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 of best-selling downshifting self-help books for people who want to simplify their lives; there are newsletters, such as The Tightwad Gazette, that give hundreds of thousands of Americans useful tips on anything from recycling their cling-film to making their own soap; there are even support groups for those who want to achieve the mid-'90s equivalent of dropping out.

While in America the trend started as a reaction to the economy decline-after the mass redundancies caused by downsizing in the late'80s-and is still linked to the politics of thrift, in Britain, at least among the middle-class down-shifters of my acquaintance, we have different reasons for seeking to simplify our lives.��

For the women of my generation who were urged to keep juggling through the'80s,downshifting in the mid-'90s is not so much a search for the mythical good life-growing your own organic vegetables, and risking turning into one-as a personal recognition of your limitations.

當決定辭去自己的全職工作時，我決沒有想到自己會成為國際新潮流的一分子。一次平級的人事調動傷了我的自尊心，并且阻礙了我的事業發展，這促使我放棄原來那個地位較高的職業，當然，就像面子掃盡的政府部長那樣，我也掩飾說"我只想與家人更多的呆在一起"。

奇怪的是，在大約兩年半的時間內寫完兩部小說后，我這種被美國人稱為"放慢生活節奏"的嘗試卻使我原來那個陳詞濫調的借口變成了現實。我已從一個"獲得一切"哲學（琳達·凱茜過去七年中在《她》這本雜志所宣揚的）的狂熱支持者，變成了一個對一切淺嘗輒止就心滿意足的女人。

我發現，放棄"忙忙碌碌"的生活哲學，而選擇一種"放慢生活節奏"的生活所帶來的回報，比經濟成功和社會地位更有價值。由于壓力過大，凱茜已多次公開宣稱要辭去《她》雜志編輯的職務，也許在辭職之后她會有同樣的發現。沒有任何理由能夠說服我回到過去那種凱茜所宣揚的、我也曾自得其樂的生活：每天工作12小時，壓得人喘不過氣來的最后期限，辦公室里的爾虞我詐、提心吊膽、緊張不安，為人母也受到了很大的限制而必須高效，無法與孩子共渡"優質時間"。

在美國，擺脫忙碌、轉向一種簡單、遠離物質化的生活已成一種明顯的趨勢。具有諷刺意味的是，"放慢生活節奏"--在美國也稱"自愿簡單化"--居然還孕育了一個嶄新的、可稱之為反消費主義的生活方式。對于那些想簡單生活的人來說，有許多暢銷的自助書籍能幫你輕松生活；有各種簡訊，例如省錢簡報，會給美國人提供成千上萬條有用的點子去做事，從回收保鮮膜到自制肥皂；甚至還有一些幫助團體專門幫助人們按照90年代中期脫離傳統社會的那種人的生活方式去生活。

在美國，這種趨勢一開始是對經濟衰落所做出的一種反應--出現于80年代后期縮小經濟規模所引起的大量裁員之后--現在仍與節儉的觀點密切相連；而在英國，至少在我所認識的那些簡化生活的中產階級中，尋求簡樸生活卻有著不同的原因。

對我們這一代女性來說，整個80年代中我們曾被迫忙碌地應付生活，90年代中期的簡化生活與其說是尋求神話般的美好生活--自己種有機蔬菜以及冒險制造有機蔬菜--倒不如說我們都認識了自身的局限。