Welcome to the Infinitely Precious podcast produced by Infinitely Precious LLC. Your host is James Henry. Remember, you are infinitely precious and unconditionally loved for the gift you already are.

Hello, beloved. It's me, James, and it's another opportunity for us to think together about a topic and, for me to share some thoughts I've been having. Today, I've been thinking about simplicity. It seems to be something that many of us strive for in life. But I wonder what simplicity really means when we're trying to figure out how we're going to add simplicity to our life.

See, right there and then, the idea that you would add simplicity to your life among all the complexity that's already there, just sounds like you're adding one more thing to the complexity rather than going for the simplicity. I remember when I was trying to simplify, the work in, our kitchen. When we're doing various kinds of cooking and other things like that, there are lots of appliances appliances in the world that are designed to simplify my life. Of course, by the time I've put all those appliances in my kitchen, it doesn't seem very simple. I have a food processor, so I can chop up vegetables.

But by the time I've gotten the food processor out and all the pieces out, made sure they're clean, put the vegetables in to chop them up, and then taken apart, the food processor and washed each one of the pieces carefully, dried it, put it back together, and put it away, I wonder how much simplicity I really added to my life. I've added a different kind of complexity, not simplicity. There probably are some appliances. I'm not I'm not dissing appliances for the kitchen by any stretch of the imagination because I know how important they are. But I wonder if we haven't, made an idol of this word simplicity, as being something that gives us back time in our lives when, in fact, it doesn't necessarily give us back time or make our lives any better than they were before.

So I guess the question, right up front is what does simplicity really mean? What does it mean to you? When you think about the word simplicity, what do you think it means? And perhaps in this relatively new year, because it is a relatively new year, if you're wanting to, resolve to make simplicity more of a centerpiece in your life, the first thing is to simplify what is the ultimate value around which you want to build that life. Is it more time?

Is it, more, greater sense of meaning? And begin to ask the questions as I find myself doing as I begin to ask the questions. What, what is most important, and how can I begin to focus my life, the choices I make about my schedule, the choices I make about the time I'm going to use, the things I'm going to acquire to put in my home, all of those pieces, the relationships I'm going to say yes to? As I begin to look at all of those pieces and begin to realize I'm limited as a human being, maybe, simplicity is the invitation to get back to the most basic meaning giving aspects of my life, to make sure that my focus lies there, not to be divided, separated all over the place by all the, items and people I add to my calendar on a regular basis, all the things I say yes to on a regular basis. Simplicity may be something as meaningful as sitting down and looking at what I'm doing with my life, where I am spending myself, giving myself away, and asking, is this, what I want?

Maybe simplicity is a value about what's most important in our lives and how can we build our lives around what who is most important. Ultimate value is something we're all seeking in life, ultimate meaning. What is the purpose of this, this daily get up in the morning, go through the day kind of thing that happens before I go back to sleep, sleep again, and start again tomorrow. What is this life about? And maybe the yearning for simplicity, the movement towards living more simply comes with asking the question, what's most important?

What gives me meaning? What am I gifted to do? And how can I align all of the energy that I'm pouring into all these disparate places? How can I align my energy into one focused space? How can I focus the use of that energy more simply?

Not just add something else to my already complex schedule because that's not simplicity. Simplicity is not acquiring things, I don't think, to, make things appear to go more smoothly when what they do is, create other tasks that we didn't potentially have before. What are the things we can let go of in order to simplify? Not add something more, but what can we let go of? What is that thing that I keep finding myself doing and asking, why am I doing this?

Why am I spending myself, my life in doing this thing when it it has no ultimate value or meaning for me. It doesn't speak with my gift, my giftedness into the world in a way that makes a difference, in a way that I think I'm meant to make a difference. I think in some ways, it comes back down to the thing I say to you every time I speak to you, which is that you're infinitely precious, unconditionally loved for the gift you already are. What is the gift that you already are? And how do you bring that gift to life in a way that's life giving for you and perhaps life giving for those around you in ways you can't even imagine?

How are you going to spend this one wild and precious life you have? And simplicity asks us to not add more things, thinking that adds value, but instead get down to the basic values that are most important to us, down to the basic mission we think our gift calls us to be a part of. And then to engage that, to engage with that, to use that, and begin to just kind of prune away the pieces of our lives that just add complexity without being hopeful. Maybe you don't have any of those things in your life, and this has not really added much value to you, this simplicity that I've talked about. But if you have, I invite you in the same way that I'm doing in this, new year to sit down, and and I made a list of some of the things I'm doing with my time, that I'm spending myself on.

And then began to ask, of these things, what really, is required of me? What is this life asking of me? How am I living out the divine gifts that were poured into me in a way that that brings them out and that touches the lives of others? Almost all gifts I can't think of any any off the top of my head. Almost all gifts that are of that divine origin are really meant to enhance everyone's experience of life around us.

Maybe not the whole universe, maybe not everyone on the planet in ways that we can, picture. But there are impacts we have when we use our gifts that we, may not be able to see and fully embrace. That was my thought as I thought about today about simplifying my life. I wanted to add that on top of what I was already doing. And it was like, wait.

Simplifying your life isn't adding more. It's letting go of some things and really determining what are the core, piece is or piece that I want to build this life around? Where am I gonna find my ground? Where are you gonna find your ground? No matter where that is, remember, you are infinitely precious and unconditionally loved for the gift you already are.

And thanks for joining me today.