So to kick things off my wife and I have decided to share our new plan with our friends and family using the blog method. It's highly sophisticated and requires highly educated and qualified individuals to accomplish this task. Ok obviously not, but we did think it would be a good way to share our story. Now the first point I would like to make is I don't claim to be and never will claim to be an English Major or writing expert. I can however communicate my thoughts somewhat clearly and intelligently for a guy with a GED so bare with me as I attempt to share them with you.
Simply free to just be has been something I have been telling my wife for years. It is my hope and prayer for her that she can fight through all she has been dealing with and find herself in a place where the expression makes sense. All of you know her story and what she's been through over the last several years so I don't plan on reliving it here. If she chooses to share more of her thoughts in her own words then I'll leave that up to her. Whatever she chooses to say will surely be a blessing to your ears because she is nothing short of amazing in her storytelling. The woman has a gift. What I will tell you is had it not been for what the two of us have been through we could have never come to a place where any of this makes sense. You see without challenge in life there is no growth, a life without adversity creates bland and grey meandering through life with a wondering of what to do next to fill the void. Adversity and friction sharpens the edges, refines the steel and makes it ready for something new. You need to be thrown into the fire occasionally to remind you of what's burning somewhere inside of you. For Amber and I it has taken us on a serious path of self-evaluation and rediscovery. Whats important, how do we see our future for us and our children, how to use our time and what to spend our money on. It's motivated us to really look into and reassess the so called American dream.
The "American Dream" they say...freedom, a house, a good career, kids, etc. Now what that equates to for most Americans is debt, debt, and more debt and working non-stop to pay bills and accumulate stuff. Does anyone else think this sounds like freedom? Most people are working to pay for things they don't really want or need and working to provide "the man" somewhere else his ability to truly live free on your blood sweat and tears. So how does one combat this ideology? We make hard choices to go against the norm and place our value in other things. We put value in experience over objects, time with people we care about and not time in virtual worlds of no depth, we put effort in going back to our roots and living within our means and enjoying the little things.
Where to start is definitely not simple. It requires hard choices. Ours came from the struggle with health and what was needed for my wife. It shaped my point of view and brought me a new understanding. Without that real struggle in my life I would have probably never gotten to a place to even challenge myself in this capacity. The road to discovery is littered with potholes, speed bumps and occasional land mines. Some meant to sabotage you and others to knock you back on course.
So we sold our dream home. The home I always wanted in the small town I dreamed of raising our kids. It was also going to be thirty more years of servitude and debt, I would have been 66 when the house was paid off. We now live, temporarily, in our good friends basement. Give me some video games and a bag of Cheetos and I'm right inline with all the stigmas. (Insert cheap shot at my pride.) We live here with the first and ultimate goal of getting Amber healthy, whatever it takes, however long it takes and whatever the cost. I refuse to give up. This will always be my first and highest objective. In the process we have either sold or given away most of our "stuff" furniture, clothes, whatever... We are currently working through elimination and shifting gears. Second, we have purchased a motorhome. More to come on this in the next post but the short story is it is allowing us the freedom to travel. The ability to gain experiences with our family. Memories to last a lifetime. The opportunity for Amber to go with us, even on the bad days. The other option it provides is longer term living given the purchase of a piece of property or what have you when we get to our longer term living plans. The long term living plans you ask? Well right now it is looking like a small piece of property and a small (possibly tiny) house. We buy the property out right and have a small loan for the house to be rapidly paid off and free of debt. Financially free, material free, unplugged kind of free, truly free to focus on real life.
I've become more and more convinced the "American Dream" of more, more, more is a marketing sham that is robbing all of us of something greater. So as Sean Rowe puts it, "if you want me to go through a wall then show me a door" this is my goal as I try to leave something behind.
Where does God fit in? Everywhere. Our guiding light and hope that all of this is for the right reasons and not a colossal mistake. That includes her illness, selling the house, homeschooling the kids, all of it. Without God in our life and a hope that all of this happens for a reason I would be totally lost. The mentality that we all have a cross to bear, the teachings of the Orthodox Church and what struggle really means in our Christian walk has been the only thing keeping me and my lovely wife afloat. Now I don't always listen, carry myself Christian like or make wise choices I'll be the first to admit but I always find myself coming home. Home to my Savior to show me the way, the reason I'm alive, and the hope I have for a future.
So without sounding too cliche, I hope you follow along and enjoy the next year or so of this journey with us. Only time will tell if the not so simple choice of living simply will provide the ability to just be. Not just be boring, not just be checked out, not just be lackluster and non-impacting but the complete opposite. For every action there is a reaction, thanks Newton, so maybe this action will be the small ripple that starts in the middle of the ocean and becomes the crashing waves on the shore.
