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Welcome to Simple Abundance Online
August, 2008

Prosperity Pioneers

Woman must be the pioneer in this turning
inward for strength. In a sense she has
always been the pioneer.

---Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Dearest Friends,

These are challenging times in which to live. But we are not the only generation of women to have known difficult days. It is reassuring to realize that others before us have persevered and prospered when the world said they couldn’t. During the dark days of the Depression an editorial in a 1932 Ladies Home Journal wrote “When money is plenty this is a man’s world. When money is scarce it is a woman’s world. When all else seems to have failed, the woman’s instinct comes in. She gets the job. That is a reason why, in spite of all that happens, we continue to have a world.”

But the magazine editors stressed that “The return of good times is not wholly a matter of money. There is a prosperity of living which is quite as important as a prosperity of the pocketbook. It is not enough to be willing to make the best of things as they are. Resignation will get us nowhere. We must build what amounts to a new country. We must revive the ideals of the founders. We must learn the new values of money. It is a time for pioneering—to create a new security for the home and the family….Where we were specialists in spending, we are becoming specialists in living.”

I remember the exact moment when I found that quote. I was seated on the floor of an antique shop perusing women’s periodicals from the past for hints on how to live successfully today. I had been on the Simple Abundance for a year and I felt like a pioneer. The book had been turned down by every publisher it was sent to; everyone said it’s was foolish to think you could write a life style book based on Gratitude. But I knew the tremendous, even miraculous changes the saving grace of Gratitude throughout any difficulty could bring to bear on a situation for the better. I was eager to share the good news during a time when all the news seemed to be doom and gloom.

I’ve now been writing about gratitude one way or another for nearly sixteen years, both professionally and publicly (in my books) and privately (in my own Gratitude Journals.) But back in 1991 when I first started experimenting with Gratitude as a spiritual catalyst for changing my life (in case you’re wondering skeptics make the best seekers) I recall being disappointed that there was very little written on the subject. Certainly there was no such thing as my “Gratitude Journal” which I created because gratitude was such a new and wondrous step toward changing how I perceived my life.

And why did my life need to change? Like fifty million other working mothers, my daily round had become a tug-of-war between other people’s demands and expectations and my own genuinely conflicted desires and unrequited needs. I frantically multitasked from one obligation to the next so fast that my spirit felt as if it was constantly sprinting to catch up with me, which it did when I collapsed into bed. Mornings were a major source of dread; my first conscious breath was a sigh; my awakening thought was how to make it through the day. My second thought was money.

When you are worried about your health or the health of a loved one, your concentration focuses like a laser. Suddenly there’s a clarity about all of life because you realize what is truly important. Living is important. Every day is a gift. You ask for another chance to get it right. Most of the time you’re given it, and you’re very grateful.

But worries about money mock you. They steal the joy of living because they follow you around all day like a dark, menacing shadow. At night they hover at the foot of your bed waiting to rob you of sleep. When you’re worried about money you dread the days and you agonize at night. Without thinking, you throw away every precious twenty-four hours that come your way. You cease to live, and merely exist.

Of course, I never complained to anyone else, but I whined to myself and God, until, literally, the sound of my own nagging drove me mad and the weight of my worries drove me to my knees.

One morning I woke up physically exhausted and spiritually bankrupt; money was tight, too. I didn’t know when or where the next check would come from. The free-lance market was shrinking fast because the only story in town was downsizing. I was so sick and tired of concentrating on what was missing in my life, God knows I didn’t want to write about. I felt drained, depleted, discouraged. Worrying about money had squandered my most precious natural resources—time, creative energy and emotion.

So I forced myself to sit down at the kitchen table and start writing an inventory of what was GOOD in my life, right then and there.

Think Pollyana on Prozac. When I stopped some six hours later, to my great astonishment I’d created a master list of my life’s many overlooked blessing. I had over 150 and none of them had anything to do with money! And then, what I call an everyday epiphany occurred: I realized I didn’t need a single thing, except the awareness of how blessed I was. That was the very first time Gratitude beckoned and invited me to use its transformative power, not just to revamp my life, but to rejoice in it.

Today when I type the word “gratitude” on search engines the books, websites, articles, newsletters and research projects the computer wishes to direct me to over 200,000 sources and climbing daily. My favorite is the weighty tome The Psychology of Gratitude (Oxford University Press, 2004) edited by Robert A. Emmons and Michael E. McCullough, which is the first compilation of the empirical, scientific research on gratitude conducted by prominent scientists called Counting Blessings Versus Burdens: An Experimental Investigation of Gratitude and Subjective Well-Being in Daily Life.

Isn’t this amazing? Although scientists are usually latecomers to the party, once with you, they’re true believers. By conducting highly focused, cutting-edge and controlled studies on the nature of Gratitude, its causes and consequences, Eammons and McCullough concluded that people who keep Gratitude Journals, are more optimistic than people who don’t, take better care of themselves, exercise more regularly, report fewer physical ailments, experience more alertness, enthusiasm, determination, and confidence to meet life’s challenges, as well as noticed more moments of contentment than distress.

Everyone on the Simple Abundance path knows that. But are we remembering this? We know that keeping a Gratitude Journal is the soul of the Simple Abundance philosophy. We also know that’s it not an optional insight tool.

It’s occurred to me that when we muse about Gratitude, what we’re really doing is meditating on hope as much as happiness. Who is so wealthy they can’t use more hope or experience one more moment of joy? The restoration of hope, the pursuit of happiness, the awareness of joy through moments of contentment in our daily round is what truly makes a difference in how we feel, day in and day out. But here’s the crux of the matter. When we discover a new bliss trigger we need to write it down. Because Gratitude’s magic and power isn’t just the acknowledgement of what’s working in our lives, it’s the remembering of it. The detailing of what makes us happy and appreciative, basically so that we won’t forget in the next ten minutes. Because we do. And who can blame us when the rest of the world is focused on lack.

At Simple Abundance Online we celebrate the deeply personal pursuit of happiness that home comforts, earthly pleasures, vintage bliss and the everyday grace of belonging to a community of kindred spirits around the world bring women of all ages. We cherish the pioneering spirit of women, past, present and future and encourage it in each other as we learn how become curators of our own contentment. You’ll find here the loving legacy of linen and lace. A celebration of Home Arts. Seasonal pastimes. Ceremonials for common days. New friends and favorite treats. Joyful Simplicities. Everyday epiphanies. Restoring rituals. Cherished Traditions. Inviting and inspiring ways of discovering what you really love about your life. Today, not tomorrow. In other words, a prosperity of living.

There may seem to be many a hill between your dreams and today’s reality. We hope to change all that for you. Our passion is to remind you of all the good in your life. It’s time to put thoughts of lack behind us. It’s time for us to discover the secrets of the stars, to sail to an uncharted land, to open up a new heaven where our spirits can soar and without leaving your own backyard. If you are worried today, take heart. You do have the power to change your lifestyle and move from a feeling of lack and deprivation to a feeling of abundance and fulfillment. Money ebbs and flows in our lives. What should remain a constant is our realization that abundance is our spiritual birthright. This is what I have learned and share with the seeker in you. The simpler we make our lives, the more abundant they become.

There is no scarcity except in our souls.

Westward ho, my Ladies. Westward ho and Welcome Home.

Sending you blessings and a prayer that you may know the Deep Joy of belonging this August and for many months to come.

With love,

Sarah Ban Breathnach