“The thinking and compassionate person’s blog with everyday ‘sides’ of living well to savor.” —TSLL’s guiding axiom

An eclectic group. A heterogeneous group, simply put, the community of TSLL is diverse.

Diverse in the sense that what each of our lives look like to an onlooker will look entirely different – our age, where we call home, our career, our relationships, our family composition, our life experience, income, spirituality practices, and what makes us feel fulfilled. Put simply, living simply luxuriously is different for each of us. And that is beautiful.

As we step into the sixteenth year of The Simply Luxurious Life blog’s existence on this ever growing and expanding internet, I wanted to offer a series throughout the month of September to share exactly what TSLL is. What new readers will discover, but most importantly, what long-time and recently and regularly visiting readers have found by sharing time on The Simply Luxurious Life.

With so many posts in TSLL’s archives, I first look to the Start Here page (Introductions in the drop-down menu at the top of the blog) to share what living simply luxuriously is about in detail. And what I have been wanting to do for some time, but needed to say it as concisely as possible – one sentence if I could – was the guiding ethos.

Yes, as the subtitle of the blog in the blog header shares, TSLL is where we Cultivate True Contentment: The art of living a life of quality over quantity; however this is still a bit of an unknown if we don’t quite grasp what true contentment is as it is complex and takes time to understand, so I wanted to go a bit deeper and be a bit clearer.

I began first by considering the people, the readers, non-members and members who visit the blog on a regular basis, who email me and share how they found the blog, why they enjoy reading it. And over the past 16 years, the phrase I came up with encapsulates entirely who these people are – thinking and compassionate people from all walks of life and from all corners of the world who enjoy partaking in the ‘sides’ of living life well, savoring the simple luxuries experienced in the present moment as they do.

The New 7-Part Series

Throughout the month of September, I have seven posts and/or episodes lined up to dive deeply into what the new axiom means.

Beginning this coming Wednesday with episode #409, we’re going to talk about “How to Make Living Itself an Art“, and why a rigid prescription is unable to lead us to fulfilling our desire. Rather, we, as individuals, must put in the effort, the time and the intention once we have the tools and skills necessary to eventually create the ‘art’ that wants to come forth.

As we continue through the month, we’ll talk about the genesis of true compassion and its relationship to contentment, and then move on to talk about the nervous system, the physiological reality we all live with, but many don’t understand until we choose to learn about it, and thus until we grasp it, we are the passenger of our life when we absolutely can be the driver handling deftly our emotions, fears and thus life decisions that will lead to the most peace and fulfillment. Lastly, we will talk about the science of savoring and how, much like a habit learned or a muscle toned, once we respect how powerful this skill can be and welcome it into our lives, the entirety of our way of existing, being and engaging changes in amazingly wonderful ways.

Look for each part in this series to be posted on Mondays and Wednesdays throughout September, and today we begin with what it means to be a ‘thinking’ person as it pertains to living a life of contentment which is what resides at the foundation of a simply luxurious life.

Why TSLL is a Thinking Person’s Destination

We begin with the first adjective/descriptor of the reader of TSLL – a thinking person, but also notice this person is not solely described as a thinking person, but is a compassionate person as well. We will talk, as I mentioned above, about compassion in a detailed post/episode later this month, but it is important to understand that the two are linked and coincide as a unit. They must if contentment and living simply luxuriously is to be our everyday reality which it absolutely can be.

Thinking refers to the person who is curious, forever a learner of life, open-minded and seeking to expand their knowledge of the world. The knowledge of the world seems, and arguably is infinite, so the thinking person will forever be in the classroom of life if they choose to keep attending. Attending in this analogy shows up as being fully present, engaging with life, dancing so to speak, but also bravely offering of their true selves.

The thinking person applies critical thinking skills, something that is taught in TSLL’s Contentment Masterclass, a skill that was at the foundation of my AP Language course that I taught for 11 years in public schools. This is a life skill, but it is a skill, therefore, we must choose to learn it; we are not born knowing how to do so. Essentially, critically thinking requires objectivity, regulation of emotion, awareness of others’ motives through the rhetorical lens, and a plethora of specific questions to ask before reaching (if ever reaching) a conclusion about anything that is presented to us – news, books, films, art, design, lectures, speeches, anything that is a mode of communicating.

