Change and Living with Simplicity

To live simply.  To declutter our lives.  To be mindful.  These life goals require us to change.  Perhaps we can gain insight into the role of change in living a focused life from a unique spiritual tradition: the Shakers. 

The following is a print version of this blog.

If you watched the popular TV series, The Big Bang Theory, you probably heard the lead character Sheldon Cooper confess:  Change is hard for me!  The truth is that change is hard for almost everyone.  We like things the way we like them.  We also generally like ourselves the way we are.  Change, even for our own good, for our own growth, is hard for us.  Yet, change is part of life and is critical for our growth.  When we stay the same, when we don’t grow, when we refuse to change, we begin to take steps toward our own isolated demise.  The world just passes us by.

In the 1800s in the United States, there were different groups, and communities, that sprang up in rural areas where people gathered to live what they thought were utopian lifestyles.  Some were based on communal ideals and economic living, like the Harmonists.  Some drew on transcendentalism and lived close to the land by farming, like the communities at Fruitlands and Brook Farm.  But one, whose ideas flourished over nearly two centuries, formed communes in several locations based on the ideal of simplicity and austere living.  They were the Shakers.

Some years ago, I studied the writings of the Shakers and was struck by their unique and practical insights.  Their beliefs and perspectives drew on Christianity but were rooted in living close to the natural cycles of life as farmers and crafters.  Unlike traditional Christians, Shakers don’t believe in God as a trinity but believe in a Mother and Father God. Based on their experience, there needed to be both feminine and masculine energy in life. If there is Jesus, the son, there must be a Mother and Father.  But that’s not what struck me most about the Shakers.  Instead, it was their essential belief the living with simplicity required the ability to embrace cycles of change.

The Shakers were agrarian people.  They understood the natural cycles of the seasons for farming, for raising animals, and for everything that is alive.  They understood that it was the design of how life occurs.  To live with simplicity means to live in this cycle of change and embrace it.

Their famous song, Simple Gifts, captures this life perspective very clearly:

‘Tis the gift to be simple, ’tis the gift to be free

‘Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be,

And when we find ourselves in the place just right,

‘Twill be in the valley of love and delight.

When true simplicity is gained,

To bow and to bend we shan’t be ashamed,

To turn, turn will be our delight,

Till by turning, turning we come ’round right.

(Joseph Brackett – Public Domain)

The gift of simplicity, of finding ourselves in the place that is just right for our lives, depends on our ability to bow, to bend, to turn, and turn round right.  It’s all about accepting the cycles of change. 

Perhaps many of us have difficulty with change because we live in ways that don’t keep us connected to the natural cycles of life.  We’re insulated from natural change by many of our modern conveniences.  Perhaps by paying closer attention to the natural cycles of life we’d have better insight into the rhythms of change around us and understand that nothing stays the same, and that change is the only constant.  When we learn to bow, to bend, to turn, and to turn again, when we embrace change as it comes into our lives, I suspect we’ll find that our lives will come ‘round right as we live with simplicity and with focus.