Here is a story that has captivated hundreds of thousands of Americans: Not long ago, there was a successful businesswoman. She and her husband had " bought into the Bigger is Better and More is Better Yet philosophies of the 1980s." People wanted her all the time. Her appointment book was "the size of Nebraska." Life was hectic.
One day, she decided to clear a weekend and go to a nice country inn. There, she rethought everything. She concluded that her life was too complicated. She wanted back her freedom. Accordingly, she returned home and quit her job.
In doing so, she opted for less money -- though, thanks to those years of greed, not no money -- and more time. She and her husband disposed of many belongings, moved to a smaller house in Santa Barbara, and dedicated themselves to doing only what they wanted to do.
Our heroine is Elaine St. James, who recounts her story in the introduction to Simplify Your Life (Hyperion, 242 pages, $ 6.95). The book is bound in simple, tasteful beige with simple, austere lettering in a square, precious size. Its back cover tells shoppers that St. James and her husband "live a simple, peaceful life in California." It has sold so well that its publisher has also brought out an equally simple sequel: Inner Simplicity (Hyperion, 238 pages, $ 7.95), bound in an understated forest green. Yet a third volume, Living the Simple Life, is scheduled for release this spring.
The body of each of the first two books consists of 100 short tips on how to do what St. James did. Some of her tips are practical time-savers ("Cut your laundering chore in half"). Some are money-savers ("Reduce your go-go entertainment") -- important because, in pursuit of their freedom, her readers have quit their day jobs. The rest of her advice concerns new ways readers can spend their now-abundanttime.
Her tale of liberation, with the 200 tips, has made St. James one of the leading figures in a nascent movement that calls itself "voluntary simplicity. " "Simplifiers" -- Who also sometimes call themselves "downshifters" -- are a heterogeneous group of uncertain size whose members have traded money for time. They work less than they could, earn less, and live on less -- more fulfillingly, they say.
Some, like St. James, reject work because they associate it with the eighties and that decade's alleged celebration of money. Others reject work because they connect it to exploitation of the environment -- we work because our consumer culture compels us to buy things; the making of those things rapes the earth. Still other simplifiers say frankly that they just don't like working. They find it stressful. They would rather be free.
The movement has lately received impressive media attention, running the gamut from Oprah to the Wall Street Journal. Much of that coverage has focused on the St. James story. The New York Times even ran a couple of photos of St. James: one of her solemnly displaying the new, simpler contents of her closet, and another of her seated on a rock, gazing out to sea.
At first blush, there is something to respect in St. James's story, as there is in the movement. She asks for nothing from anyone else. She lives on what she has, insisting only on the freedom to make her own choices. And even if one doesn't share her view of the decade that enabled her to prepare financially for her current freedom, one can understand her desire for what money can't buy.
But St. James and her movement also suffer from some seriously misguided ideas. One is that people want money only for foolish or vicious reasons. Another is that free time is necessarily a good thing. Reading her will convince anyone who didn't already know so that, much as we may love our leisure, work benefits us in far more than material ways. In fact, an afternoon spent with St. James's books is enough to make the rabid pursuit of filthy lucre seem like a morally healthy way of life.
For St. James, it's probably also a way of life to which she is better suited, if her advice on housekeeping is any indication. She is proud of having abandoned her income, "fired the maid," and joined the no-nonsense, frugal folks who clean their own homes. Unfortunately, her tips on housework are often either commonplace or poor. For instance, St. James's fundamental economy and life-changing discovery is a "program" that she calls " uncluttering." Go through every closet, every drawer, in every room, and get rid of what you don't need. Non-downshifters know this as "cleaning up." She also states that she cut her meal-preparation time in half by "simplifying" her diet -- eating no processed food, less meat, and lots of "fresh fruits, vegetables and grains." Good nutrition, probably; fashionable, certainly. But faster than a steak and potato? She further recommends that you "simplify" your grocery shopping by planting a garden -- something like simplifying your travel planning by building a plane.
Her only household advice that would actually save time amounts to: Be dirtier. Wash one load of laundry every two weeks. Choose busy, patterned carpets. Don't "dress for success" but for "comfort and convenience" (which is not, as you might imagine, washable, wrinkle-free polyester but "natural fabrics"). Also, adopt a sort of uniform. Select a couple of simple garments and buy a bunch of them, all in "muted" shades so that everything thing will go with everything else. No jewelry. And "have you ever seen a face that was improved by makeup?"
