I'm thinking about all the time I spent when I was a teenager worrying about how I look. Because now that I'm a grown up, it's really amazing how un-important it is to occasionally show up at work looking exhausted or having a bad hair day.
Whenever I complained when I was a kid my parents would tell me that it would be much worse when I was an adult. I didn't believe them, and now that I'm grown up, I disagree with them. I see their point. There are certainly things about it that are way more complicated than anything I dealt with as a kid. They just didn't know me very well. They didn't know how much I value my independence, or how I thrive in an environment where no one is yelling. Or how much pain my obsession with my appearance was causing me.
The voluntary simplicity movement has made a big impact on me enjoying adulthood. My participation is pretty minimal but just knowing that I have the option to participate more gives all my hard work a terrific sense of being optional. I don't feel stuck. When work is stressful, I don't think, "I wish I didn't have to work." Instead I think, "This sucks but it pays for the lifestyle that I enjoy soooooo much."
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