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Simple and Free: Guided Journal

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Discover the peace found in a radically simpler life using this guided journal featuring prompts based on the joyful, liberating lessons shared by New York Times bestselling author Jen Hatmaker in Simple and Free: 7 Experiments Against Excess.

In Simple and Free, first published as 7, Jen Hatmaker described her reckoning with excess through a social experiment, which turned into a spiritual movement. Now, in Simple and Free: Guided Journal, Hatmaker invites readers to examine their own seven areas of excess--from stress to spending to social media--and identify personal practices toward creating a life of "enough."

It's one thing to imagine a better story; it's another thing to live one. This guided journal helps readers simplify the excess in their lives in practice, not just wishful thinking. Simple and Free: Guided Journal is a tool to help readers stay attentive, inspect their tendencies thoughtfully, and combat the modern-day diseases of greed, materialism, and overindulgence. It invites readers to deeply explore seven areas of excess: food, clothes, spending, media, possessions, waste, and stress--and create pathways towards a gentler, simpler life.
Jen Hatmaker is the author of the New York Times bestsellers For the Love and Fierce, Free, and Full of Fire. She hosts the award-winning podcast For the Love, is the delighted curator of the Jen Hatmaker Book Club, and leads a tight-knit online community where she reaches millions of people each week. Hatmaker is a co-founder of Legacy Collective, a giving community that grants millions of dollars around the world. She is a mom to five kids and lives happily just outside Austin, Texas, in a 1908 farmhouse with questionable plumbing. View titles by Jen Hatmaker
Intro


Welcome to a little social experiment that changed our lives for good. I can say that now, because although this specific season is in my rearview mirror, as I looked back through every word I jotted down during my first foray into this experiment, I was surprised how many ideas were so new to me then, because they are the air we breathe today.

Let that be good news to you: No matter if anything you encounter in these next seven months seems too hard or crazy or overwhelming, maybe it will just be Step One into a new idea. Maybe in seven weeks, seven months, or seven years, you’ll discover yourself embedded within an entirely new way of life; you won’t even remember not thinking that way.

Remember, we’re jumping into the Simple & Free experiment together. Some of us are brand-new, some are trying again, some of us are still living out the elements we learned from our experiment years ago. But we’re all a part of this journey. We’re all committed to being lifelong learners who are less attached to certainty and Being Right, and more interested in paying attention and developing.

Let’s begin.

About

Discover the peace found in a radically simpler life using this guided journal featuring prompts based on the joyful, liberating lessons shared by New York Times bestselling author Jen Hatmaker in Simple and Free: 7 Experiments Against Excess.

In Simple and Free, first published as 7, Jen Hatmaker described her reckoning with excess through a social experiment, which turned into a spiritual movement. Now, in Simple and Free: Guided Journal, Hatmaker invites readers to examine their own seven areas of excess--from stress to spending to social media--and identify personal practices toward creating a life of "enough."

It's one thing to imagine a better story; it's another thing to live one. This guided journal helps readers simplify the excess in their lives in practice, not just wishful thinking. Simple and Free: Guided Journal is a tool to help readers stay attentive, inspect their tendencies thoughtfully, and combat the modern-day diseases of greed, materialism, and overindulgence. It invites readers to deeply explore seven areas of excess: food, clothes, spending, media, possessions, waste, and stress--and create pathways towards a gentler, simpler life.

Author

Jen Hatmaker is the author of the New York Times bestsellers For the Love and Fierce, Free, and Full of Fire. She hosts the award-winning podcast For the Love, is the delighted curator of the Jen Hatmaker Book Club, and leads a tight-knit online community where she reaches millions of people each week. Hatmaker is a co-founder of Legacy Collective, a giving community that grants millions of dollars around the world. She is a mom to five kids and lives happily just outside Austin, Texas, in a 1908 farmhouse with questionable plumbing. View titles by Jen Hatmaker

Excerpt

Intro


Welcome to a little social experiment that changed our lives for good. I can say that now, because although this specific season is in my rearview mirror, as I looked back through every word I jotted down during my first foray into this experiment, I was surprised how many ideas were so new to me then, because they are the air we breathe today.

Let that be good news to you: No matter if anything you encounter in these next seven months seems too hard or crazy or overwhelming, maybe it will just be Step One into a new idea. Maybe in seven weeks, seven months, or seven years, you’ll discover yourself embedded within an entirely new way of life; you won’t even remember not thinking that way.

Remember, we’re jumping into the Simple & Free experiment together. Some of us are brand-new, some are trying again, some of us are still living out the elements we learned from our experiment years ago. But we’re all a part of this journey. We’re all committed to being lifelong learners who are less attached to certainty and Being Right, and more interested in paying attention and developing.

Let’s begin.