Downsize Your Life Like Jay Shafer
July 16, 2010 – 10:02 am by MarinaHanes
Living off the urban grid requires that you live life with an alternative mindset. You can’t allow yourself to get caught up in fads and trends, otherwise, you will find yourself coveting items that you don’t really need. The key to living a simpler life—one without excess waste—is to realize that you have everything you need right now, which is a challenging Buddhist philosophy to live by. However, those frivolous desires are what cause problems. If you’re ready to own less and live a simple life, you might be ready to be like Jay Shafer.
Jay Shafer is a 45 years old who lives in a tiny house called Tumbleweed, which is 8’ x 12’. He began working as a grocery store clerk and decided to change his life dramatically. So he left the “rat race” and started to build his own humble abode, mind you, without any architectural experience. The purpose of his transition to an 89-square-foot house was so that he could live life and do things he wanted rather than make money for the sake of making it.
His story is inspiring for several reasons. First of all, it shows that it’s possible to live in a beautiful yet conservatively sized home and have everything you need and nothing more. It also an example of how downsizing and simplifying your life can be a liberating experience. Because of this major life transition, Shafer turned his small home building into a business: Jay’s Small Homes. Not only did living in a tiny house enable him to simplify his belongings, but it also opened up more opportunities for him and everyone else in the world.
With the recent economic turmoil that the U.S. has been in, living in a smaller home that doesn’t have a mortgage and only has a utility bill of $100 per year sounds pretty good.
