Cultivating a less materialistic lifestyle.

I’ve spent a lot of time over the last six years re-thinking what’s really important to me and the life I share with Yim.

If there was one thing a diagnosis of cancer provided me with, it was the ability to focus on what is important and while I spent the first four or five years after the diagnosis largely focused on our nutrition and exercise, I also spent a lot of time making sure that I paid attention to our relationship. Although it’s not easy to see while you are in it, no one lives through a serious health scare alone and Yim was there with me during the surgery, radiation treatments, three years of hormone replacement therapy and all the emotion that each follow up quarterly post-bloodwork phone call brought into our lives.

During that time, I changed more than I ever thought I would and here are some of the things I learned along the way…

Shift your focus from Possessions to Experiences

     • Prioritize relationships and social connections:  Spending quality time with Yim, our family and our friends continues to be a source of joy in my life. Cody and Nat got married. And I have nieces and nephews now that I have watched grow up, go off to college and become professionals in careers which didn’t exist when they were born. One of those nieces recently had a baby boy so I am privileged to be a part of another generation of our family. Our friendships are strong and interesting and each one of them is unique. Yet no relationship is more important than my relationship with Yim.

The Vietnamese word for wife is Nhà em, meaning Home and Yim is my home. Over the years, I have learned that if we have a disagreement, I take the time to reflect on it and write it down and consider it from both of our perspectives now. I’ve learned that no matter how long you live with someone, men and women think differently and sometimes that takes me a little bit of processing time. In short, I work on our relationship every day because there is no one else in my life as important to me than Yim. And by doing that, I have faith that we will live a long and happy life together, continuing to see different things through each others eyes with respect and kindness.

     • Engage in activities that bring joy and meaning:  Yim and I spend a considerable amount of time every year hiking and enjoying time in nature. We also both have very active fitness schedules but for me, the best thing I’ve learned over the past six years was achieved by educating myself on how to eat a whole food plant based diet, and then how to shop and prepare meals for Yim and I that are nutritious and provide us with the balance of protein, fibre and nutrition we require for the fitness oriented lifestyle we both lead. While the initial impetus for this was largely self preservation, after reading many books on the subject of plant based nutrition, I cannot imagine not eating a mostly plant based diet ever again. Today, the simple joy of being able to shop for and prepare healthy delicious meals which provide Yim and I all the nutrition we need also brings meaning to my life, knowing I am feeding someone I love the best possible food we can eat.

     • Focus on personal growth and development:  Invest in activities that help you learn, grow, and become a better version of yourself. In my case, one goal I set for myself many, many years ago, was that I wanted to be able to support Yim and I in retirement through my abilities to invest and manage our finances and it’s something I enjoy and am good at after a lifetime of focus. This skill allows me to feel a sense of self sustainability, security and faith in what our lives together could be like for the years ahead of us. It allows me to have the confidence that Yim and I can plan significant travel in our lives and experience those travels – and it is a skill I enjoy. It provides me faith.

Our porcelain Buddha.

Reduce Consumption and Declutter

     • Be mindful of your purchases. Ask yourself if you truly need something before buying it. Yim and I now have a One Thing In – One Thing Out policy and that has helped us a great deal. For example, I want to keep my entire wardrobe to less than 100 pieces, in total, including dress clothes, casual clothes, fitness gear, jackets, coats and shoes and I’m successful at managing that but it took a few years to really find what I can wear consistently and feel good in. Plus , because of my fitness regime, I lost 65 pounds so most of my wardrobe had to be replaced in any event.

     • Declutter your living space. For five years now, I have recycled, donated or discarded 1 thing a day and may be able to continue for the balance of year six before I start simply maintaining or slightly reducing. This has freed up a significant amount of space in our lives and had the added benefit of allowing me to appreciate what we do own more.

At this point in my life, I believe that we require less than we have and I intend to be careful with that for the rest of my life. During that process, I’ve learned that I appreciate knowing where everything we own is and I don’t want to store things we don’t use – I would rather donate them. I also believe that stuff from years ago no longer has a place in my life. For me to grow, the past needs to stay in the past and I need to live in the present.

     • Reduce exposure to advertising and media, especially social media, that encourages hatred and excessive consumption. Three years ago, I started unsubscribing to online newspapers, then I started to stop watching the news on television. After that, I removed Facebook from my phone so I no longer get notifications and I began deleting the memories, so Meta doesn’t have my photos in their databases. I also made a conscious decision to never get into a disagreement with someone on Facebook again, so avoiding it removed both temptation and something that added very little value to my life. I still have a Facebook and Instagram Account, I just manage them very tightly now and I refuse to post anything negative – there are too many beautiful things in my life to dwell on the bad. I know it’s there but I do not have to add to the negative noise.

Cultivate Gratitude and Generosity

     • Practice gratitude for what you have.  I have reached the point where I am incredibly grateful for our lives. We have everything that we could possibly want and have the ability to do pretty much anything that we want to do – not everything we want to do but certainly any one thing (being subjective of course) that we really want to do. We have a comfortable home we both enjoy, financial stability, our health, hobbies and fitness routines we enjoy and an extended family and friends who we see often during the year. That’s enough reason for me to be grateful.

     • Generosity (Dāna). Giving away what you don’t need—or even what you value—builds non-attachment. Even small acts of generosity can shift your relationship to material things. Over those five years of de-cluttering our household, probably 30% of everything we rid ourselves of was donated and that’s a good feeling.

My quiet home office – featuring a Sue Tupy and an Antoine Chapon from the French West Indies.

Embrace Minimalism

     • Simplify your life. Minimalism is about intentionally living with only what you need and value. As mentioned above, we have been simplifying our lives for several years and another way I’ve added to that is by doing all of our groceries on my bike while we are home in Collingwood, and I’ve managed to do that right through from mid-April and into November. It’s become an important part of my day both physically and spiritually, as it provides me 90 minutes of peace along well maintained, green canopied bike trails and not being trapped inside a car. This also gives me a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction by decreasing my dependency on a car.

     • Find joy in simplicity. Years ago, I opened a Fortune Cookie which said, “You find beauty in ordinary things. Do not lose this ability”, and I taped it to my computer and try and live that way every day, whether that is being surprised at discovering what distinguishes Queen’s Annes Lace along my daily bike rides or watching a bumblebee gorge himself on our huge Allium’s in the spring, seeing life close up provide me some of my simplest pleasures. Anyone who visits my website will see that reflected in my photographs.

Queen Anne’s Lace – distinguished by the purple flower in the center.

Redefine Success and Happiness

     • Recognize that happiness is not tied to possessions: True happiness comes from within and from meaningful connections and experiences. When I think of our lives together, my mind is filled with the stories we’ve shared and built along the way on our life journey – not the stuff we own.

     • Find meaning and purpose in life beyond material wealth: Set goals that are aligned with your values and passions.  Yim and I consider health and fitness to not only be one of our core values, but also one of our passions. Over the past five years, I have fine tuned my fitness routines, which now include running six days a week and I really enjoy that daily quiet time. Further, I have also committed to five days of strength training weekly because being physically strong as we age is important to both of us. Yim takes several fitness and strength training classes weekly, as well as Ballet, Zumba, Burlesque and occasionally Line Dancing classes. We both believe that being fit is what will allow us to enjoy life as we age.

By consciously choosing to prioritize relationships, experiences and personal growth over material possessions, I’ve learned to cultivate a more meaningful, fulfilling life.