Simplicity: Inner Attitudes

I have recently picked up "Celebration of Discipline" by Richard Foster again after finding it in a storage box with a bookmark several chapters in. I had forgotten how much I like this book. I just finished reading the chapter on the discipline of simplicity and found a few salient sections to share. The first is about the inner attitudes that characterize simplicity. These, by nature, are more abstract but I think they provide a good foundation for what follows: ten practical steps for achieving simplicity in the 20th (now 21st) century.

Freedom from anxiety is characterized by three inner attitudes. If what we have we receive as a gift, and if what we have is to be cared for by God, and if what we have is available to others, then we will possess freedom from anxiety. This is the inward reality of simplicity. However, if what we have we believe we have gotten, and if what we have we believe we must hold onto, and if what we have is not available to others, then we will live in anxiety. Such persons will never know simplicity regardless of the outward contortions they may put themselves through in order to live "the simple life."

Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster, Harper and Row (1978), pg. 77.

In the near future, I hope to follow up with the ten practical suggestions. If you have a copy of the book, it's worth another look at this chapter, and if you don't have a copy, what are you waiting for?