Sallie Schaaf Borrink
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I’ve spent quite a bit of time behind the scenes the past few months putting in action my plan for simplifying my blogging. In this chat, I describe the choices I’ve made so I can focus on my home responsibilities while still enjoying creating helpful content on this website.
The audio for this post is included in the playlist below under “Simplifying My Blogging.”
You will be able to find all of the Audio Playlists I end up creating under the category Audio Playlists By Theme.
Post may contain affiliate links. Read my disclosure statement.
I have a number of playlists on my website that feature various topics. This playlist contains encouraging and helpful audio posts and chats about simple living.
This playlist will continue to grow in the coming months. I hope you enjoy these chats!
Post may contain affiliate links. Read my disclosure statement.
Caroline and I finished up our summer homeschooling yesterday. I now have two weeks off and we’ll start up with the new school year the day after Labor Day. I have been making small and large changes during August that are already paying off in terms of more time and less stress. I could write a post about each of these (and probably will), but for now I’m simply going to list them.
One, I have been steadily removing myself from email lists. I have significantly reduced the amount of email I receive. I’m already pretty careful about this, but have taken it to another level. Anyone who emails too frequently and doesn’t give me an option for less? Gone. Anyone subtly inserting propaganda that makes me feel stressed or angry? Gone. And so on. Even if it’s a company I like and might buy from again, if their emails annoy me they are gone.
Two, I deleted my Twitter account this week. I do plan to write a full post about this. Twitter is by far the most stressful social media I’ve ever used. It’s not even close. I think their algorithm is designed for it. I already feel different today by not having it.
Three, we have been cleaning out each room of the house. Last weekend, David took a carload of donations to a local charity that operates in our part of the county. I decided I didn’t care if there were things I could sell on Facebook for a few dollars. I asked the Lord to bless the people who find the things and provide that money for us in another way.
Four, I’ve been cleaning out homeschooing materials. Now that I know what we’ll be doing the last two years of homeschooling, there is no reason to hang on to a lot of things. I’ve been pitching stuff left and right. Some things will be donated.
Five, I moved all of my media files in posts to my own hosting/server. Every podcast and video I’ve made for both of my sites is now self-hosted. I have left some of them up on other platforms so people can find me, but nothing is embedded from anywhere else. No more adapting to changes on other platforms.
So that’s what I’ve been doing to simplify my life this month. Have you made any changes lately? Please share in a comment below if you have. Maybe your ideas will inspire someone else!
Post may contain affiliate links. Read my disclosure statement.
Yesterday David and I updated this collection of floral artwork in my shop. I wasn’t completely satisfied with them and then realized one day a few months ago that they needed a taupe check background. So that’s what we did!
The artwork was created based on five key ideas I use when writing here:
Each of the original five printables are available individually. You can also purchase them as a set. If you purchase the set of five, you save.
In addition, we created the full set that has all five sayings in all five floral arrangements. So you can pick the right combination of words and art for wherever you wish to use it in your home.
The taupe background is so hard to show accurately on a computer screen. It might look pinkish or blush on your computer screen. When you print them out, they are a light taupe color.
If you have The Lifetime Shopping Pass, you can download any of them you wish with your personal coupon code.
If you purchased one of the original versions of the individual printables or sets, you can download the updated file in your account. You can access your account through the link in my website header drop-down menu.
I’ve included a sampling of printables below. You can see all of them in my shop under Artwork.
Post may contain affiliate links. Read my disclosure statement.
Last week I mentioned multiple times in The Final Pivot my strongly-felt need to not depend on other services, plugins, add-ons, subscriptions, etc. as I move forward with what I’m doing both here and at Sallie’s Rebuilding America. I said:
I have been getting rid of every website plugin, extension, paid service, etc. that I possibly can. I’m so sick of dealing with them and cannot imagine the hours David and I have spent managing all that stuff over the years. I’m going simple in this area with only those things that have a true benefit. I’m not building my website around other people’s products and services any more than I have to. Any products I have to use (such as WooCommerce and MailerLite) must be considered truly necessary. I don’t want to be reliant on other platforms and services any more than necessary. I feel very strongly about this in ways I can’t fully express.
