Simple Life: On Social Media

Screencap from my tumblr page

Like most people today, I use a lot of social media sites. These can take up a lot of time with constant checking on the phone, instead of enjoying the moment. I have pared down with simple tricks: turn off push notifications, put the phone away when I'm with people etc., but also by selecting which ones really add value to my life. Here is my simple approach to social media, if it can help.

Seasonal Appreciation

Jasmine & Olive Candle // Personal Picture

As the sun shines over Paris and temperatures rise to leather jackets & café en terrasse level, I thought about the pleasure of changing seasons and how to appreciate and contemplate the unique rituals of each moment of the year. (Not that we had a proper winter here this year. So jealous of Canadian pictures of snow.)

28 Bits of Gratitude

Snapshot on the fly from the Pont de l'Alma, which I cross every week on board game night

Today, I'm turning 28. Even though I'm technically only one day older than yesterday, birthdays are always quite reflective moments. After seeing this TED talk on the defining decade, plus celebrating friends' 30th birthday or wedding or first child, I'm feeling at quite a turn of my life. This turn when you shed the last skin of "youth" and march head on into adulthood, as real as it can get. To celebrate this new milestone, I have selected 28 bits of my life, big and small, I am grateful for.

Reclaiming Time

Personal photo - Lac Chambon, Auvergne

Simplification is mostly associated with objects: decluttering closets, cleaning spaces, editing wardrobes and other collections of items. Three years into my own simplification process, I have come to believe that the real issue isn't the physical clutter, but the mental one: the time we spend thinking about, and caring for our material collections. What if the main benefit of simplifying our lives was to reclaim our time and energy?

Picking Walnuts

Personal picture // Freshly hand picked walnuts

Last week-end, I visited my family in my home region and enjoyed simple Autumn pleasures - a walk around a crater lake, views of forests slowly turning orange, family gatherings around the dining table, featuring garden vegetables and games. And picking walnuts down the road.

Les Arts de la Table

Personal Picture - Home made Pumpkin & Chestnut spice cake

After reading Dominique Loreau's l'Art de la Simplicité again this summer, I have decided to write small "simplicity chapters" summarizing my own views on various elements of life. As a follow up to my first post on Quality, here is the second Simplicity mini-chapter, exploring the subject of food and all there is around it.

Mindfulness & Habits

Hand made red teacup and Muji candle - personal photo

As I often do at the end of August, I am currently in the middle of a life assessment - thinking about my goals and achievements, my level of happiness, wishes, mistakes... And I noticed one simple element, a recipe that helped me introduce simple changes these past two years, but made a big difference now that I look back: mindfulness and habits. Let me explain.

Already Longing

Sources: tumblr, Shopbop, Minelli

I am one of these weirdos who dislikes Summer and has elected Autumn as a favourite season instead. Entering the second week of August, this is about the time I am starting to long for cinnamon hot chocolates, walks in golden forests, clove cakes, fresh mushrooms and nuts at the market, pumpkin soups and cakes, ankle boots, scarves, tights, jackets, and long chilly nights with candlelight.

Quiet Time

Personal photo

The first time I really started to think about myself and whether I was happy with my own life, I was on a two-week vacation at my family's home to take the driver's licence exam. My mother and sister were working, and most of the time, I just had nothing to do, except for my 8AM driving lessons. At first, I was bored. But after a week, I had started a life changing questioning path, and when I came home after two weeks, I was more rested than I had been in years.

Suddenly, A Museum

At Charles de Gaulle Airport // My picture.

Airports are temples of consumption. Between vast duty free shops that sell fine whisky by the liter, cigarettes by the 200 and beauty products by the "airport exclusives", it feels like they are trying very hard to make you spend your waiting time buying stuff. And the little minimalist in me, tired of consumerism, started being fed up with this atmosphere after the fourth airport in a month.

Moments of Happiness

Espresso and good book // my picture

While I am traveling around the world, here is a little photo collection of moments of happiness I have been lucky to experience in June 2013.  Just a graphic way to express gratitude, and enjoy the little moments of joy in life. Above: enjoying a real, strong, black espresso after one week of American coffee (no offense) while reading a great book.

On Meditation

When I started reading about self development, no matter the source - minimalist books and blogs, psychology papers, self help books, spiritual reads, japanese culture and history - the idea of meditation came up in a way or another. Meditation as a way to be more mindful, be in the present moment, know yourself better, reconnect to your body. However, I've always had this idea that meditation meant stop thinking, and I never could do that. Until I saw this TED talk.

Start Living it Now

Source: After the Cups

Have you ever felt like you are currently in a transitional phase, and that everything in your life will be much better once you have completed this tiny little thing that's bugging you? I have. And I would imagine my new life with a lot of new habits and great happy moments ahead, but that I can enjoy only if I'm done with this little thing. Well, I have decided to change that mindset.

Here and Now

Source: We heart it

One of the central themes of simplicity and minimalism is the present moment, the here and now. We can't win against the past or the future because we aren't there anymore/yet, and the only moment we have control over is here and now. Let me explain a bit how understanding this changed my life.

Little Sunday Joy

My pictures - le marché de Buzenval (Paris, 20th district)

Sunday is the market. Black coffee, news, the first clothes available in the closet and off the Buzenval market, in le 20ème arrondissement. No watch, no phone, just a tote bag, some cash and home keys. Fifteen minutes walk, raining or sunny, hot or cold, my little Sunday pleasure.

Autumn Tidbits

Totoro decoration from Japan // Home made brownie with freshly picked walnuts // Hot chocolate & cinnamon

As we enter deep into November, the second, harder part of Autumn starts here in France. Marked by the daylight savings week-end, this is the beginning of a period of cold weather, dark evenings and naked trees.

Ordinary is Extra

Sunset over the parisian (ordinary) suburb Montreuil

You probably have heard about this polemic about series, movies or commercials selling fantasies of perfect lives and making people unsatisfied with their own ordinary life. I thought about this lately because Maja mentioned a similar polemic around blogs in Norway. Basically, advertisements, works of fiction, media, or blogs, would be selling a fantasy life made of extraordinary moments while our lives are so ordinary in comparison.

Donning the Autumnal Dress

Mont St-Odile, Alsace

Autumn is like a second spring, when every leaf is a flower.

-- Albert Camus

Although the temperature dropped to snowy this week-end here in France, I am not quite done singing praise to Autumn yet. Every year, I am equally amazed at the beautiful dress Nature dons when the Autumn days arrive. Rich and bright yellows, oranges, reds and browns vibrate in the changing landscape, and the low, quiet sun of Autumn brings their colours to the fullest.

In a Live Museum

Invalides, Nation (x2), Opéra (my photos)

Having moved to Paris merely three months ago, I am in that blissed period of being both a local living and working here everyday, and an ever amazed tourist. See, when you live somewhere, no matter how stunning the place, habits creep in and you tend to get used to it, blind to the beauties of your surroundings.

Slow

my photo - magazine: Ravages, 7th issue (winter 2011)

I've got nothing but time, so the future is mine.

- Metric (Nothing But Time, in Synthetica)

We are in a world where fast is good. Productivity is about completing a task as quickly as possible, and we seem to be always rushing through our days to meet deadlines, appointments, catch trains and flights... And down time is viewed as wasted time. "Time is money", as goes the saying. And we often feel that we don't have time for anything.