Building a Sustainable Future with Duane Elgin
Author of Voluntary Simplicity Promotes Green Lifestyle
Jul 20, 2009
This is the question Duane Elgin posed at the recent Science Wisdom and the Future Conference in San Luis Obispo, California. Author of Voluntary Simplicity and The Living Universe, Elgin is a leading writer and speaker on the importance of simplicity, sustainability, and community for building a green future. This question reaches deep into humanity’s soul, Elgin asserted, as he urged the audience to rethink how we create our sense of identity and seek happiness.
Going Green - More than Solar Panels and Recycling
Indeed for Elgin, what is taking place in the United States now is nothing short of a leaderless revolution. It’s not a simplicity movement he insists; it is a sanity movement. For Elgin, the superficial simplicity embraced by well-meaning but essentially spoiled consumers is not enough; solar panels on the roof, fuel efficient cars, and recycling may ease the conscience, but they are far from the more radical, sophisticated simplicity Elgin calls for.
In a new edition (winter 2010) of Voluntary Simplicity: Toward a Way of Life that is Outwardly Simple, Inwardly Rich (1993, 1981), Elgin clarifies what living simply means by breaking the concept down into eight categories. This helps consumers understand not only their motives but the myriad ways lifestyles need to change. Elgin’s list will resonate with those who feel buried under a pile of stuff and also worry about the implications of their habits.
The Eight Elements of Simple Living
- Unclutter simplicity: Eliminating the excess stuff in our homes and freeing up our space.
- Ecological simplicity: The need to simplify our food production for sustainability.
- Family simplicity: Instilling better consumption habits in the family by limiting exposure to advertising which targets children with the aim of creating new consumers.
- Compassionate simplicity: The desire to reduce consumption and to live more simply so that others may enjoy a higher quality of life.
- Soulful simplicity: Getting back to the essentials for a deeper appreciation of what we have.
- Business simplicity: Green efforts on the part of business; making the way business is done more sustainable.
- Civic simplicity: Calling for a new kind of ethics to support the reconfiguring of our lives.
- Frugal simplicity: Bringing freedom back to our lives by cutting back on buying.
Being Mindful of Our Consumption Habits
The beauty of Elgin’s message is that the steps he outlines are feasible. There is no expensive contraption to buy, no extreme change in diet or quality of living. It is a matter of being mindful of the forces which compel us to consume more than we need and to consider the implications of our way of life not only on the unknown mass of the world’s population, but on ourselves and our children.
With unprecedented population growth and destruction of the environment on a large scale, Elgin's message should resound louder now than when Voluntary Simplicity first came out in 1981. It is to be hoped that more people are ready to heed his warning twenty five years later.
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