a grand scale to ensure our collective survival on this planet. That is the big emergency that should unify us all.

When I see the resilience, love and hard work of helpers after disasters, I feel I am seeing the true nature of humanity. We can do this thing. We can make everything better. Together. It is our default setting.

The Map Of Freedom

I am not sure how free any of us are, but some are more free than others. Those of us who are more free (yellow on the map) are in a position to help those who have more restrictions on their freedom (orange and purple).

One way we can help is through the way we live. We can help by reducing our consumption to a level that reflects our fair share of the planet's resources. When we support deleterious corporations and governments with our dollars we enable them to restrict the freedoms of the people.

We can help make the world more free so everyone may pursue liberation and self-determination. We can do this through a revolution of love and fairness. We can change the look of the map of freedom.

Do With Less - So They'll Have Enough

The state of wealth distribution globally has been worsening in recent decades. Twenty percent of the world's population consumes eighty percent of the resources.

In 1976 in the United States the richest 1% of families owned 20% of the wealth. By 2007 they had increased their already ample portion of the pie to 35%.

That makes the WW II poster above a message for the times. Just replace the image with the slum soldier below who fights a grim battle for survival every day in his Mumbai home.

It is a sad commentary on the state of the world that we can ration in order to enhance our military's effectiveness, but will not live with less in peace time in order to save the lives of our brothers and sisters that lack the necessities of life.

Those of us in the privileged top consuming nations could do with less so the 80% of the population that gets by on only 20% of the resources would have enough. Controlling desires and rationing our consumption of resources will lead us to our fair share.

Then there can be enough for all.