St. James claims to save time with these homely measures. But she saves even more time by following ing one simple rule: Abandon everything and everybody you don't feel like dealing with. Here, the tips come thick and fast. "Few things complicate your life more than spending eight to ten hours a day, five to six days a week at a job you don't like," she intelligently observes. So quit. And stop reading the newspaper, with its bad news. "Until we're tuned in to our inner selves, we're often not even aware of the adverse impact tuning in to the apparent problems of the world can have on us."
Next, don't be afraid to spill human blood. "Clean up your relationships," she advises, applying one of her favorite metaphors to a step that might more accurately be described as, "Jetrison the needy." "Perhaps it's time to think about moving on from a friendship that no longer works for you." In carrying out these measures, remember that "regaining touch with the art of communication" means that you should not try to soften the impact of your new policies. Courteous evasions are a weakness. Learn, like St. James, to say, " 'Sorry, but there is someone else I'd rather be talking to.'" Don't answer the phone; don't go to the door. Fumes the author, "We've all been trained to be polite to guests."
If this brutal candor is too hard for you -- if you are "a pushover" -- St. James recommends that you lie. Draw up a list of all-purpose excuses and paste it by your phone.
When someone calls, you'll be all ready with your fib.
If you do decide to keep a few people in your life, don't do anything for them. This means no entertaining. She and her husband have found that it is a lot trouble. Their solution? They meet their (remaining) friends in restaurants, "dutch treat." St. James does admit that there's one problem with this plan. Secondhand smoke. It has driven so many people out of restaurants! If your friends hate second-hand smoke as much as hers do, she recommends that you try pot luck.
Avoid not just doing for others, but giving to them as well. If you absolutely can't help yourself, give them some object you already own and don't want. St. James designated a section in her linen closet for collecting and storing such items. She then announced to her family and friends that, henceforth, that is all they would be receiving from her. Of course, they should feel free "to pass on . . . these "treasures" to someone else."
For what purpose has St. James abandoned the human race? Here it gets sadly predictable: weird therapies, fruit-juice diets, ersatz religions -- the whole New Age ball of wax.
St. James desires to connect to "a power that is larger than ourselves, whether we think of it as God, a supreme being, or simply the energy of the universe." Or maybe Elaine St. James. Curiously, in nearly every sentence in which the reader might anticipate the word "God" -- or "supreme being" or " energy of the universe" -- he finds instead a reference to the subject's own " intuition," "heart," or, simply, "self." When the text seems to prepare the reader to expect something about getting to know God's will, there is instead something about getting to know "what's really important" to the seeker.
To learn God's will was . . . well, simpler. To learn one's own, here's what St. James recommends: Set aside time to laugh, first thing every morning. This will be hard as "we are not encouraged to laugh a lot in this culture." Arrange to cry every day. This too will be hard, as "crying is discouraged in our culture." Practice dying -- literally, lie down and practice. Alsopresumably not when dead -- "Make a point of connecting with your breath." Invent a dance: "whirl and twirl or stomp and rock." And, in the midst of all this, follow Tip No. 81: "Do less." Even Tip No. 82: "Do nothing."
Where did St. James go wrong, from that weekend in the country when she so reasonably decided she wanted her freedom? Her first mistake-and one of the central errors of the movement -- was to harbor too low an opinion of why most Americans labor for their money. (Some simplifiers even disparage work as "selling yourself for money,") St. James assumes that the only reason people work hard is to consume conspicuously -- competing with friends and neighbors in a shallow war of appearances -- or to "buy happiness" through fancy toys and entertainments. Yet most who labor seek not an appearance but security. This is not an easy goal to accomplish, and attaining it is a genuine achievement. (On some level, St. James must know this, which is why she tends to brag about her past success.) More fortunate laborers seek not only security but comfort and pleasure -- which are not dirty words to those who lack them. Only after amassing a pile to "unclutter" did St. James find it possible to adopt a superior tone toward those who strive to improve their lives with things.
To be fair, not all simplifiers are like St. James. When she quit her job, she had a nest egg that made relative idleness an option. Others in the movement downshift to live on next to nothing. For them, unemployment or reduced employment doesn't mean free time to practice dying so much as it does time-consuming economies like canning, repairing their own cars, and sewing their own clothes. These downshifters have altered their lives, not to stop working, but to do for themselves and their families what they'd otherwise have to earn money to pay for.
However reasonable downshifting may be for some, in St. James's case -- and, one fears, in the cases of those under her influence -- it seems to amount to little more than navel-gazing. In her second simplicity bible, S. James describes an experience she had while washing grapes. She paused to admire them -- their color and so forth. "In those few moments I sensed my whole awareness expanding. I felt full to the brim, and I hadn't even eaten the grapes yet!"
Get that woman a job.
Rachel Flick Wildavsky is a senior staff editor in the Washington bureau of The Reader's Digest.