Last night this came through my Gab feed.
I wasn’t even upset when I read it. I laughed out loud. Why? Because it perfectly proved the point that I had just made a few days before.
I have 109 videos uploaded to Gab. I have over 50 uploaded to Rumble. I stopped uploading to Rumble a few months ago because I decided it wasn’t worth the time and effort. Those video uploads to the two platforms represent literally days and days and days of work. Probably a few weeks if I were to calculate it out.
This is why all of the Sallie’s Rebuilding America episodes on my other site are audio files I self-host on our own server we pay for with a company committed to non-censorship. I’ve created video versions to upload to other platforms, but I didn’t embed the videos on my own website. I kept the podcasts self-hosted. I am SO THANKFUL I made that decision. It was a decision I made, in part, because I’ve been burned so many times by platforms and services who changed, disappeared, etc. I only have about a dozen videos about other topics I need to swap out which won’t be that much work.
Whatever it is you do in life on a daily basis, make sure you are providing yourself with redundancies. And make sure you are keeping the core things in your business and life under your own control as much as possible.
For example, when we quit PayPal last October over their new plan to penalize free speech with $2,500 fines we switched to Cornerstone Payments Systems. We use Cornerstone for client payments and the donation pages on both this site and on SRA. However, if you purchase something in my shop you will use Stripe to pay. We have opted to keep two payment processors up and running. Why? Because if one of them failed or kicked us out, we have a second option readily available. We could switch things over to the other one in hours rather than taking many days to set something up new with a new company.
How might this apply to your situation? Do you have more than one bank? Do you have a bank and a credit union? Have you reduced your risk in other important areas of your life as much as possible?
I wrote in Choosing to Create a Better Life, Not a New Normal that it was important to be scrappy. This is part of what I”m talking about. Part of being prudent, part of being a prudent homemaker is also trying to be resilient, scrappy, and ready to deal with the inevitable changes that will come your way as things continue to shift in our culture. Can we control them all? Of course not. But picking out the top five or ten things that would seriously disrupt your life is a good starting point.
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Many years ago I started using “A Quiet Simple Life’ as a part of my blogging. Over the weekend I had an epiphany of sorts as I realized the way I think about this phrase has changed. In particular, the way I think about the term simple has changed. What simple, simple living, and simplicity meant all those years ago has changed both in the culture and in my own life.
I sat down with my microphone and spent a few minutes discussing what it meant then and what it means now. I also discussed how this ties in with changing my focus from relaxed homeschooling to discipleship homeschooling moving forward.
You will find this chat in the playlist below under “What Do Quiet and Simple Mean To Me Today?”
Post may contain affiliate links. Read my disclosure statement.
Deliberately choosing isn’t a phrase you hear used often. In some cases, it’s because people have been convinced they don’t have a choice. Instead, they go with the flow whether it is at work, church, school, or the neighborhood barbecue. It’s easier to fit in and not make waves by choosing to deliberately do or say something that will alienate you from those around you.
In other cases, people believe themselves to be so harried and harassed they are convinced they don’t have the energy to make deliberate choices. So they also go with the flow.
Whatever the reason, the result is the same. By not deliberately choosing, you are still choosing. You are choosing to let others direct your life, direct your children, direct your church, direct your vocation, etc. By choosing to not speak up, to not acknowledge something beyond the acceptable narrative, you are deliberately choosing the path of least resistance – even if it doesn’t align with your beliefs and convictions.
It’s always worthwhile to ask ourselves if it’s time to work on deliberately choosing in some part of life. Is there a situation where we’ve been going with the flow and we sense God is calling us to stop? Have we been going along to get along because we’re weary, but now we realize we can’t do it any longer? Are there choices we need to deliberately make in order to have some aspect of life better aligned with our faith in Christ?
We probably all have some part of our life where we would benefit from making deliberate choices beginning today. If you need additional inspiration, here are a few of my posts related to deliberately choosing.
May God bless you as you make deliberate choices in the days ahead.
