German speaking People might recognize the term Freudscher Versprecher, in English it’s called the freudian slip. It’s a type of error in speech memory, or physical action that occurs due to the interference of an unconscious subdued wish or internal train of thought (quoted from wikipedia). Your subconscious reaching the surface of your actions so to say.

The term Freudscher Vergesser (freudian forget) does not exist as far as I know. It’s something I’ve made up this morning; I got home quite late yesterday but woke up early this morning, consequently I had the intent to sleep some more, tiredness being my arch nemesis. I took my sports watch, navigated to the timer menu and … just fell asleep again? I didn’t activate the timer. I slept in, without having set a timer. I didn’t sleep much longer than the originally planned 60min, but still. The point is: This has happened to me more than 5 times by now. I want to set a timer, go into the timer menu of my watch, wake up by myself after a longer than planned period just to find out I haven’t even started the timer in the first place.

Because it is a driver for less and there is too much of much and too little of less in technociety. I’d like to derive my interpretation of simplicity from a pair of attributes:

• easily understood and modified
• not more than needed

I like simple things. Simple things often go unnoticed, exactly because they don’t appear big. Simplicity, e.g. the absence of unnecessary things, is often difficult to notice without active thought. The fact that I don’t use social media makes my life simpler. But I’ve only noticed that recently when talking to a friend who does a lot of instagramming. I can only guess how much of my mind is freed by not using that.

A broadly categorized, work in progress list of my favourite books:

Sustainability

1. Building a Better World in Your Backyard Instead of Being Angry at the Bad Guys by Paul Wheaton & Shawn Klassen-Koop
2. The One-Straw Revolution by Masanobu Fukuoka

Self Improvement

3. Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown
4. The Gap and the Gain by Dan Sullivan & Benjamin Hardy
5. Stoicism for Inner Peace by Einzelgänger

Fantasy

6. Ranger’s Apprentice Series by John Flanagan (also Brotherhood series)
7. The Kingkiller Chronicles by Patrick Rothfuss
8. Drachenreiter by Cornelia Funke

Sailing

9. Sailing the Farm by Kenneth Neumeyer
10. Get Real, Get Gone by Rick Page & Jasna Tuta
11. Den Wind im Gepäck by Marc Bielefeld

Philosophical and other stuff

12. Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig
13. Le Petit Prince by Antoint de Saint-Exupéry
14. Sand, Wind and Starts by Antoint de Saint-Exupéry
15. Im Westen Nichts Neues by Erich Maria Remarque

Zen

16. Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu (English Translation by Jonathan Star)
17. Practical Zen: Meditation and Beyond by Julian Daizan Skinner

Really Simple Syndication allows for easy and fast delivery of content that you actually want.

1. Install an RSS reader app like Feeder (Android) or Feedly (iOS)
2. Add a feed. Mine is always linked to at the bottom of the page (RSS).

We get way too much unnecessary information shoved down our throats. A sane mind is more easily achieved if we just consume what we actually signed up for.

Many news and podcast sites also offer RSS links. The world of RSS is your oyster.

Welcome to minimare.quest, a simple static site about my journey into a simpler, more resilient and sustainable life. I will talk about tech, natural farming and eventually sailing. Most of the things I write about have a philosophical background.

Why a blog?

• I have some things to share.
• Static sites are cool.

Background

Ever since I first read Masanobu Fukuoka’s book about natural farming (The One-Straw Revolution), I’ve been drawn away from the realm of technociety towards a more resilient way of life. We are children of Nature. Recent developements make us forget that. I’ve never achieved as sane a mind as during prolonged stays in Nature.