Last week I moved apartments.
I’m sure that reminiscing back to your own experiences moving homes makes you wince a bit, as moving is such a dreadful experience, at least for most of the people I know. While moving into a new home may bring excitement for new beginnings, the physical act of moving one’s possessions from one location to another is a different story.
Even with hired help, one still must sift through all of their belongings, dismantle furniture, box things up, protect the fragile items, so on and so forth.
But does it really need to be as stressful of an experience as it is we make it?
You see, I created Unleashing Savage because I believe there is a goldmine of knowledge to be gained by revisiting the lives of humans prior to “civilization.” Looking backwards into our past ways of living before the paradigm-shifting effects of civilization took place can not only give us insight into what a more natural and connected way of living looks like, but also clues us into humanity at its most basic level.
When taking the backwards look into our prehistoric past, one clue that we cannot ignore is the notion that until very recently in the timeline of humanity, we were hunting and gathering nomads. This means that moving around was a natural aspect of our way of being.
In other words, moving is as old as humanity itself. Moving was core to our survival. As climates, weather patterns, and migration patterns changed, we also needed to change with our environments if we wanted to survive.
And with mobility being so important for our survival, the one thing we couldn’t afford to do was make the process of migration more burdensome than it needed to be by creating unnecessary dependencies on non-essential goods that weighed us down. So we made our lives easier by keeping it simple and naturally possessing far fewer things.
Less equals more, and embracing simplicity leads to greater alignment with the life you truly want for yourself.
This is a philosophy that I have personally adopted over the years, and in the past year or so, I have really doubled down on it. I have always been a bit of an adventurous spirit who enjoys exploring the world and all of the interesting experiences that come from it. For me this not only entails traveling for extended periods of time, but also entails having the flexibility to live in different countries as I desire.
However, following the standard American lifestyle introduced unnecessary complexities into my life that made my desire for geographic autonomy unreachable for me. I bought a home, furnished it, and secured a job that would provide the funds necessary to sustain this living arrangement. By society’s metrics, this is the successful path of a normal person who is on his way to a life of greater happiness and satisfaction.
Ironically, it is these actions that are considered normal that only served to make my life more complicated than it needed to be.
So around this time last year in late 2023, I decided to aggressively simplify my life by reducing my personal possessions down to only the most basic items.
Rather than dealing with the maintenance, financial, and time liabilities that come with owning a home, I put my primary residence up for sale and begin renting a place to live instead.
Rather than furnishing my newly rented apartment with furniture and household items that would leave me feeling bogged down, I made sure my apartment was fully furnished.
Rather than having walk-in closets with a wardrobe to match, I reduced my entire clothing selection to a small assortment that can conveniently fit into a couple of suitcases.
As a result of these intentional simplifications, it became much easier for me to live a lifestyle that is more naturally aligned with the things that bring me a sense of peace and genuine happiness. Eliminating the unnecessary complexities of the standard societal blueprint in this specific area of my life has made a world of difference for me.
Since making these changes, I have moved away from Chicago and am now enjoying a more peaceful and connected life in Portugal.
I am however still getting adjusted to my life in Portugal and recently needed to move out of my shorter-term apartment and into a longer-term apartment that I will likely call home for the next few years of my life.
So last week when I moved into my new apartment, the full process of packing up my old place, transporting my items, and unpacking the new apartment required a total of about 90 minutes and the cost of 3 cross-town Uber rides.
At this point the process of moving, a major source of stress and frustration in the modern lifestyle, is a rather stress-free experience for me… and that matters a lot considering that I prioritize geographic flexibility so highly.
This is only one specific example, but the bigger takeaway here that I want to point out is that life can most certainly be so much easier than you are making it. When you take a step back to observe the norms and customs of modern lifestyles, it can quickly become apparent that our current way of living is unnecessarily complex.
And this complexity that we’ve introduced into our lifestyles brings unwarranted levels of stress, worry, anxiety, confusion, financial liabilities, wasted energy, and deferred dreams.
So find a way to simplify areas of your life that are of high priority to you, and you may also unlock greater possibilities.
You don’t necessarily have to get rid of most of your possessions to simplify your life. While I generally believe everyone can benefit from such action, your version of simplifying might be much different than mine, as your priorities are likely quite different.
As a person who highly values geographic autonomy, it would make sense for me to intently focus on minimizing the things that physically constrain me to a particular location. Therefore, parting ways with material items makes logical sense.
Another area of life that I have successfully implemented this strategy is in my health and fitness. Rather than following the complicated rules and regimens of the standard medical and fitness industries, I looked back to the basics of prehistoric living to create a simple process that unlocked disproportionate results.
So in your case, you’d need to first understand where your life priorities lie, and then simplify around those priorities.
For you, it could be personal finance, health, relationships, time management, or any other area of your life that is extremely important for you to optimize. No matter what it is, simplifying that aspect of your life can certainly make life so much easier while placing you in greater alignment with your desires and life goals.
As I alluded to earlier, my method for simplifying starts off by looking back at what life was like before the complexities of modern civilization changed the way we conduct ourselves. Asking yourself “how would my ancestors have done things 10,000 years ago” can open the mind up to a very different way of looking at things.
For example, if building better relationships and deeper connections with people is something that is very important to you, then using this technique of looking backwards in time might reveal that the absence of modern communication technology required humans to be proficient in building relationships through direct face-to-face communication.
This sort of revelation could lead one to rethink their relationship with technology and how it may be impacting their ability to build deeper and more trusting relationships. Thus, a solution in this case could be to aggressively simplify by deleting social media or discontinuing use of smart phones to allow for more in-person communication.
Another example could be for someone who is trying to achieve financial autonomy and break free of the 9-5 corporate lifestyle. Looking backwards at prehistoric society one would realize that consumerism, subscription services, and credit cards were not a part the human existence. Thus one can then decide to simplify his life by eliminating the use of financial products with hidden terms and fine print… and instead buying ONLY the bare necessities on an as-needed basis, using cash (or debit).
There really is no wrong or right way to go about this. However the point is that life can be much, MUCH, easier if we strategically simplify…. but we insist on making it difficult by following the standard model of modern living.
I realize that simplifying may be easier said than done, because it requires not only understanding yourself and your desires on a deeply connected level, but also living very intentionally in a way that oftentimes goes against society.
The saying goes that in order to live like no one else can later, one must live like no one else will today. This is easier said than done, as living differently comes with many pressures to conform. In a world where complexity is king, simplicity is often received with criticism and disapproval.
So while the concept of intentionally simplifying one’s life makes logical sense, coming up with a plan and executing is a different story.
So I’m here to help.
For those who are serious about making life less complicated, and living more intentionally for greater health, wealth, and happiness, the feel free to book a 2-hr consulting session with me to get you start off on the right track.