Reclaiming simplicity: focusing on the things that matter
Oliver Robertson reflects on what our approach to email backlogs might tell us about accessing the divine.
When I started working for Quakers in Britain six years ago, my personal emails were in pretty good shape, all read and mainly filed. Now they're all over the place, with 2,000 (and counting) still to be looked at.
But perhaps more importantly, I realised recently, the vast majority of them aren't personal. They are circulars from groups I signed up to, automated replies from online retailers – not conversations with people, not digital letters. It feels like it's become the online equivalent of sorting through junk mail and takeaway leaflets that come through the letterbox.
One of my colleagues, who worked in the private sector before joining Quakers in Britain, said that she always asked herself: "Will answering this email help make my organisation more money?" The question is slightly different here, of course – more along the lines of "Will answering this email help bring about a divine commonwealth on Earth?"
But it's a helpful reminder that just because something is there in front of you, asking to be dealt with, it doesn't mean you have to say yes to it. It's like the joke/story about intercessionary prayer: someone praying to God for the rain to stop but the rain keeps coming. "Where's your God then?" asks their atheist friend. "He's clearly not answering." "No," replies the prayerful one. "He is there. He did answer. The answer was no."
My favourite description of simplicity (which I consider the most neglected of our Quaker testimonies, despite what Quaker faith & practice 21.25 says) is that it's about getting rid of the things that take you away from a relationship with God.
Simplicity is not an end in itself, it's a means to the end of having a closer connection to the Divine. Fewer emails are not an end in themselves, they're a tool to being able to focus on the change you want to make in your life and the world. Communication is useful, administration is often necessary, but we need always to think about what they're helping us achieve and how we get there.
