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When I decided to quit my full time employment it never occurred to me that I might become
a part of a new international trend. A lateral move that hurt my pride and blocked my professional
progress prompted me to abandon my relatively high profile career although, in the manner of a
disgraced government minister, I covered my exit by claiming "I wanted to spend more time with
my family".
Curiously, some two-and-a-half years and two novels later, my experiment in what the
Americans term "downshifting" has turned my tired excuse into an absolute reality. I have been
transformed from a passionate advocate of the philosophy of "having it all", preached by Linda
Kelsey for the past seven years in the page of She magazine, into a woman who is happy to settle
for a bit of everything.
I have discovered, as perhaps Kelsey will after her much-publicized resignation from the
editorship of She after a build-up of stress, that abandoning the doctrine of "juggling your
life" ,and making the alternative move into "downshifting" brings with it far greater rewards than
financial success and social status. Nothing could persuade me to return to the kind of life Kelsey
used to advocate and I once enjoyed: 12-hour working days, pressured deadlines, the fearful strain
of office politics and the limitations of being a parent on "quality time".
In America, the move away from juggling to a simpler, less materialistic lifestyle is a
well-established trend. Downshifting — also known in America as "voluntary simplicity" — has,
ironically, even bred a new area of what might be termed anti-consumerism. There are a number
When I decided to quit my full time employment it never occurred to me that I might become
a part of a new international trend. A lateral move that hurt my pride and blocked my professional
progress prompted me to abandon my relatively high profile career although, in the manner of a
disgraced government minister, I covered my exit by claiming "I wanted to spend more time with
my family".
Curiously, some two-and-a-half years and two novels later, my experiment in what the
Americans term "downshifting" has turned my tired excuse into an absolute reality. I have been
transformed from a passionate advocate of the philosophy of "having it all", preached by Linda
Kelsey for the past seven years in the page of She magazine, into a woman who is happy to settle
for a bit of everything.
I have discovered, as perhaps Kelsey will after her much-publicized resignation from the
editorship of She after a build-up of stress, that abandoning the doctrine of "juggling your
life" ,and making the alternative move into "downshifting" brings with it far greater rewards than
financial success and social status. Nothing could persuade me to return to the kind of life Kelsey
used to advocate and I once enjoyed: 12-hour working days, pressured deadlines, the fearful strain
of office politics and the limitations of being a parent on "quality time".
In America, the move away from juggling to a simpler, less materialistic lifestyle is a
well-established trend. Downshifting — also known in America as "voluntary simplicity" — has,
ironically, even bred a new area of what might be termed anti-consumerism. There are a number