We tend to look back to the past as being somehow simple and golden. Or at least rose-tinted. The facts are far more pragmatic. When we look back to a simple golden bygone age of peace and harmony, we’re looking at a myth. Harmony is what you get when you run out of other options.
People lived simply because they didn’t have much – they couldn’t afford it. They had one set of clothes because clothes were expensive, making them time-consuming. They made do and mended everything because it was cheaper than replacement. They looked after their few possessions because the cost of replacement was prohibitvely high. Sunday best wasn’t just an expression, it was the one set of clothes you kept for holy days – for the day of rest, and the rest of the time, you wore the same working clothes day in and day out. In medieval times, Europe would have stunk. Not purely because of a lack of sanitation but also because if you’re wearing your clothes all the time, you have no time to clean them.
We look to them as an inspiration for a simpler way of living, and forget they had no choice. They aspired to a more complicated way of life, with more possessions and more requisite skills and manners. It’s only human to aspire to the life of those in power, because they are the ones who are more likely to survive – they have the pick of the resources, after all.
It’s all very well to look back and sigh nostalgically, but we’re actually nostalgic for an illusion. The idea of deliberately simplifying and minimising is a relatively recent one – and its early proponents came from those who had, because it’s only when you have that you can speculate as to the benefits of not-having. The have-nots are just trying to make ends meet and don’t have time for such patently stupid questions.
I’m all for living lightly and simply, but I don’t want to kid myself that it’s really a time-hallowed life philosophy. Which means it’s all still pretty experimental and there are no glib answers.
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