I've reflected on this before, that is the problem of having too much freedom and choice. You may remember reading my other post called - "Freedom in Choice?" Read it again if you forgot about it :)
Recently a friend referred me to a TED talk that was on this same theme, called "The Paradox of Choice." Watch it here. It's really good, I highly recommend it. He of course affirms that some choice is good. Having no freedom or very limited freedom is not good. But he makes the argument, convincingly, that too much choice actually causes us to freeze up in our decision making, and can actually reduce our satisfaction and happiness in life. I think all of us experience this, as he shows with numerous examples, and yet we don't seem to realize it, and don't change our life practices in order to have more satisfaction.
For some of us, this might be a hard concept to understand. Living in another country for a while without a lot of the conveniences you are used to is one way to help you to understand having more satisfaction and more "freedom" of a sort, even when having less, or having less choices. It would probably also work to purposely limit yourself to less choices, and less things.
This is something that I learned while we lived in Uganda, and perhaps one of the reasons I miss living there so much. If you asked me if I wanted to have intermittent power, I'd say no. If you asked me if I wanted to have a library with only a few books, I'd probably say no. If you asked me if I wanted to be limited to only watching the movies that I own, I'd probably say no. If you asked me if I wanted to be limited to the food I could purchase at a Ugandan market, and go without my favorite cereals and chips, I'd probably say no. And I could add many similar questions to this. But when you add all of these things together, it's make for a simpler life, a life less confusing and complicated, a life with less time spent on making choices, and a more exciting satisfying life. It also makes for a life, I would argue, in which you appreciate the things you do have much more. It made the movies and books I owned much more special and treasured and I got more use out of them.
It made it much more exciting to find a favorite food at the supermarket. I just about guarantee you that I had more fun coming back from a shopping trip in Uganda after finding a bag of Doritos, than you usually do going to the grocery store buying whatever you want every time. You came home with exactly what food you wanted (or thought you wanted after looking at 100 choices), but I came home feeling excited and grateful for that bag of chips, and you might have felt nothing especially positive. Makes you wonder, doesn't it? Is our plethora of choices at the supermarket really making us better off?
I'm not trying to judge all of you. I am just like you. It is very hard to have this satisfaction and simple life in the United States. Even after being in Uganda, I fell back into the same life patterns while living here. It makes me wonder if we have to stop worshiping the idol of freedom and choice, and purposely give ourselves some more limits, less choices, and more self-control. I wonder if it is sinful for us to agonize over life choices (especially simple choices like what bag of chips to buy), when our concerns should be on more important things. Further, I think it is very hard to cultivate the biblical virtue of gratitude when you always have so much choice. With simplicity and less choice, it is easy to be grateful for what you have, and occasionally really grateful for unexpected circumstances like a week with no power outages. But if you always have everything you want, and there is no special occasion for gratitude, there might tend to be only occasions for complaint when we don't get what we want.
This is a really interesting topic to me as I've pondered ways to limit myself in order to live for God more, make my life less complicated, and enjoy life more. If you have any thoughts on this, or have some contrary points that I should keep in mind, please comment below. I like a healthy debate :)
I think you are right that a simplified life is much superior to having a life crowded with too much stuff and too many choices. That's what so many monks believed too and they often lived in an extremely limited life in the monastery. A simple life gives more time for God and more opportunity to think because there are fewer distractions.
ReplyDeleteBut God warns us that anything can become and idol, and the simple life can become one too when we honor the simple life too highly and place it at the center of our life instead of God. So, we have to be careful. We have to have balance. We have to constantly seek God's will and His path for us sometimes takes us where we aren't expecting to go or where we find life more complex than we'd like.
But in general, simple is better. I agree.
-- Bill Durkin
Thanks Bill for the comment. You are exactly right. Even the quest for simplicity, (or for our own happiness in simplicity) can become an idol too.
ReplyDeleteI agree entirely. As Americians we can demand exactly what we want wherever we may be, and if the service isn't apologetic that they don't have it then we feel offended!
ReplyDeleteSome of my family members have a hard time making choices, just their personality type, and it amazes me how long it can take them to make what should be an inconsequential decision. I'm sure you've been in a carload of people trying to decide where to stop and eat lunch...
Thank you for a very thoughtful blog.