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Lisa
Taylor Huff - In The Media
Moving out of the fast lane
Tired of the corporate rat race, some are choosing to downsize their
lives
By Lisa Irizarry, STAFF WRITER
Star Ledger, Newark, NJ,
August 12, 1999
Water trickling through the rocks and seashells of a
small electric fountain pierces the silence in a corner of Lisa Huff's
home office.
She smiles as she looks over at her sort of shrine
to serenity.
"One thing you can't do at work (in a regular office) is
light candles," the 38-year-old Mendham resident says, noting the candles on
either side of the fountain.
"I liked my boss and my co-workers --
and as far as high-tech jobs, plenty of people would have wanted to be in my
position," she adds, recalling her former corporate life. "I just wasn't
happy."
Huff and a growing number of other working Americans
are doing their own "downsizing" -- downsizing their lifestyles by quitting
high-paying and high-stress jobs for others that provide a bigger payoff: a
better quality of life.
They're not "downshifting" or "cashing out,"
as are those involved in the "simplicity movement" and its formal philosophy
espousing the virtues of working less, earning less and spending less.
They have their own reasons and ways for unlocking the "golden handcuffs"
-- well-paying jobs that pay rents and mortgages but come up short in the
personal happiness department. And they are willing to take huge pay cuts just
to do something they feel good about.
"It's a definite trend,"
Huff, now a self-employed consultant and personal coach, says of the new
downsizing. "I think we're going to see more of it. Maybe it's a backlash
against our cultural materialism. People get the big house, the BMW and the
six-figure income, and they're still miserable.
"They've started to
react and are asking tougher questions of themselves," Huff adds. "I
thought my life's purpose was building computer systems, and for a while, that
was it. Then I changed."
Howard Stone, a grandfather of two who has
downsized along with his wife Marika, agrees. "I think people in corporate
America are beginning to ask themselves questions."
He finds evidence
of this in the proliferation of self-help books on spirituality, reducing
stress, simplifying life, and downsizing. He says generation upon generation of
Americans have now seen "things" aren't the answer. "They're fine -- if you're
happy," he says.
"We were driving back from Connecticut," Stone says.
"Now there are big tanks (sport utility vehicles) going by with people
(driving) like they're in some war. If you have $50,000 to buy this machine,
why are you so angry?"
Elaine St. James, the San Diego-based author
of "Simplify Your Life" (Hyperion, $19.95, paperback), says the backlash
against the excesses of the '80s is larger than many people realize.
In the summer of 1990, she had her own "epiphany."
Downsizing her
home came first, then her stressful real estate investor job had to go. Writing
about her experience changing her life led to her career as an author and
syndicated columnist.
"The book came out May 1 of '94, and I was on
Oprah May 2," St. James says. It turned out Oprah was going through the same
epiphany, and Barbra Streisand was getting rid of some houses at the same time.
"Until then I thought it was just my husband and I who had gotten
carried away," St. James adds. "We went through a period in the '80s when
people thought they had to do it all and see it all.
"People may not
know there's a (simplicity) movement out there," she says. "They just know it's
not worth it to work 10- to 12-hour days and have a huge mortgage debt for a
house they spend little time in.
"Millions of people are willing to
cut back on their salaries to get that quality back to their life. Even if you
love your job, it's so easy to get burned out and not have time to enjoy the
rest of your life," she adds.
Huff had worked as a Web site
designer and project manager for a major New Jersey corporation and earned a
"high five-figure" salary after a total of 17 years.
While sitting
around her huge Jacuzzi-equipped Bedminster condo recovering from a broken leg,
she began exploring her career options.
"I started asking myself what
I wanted to do," Huff says. "Other people have something in mind and are
afraid to do it. I didn't know."
She did research on personal growth
through the Internet and came across the new field of personal coaches. They
"coach" for people who want to make job or other changes.
Huff
got a personal coach, signed up for her own training, and tried coaching others
part time for six months while still keeping her regular job. Ten months ago,
she quit the corporation. Besides her coaching work, she is using her corporate
computer skills for consulting.
"It was hard giving up that steady
paycheck," notes Huff, who is single. "I put a plan together."
The first order of business was putting the condo on the market. "I didn't want
a mortgage hanging over my head without a steady income," she says. "I knew it
was a good sign when my house sold the first weekend. I said, 'It's okay. It's
a go.' The rest started to fall into place."
Huff said her
family was supportive of her decision, but co-workers were divided between
those who called her plans "thrilling" and "inspiring" and those she says were
thinking, "Let's see her fall on her face."
So far, she's still
standing.
Her income has been cut in half, and home is now a
dishwasher-less four-room garden apartment in Mendham. Gone also are the trips
abroad that came with her company job, extravagant vacations, and being able to
buy just about whatever she wanted.
"But now I'm doing something I
enjoy doing," Huff says. She notes she no longer works an "exhausting"
40 to 50 hours a week and adds, "I could only imagine if I had had a husband
and a couple of kids running around the house."
Also gone is the
structure of a traditional work environment -- not always a good thing.
"For the first couple of weeks, you feel like you're on a normal
vacation," Huff says, "then you realize you don't have to go back to
work. It requires a lot of self-discipline (working at home) because no one
motivates you but you."
Huff now puts in 30- or 40-hour work
weeks. Fridays are "play" days.
Another corporate transplant is
Jerome Scriptunas. He worked 17 years for AT&T and is also single. He, too,
is using what he learned in corporate life for his professional reincarnation.
The 42-year-old Red Bank resident had been offered a voluntary
retirement incentive as part of the company's downsizing. He worked there as a
benchmarking consultant, investigating successful business practices in other
companies and applying them for AT&T.
"I could have stayed, but
it was good timing for me," he adds. "I had built up the belief that at some
point I would want to change my life and see what a different career path and
personal situation might be like."
He left AT&T on June 30, 1998,
and went into business for himself three weeks later. He runs his own
benchmarking and technical recruiting business from his kitchen.
"I
went from the $85,000 level at AT&T to zero for the second half of the
year" because of equipment purchases and other start-up costs, Scriptunas says.
He is now "barely" making a third of his corporate salary and would be content
to make half his former paycheck.
"Hopefully, by the end of the year,
that (his income) will creep up, but I don't expect to get to the level I was
at -- that is not necessarily the goal," Scriptunas adds.
"I wanted
to spend more time examining my life and taking care of my health," he adds,
noting traveling he did for his job often fatigued him. He says, however, he
had wanted to work another 15 years before retiring, though his townhouse was
nearly paid for.
"I wanted to do that, and I needed to do that," he
adds. "I spent half of my career in one company.
"I've scaled back --
not taking vacations, not buying a new car, not going out eating frequently,
not buying music CDs every weekend, trying to go to movies at matinees (when
tickets are cheaper), and eating in," he says. "There were a lot of sobering
issues with the money management."
Still, he says, "I'm 100 percent
confident with my decision."
Stone, 64, and his wife, 58, say it is
never too late for a better quality of life.
Mrs. Stone quit
commercial freelance writing last year to become a yoga teacher, and Stone left
his business publishing career about two months ago. He was expected to work
there until 70.
Their Web site (www.2young2retire.com) provides
information and inspiration for people interested in making similar changes.
After going into business for themselves, selling or giving away much
of the contents of their four-story townhouse in Hoboken, and downsizing to a
loft apartment in Weehawken, they say they now feel truly fulfilled. They are
putting more emphasis on family and other things they enjoy, like cooking and
music.
Mrs. Stone says, "It's amazing how the things we like to do
don't really cost any money."
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