A thinking person is discerning, aware of the difference between responding versus reacting. Self-disciplined and often with a high EQ (Emotional Intelligence), a discerning person is perceptive of others, as well as themselves, so self-aware.

The reason I share so many non-fiction books in the weekly This & That is to give readers options to strengthen or explore something that they want to learn more about for their individual life journey. Each of us has a journey of healing and discovery that is unique to our life journey thus far as well as our passions, gifts and skills moving forward. A book that elevates my knowledge may already contain content known to another person, and so that is not the book for them, but in another instance, a book I need not read because I have gained that knowledge elsewhere from another teacher may be taught by a different teacher/author/expert that connects most effectively with you, and the information resonates and helps you learn the skill you were seeking knowledge about. This is where both our curiosity comes into play and exercising a growth mindset, along with being self-aware – where can I grow, what skills would be helpful to live a fulfilling life for me?

The thinking person utilizes logic, examines sources, does not jump to conclusions and does not take anything at face value until they have done their homework. These are all aspects of being a critical thinker, and they do this consciously, not because they are skeptical or cynical. In fact, if you are a regular reader here at TSLL, you see opportunity in difficulty, you look for lessons rather than become distrustful or disparaged when painful moments occur, and while you know that life involves some unwanted moments, you also know that it is how we navigate through those moments that determines our quality of life moving forward there-afterward.

Here on TSLL, over the years, whenever a discovery found in a book or a lecture or in a class crossed my path and I poured through it discovering something of value along the journey of cultivating contentment, I have shared it with you. There have been oodles of posts and podcast episodes diving deeply into all sorts of subjects sharing what the experts, the authors, the teachers had taught me. As I have seen my own life improve and healing happen, I have been inspired to share it because it has been liberating, life elevating and full of aha moments that I only discovered because I finally gained the knowledge. Prior to having that knowledge, my inner compass was hinting at something but I didn’t know why or what exactly it was trying to tell me. Now with the skills gained for so many ‘soft skills’ – psychology, emotions, etc. as well as how the nervous system functions, as well as neurology to better understand how the mind works and is capable of working, along with so many other detailed skills, my life before compared to after (aka now) is dramatically improved, but it only happened once I chose to keep learning, to keep exploring, to put in the time, read the book, take the class, ask questions, etc., etc.

One powerful and necessary skill a thinker welcomes into their life on a regular basis while on the journey of cultivating contentment is meditation. Something taught in the Contentment Masterclass along with a guided practice session, meditation has been scientifically proven, as shared in Start Here: Master the Lifelong Habit of Wellbeing, to change the brain, “activating the brain regions associated with states most of us long to experience more of in life: joy, resilience and contentment.” A helpful analogy to better understand the necessity and thus helpful tool that meditation becomes in helping us enjoy more happy moments and deep contentment even during difficult times is found in the Dhammapada, a core text of the Buddhist tradition, describing the untrained mind as “a fish hooked and left on the sand [that] thrashes about in agony.” We all have a mind, but unless we choose to learn how it works and then choose to train it through the practice of meditation thereby being able to master it, we are that fish. But we don’t have to be, and the thinker understands this and chooses to learn the helpful skills to put their mind as the helpful passenger rather than the driver along the journey of life.

A thinking person has chosen to deepen their knowledge base and keeps choosing this life path.

As I shared above, thinking isn’t the only aspect that ensures that we each cultivate a simply luxurious life if we choose to, thus a life of contentment; it must be partnered with being compassionate, something we will dive deeply into on Wednesday September 17th in episode #410.

Stop by next Monday when we will explore the fun and delicious part of living simply luxuriously, the ‘sides’ of life and what exactly that means for all of us and each one of us individually as well. But until then, Wednesday’s podcast episode will share “How to Make Living Itself an Art“, episode #409.

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~Learn more about TSLL’s Contentment Masterclass here.