Sep 7, 2022
Stop Looking. The Answer is Minimal Living.
Let me explain. You can still have an unruly underwear drawer.
The tale of a young professional, “I had it all, and I was still unhappy — so I threw everything away!”. That is not my story. While I am a on-my-way to success young professional — I am a happy person and I have most of it “all”. I love my life, my husband, my dog, and my apartment. I wish I had more money saved and less debt, but heck, don’t we all! Now what I will say is that I am unreasonably exhausted. I am exhausted of cleaning, I am exhausted of finding new places for all my shit to be perpetually re-organized into. I am exhausted from being tied down to a bunch of shit I think I am going to use.
Let’s back up, the true revelation came when I spent the whole month of August traveling for work and a wedding, and then I got sick and couldn’t leave my location for extra days. Out of 31 days, I spent 20 away from home. I had everything I needed in a suitcase I shared with my husband and a backpack. Do you know what I missed? My space. My big screen TV. My books. My bed. My sofa. My balcony with the awesome bird’s nest chair my husband got me for Christmas. I missed the air and the light that comes through the windows in the morning. My dog’s cute stare. The smile my husband gave me when we cross each other in the hallway of our apartment as we go about our day.
If you’re not getting it… Most of these things are not stuff. They’re spaces, moments, and items that facilitate the enjoyment of space. You don’t need all those plates you’ve been collecting for years. You don’t need all those skin care products and jewelry you will never, ever use. You know you only have 3 coats you really like, the other 17 are just a waste of space for when you lose weight, become an influencer or suddenly become a more fashionable person for some reason.
As I write this, I have so much crap in my apartment, and just thinking about it makes me miserable. In the last couple of months, I have really honed what I want out of life — and the thing I want most is a sense of freedom and peace. I want to allow my spontaneity to express itself without any constraints of “but first I have to do this”. I want cleanliness and beauty, and to be effortless in my existence. I want to expedite getting dressed, doing laundry, cooking — basically all the human shit we are convinced we have to do, so I can leave space wide open for reading, playing, and creating. Yes, I will have a box of memories, and I will have to clean once a week, but I don’t want to continue to feel overwhelmed by the material things I have.
So am I into minimal living? Yes! Am I a minimalist? No.
It is minimal living with regard to you and your sensibilities/needs.
This article is the first step to a hugely radical change that will allow me to go to the next level of my life plans. I write this as a commitment to myself and in the hopes to inspire others to find a way to be more detached from the concept of owning a lot of material things in the hopes that you will use it later.
That being said… I will collect as many books as I want. I want a giant library with millions of books. So. The true message of the article is choose your clutter, don’t let clutter choose you.
