(This post was written on my first blog in January of 2015 and I am reposting here before I start sharing where I am in my journey with Minimalism as of today. Enjoy!)
Wow. What a week! It all started a week and a half ago. I was spending the weekend with my best friend’s kids while she went on a weekend getaway with her hubs. Since it was cold outside, there wasn’t much to do. Naturally, I opened up Netflix and saw there was a new documentary recently added called “Minimalism”. To be honest, I have always been very curious about what this was, so I watched it! And I’m so glad I did. This documentary shook me and I was instantly inspired.
If you’re unfamiliar with minimalism, you can check out The Minimalists blog to learn more. Minimalism is about living with less, living intentionally, and living free. It’s learning to live without all the excess, learning to stop giving so much value to objects, and finding value in experiences. I think that in our culture, we get caught up in feeling the need to always be busy, stressing to make money so we can buy the things we think we need. I’ll be honest I have always been one of them.
Over the last year, my habits became increasingly worse. I would wake up in the morning and instantly check my e-mail to see what sales were going on that day. Throughout the day, I fixated on the thoughts of what I was going to buy when I got off work… things I didn’t need, or really even want. We turn objects, whether it be clothes, shoes, gadgets, etc. into pacifiers for ourselves. We buy all these things because we think they are going to make us happier. Newsflash: they don’t. The newness wears off and shortly after we are left with a dull steel juicer that we used one time and will never use again.
In my first week practicing minimalism, I have reduced our household “stuff” by about 40-50% I’d say. Unknowingly, my soul has been leaning towards minimalism for the past few months. I have progressively been getting rid of stuff just to get rid of it, not really knowing the reason why. This was a huge blessing because it made the transition much easier. Now, that’s not to say I got rid of EVERYTHING. We still have plenty of things, probably more than we actually need. But for the most part, every item I kept either serves a purpose, or is beautiful to me.
Minimalism is not only about getting rid of objects, but minimizing things that simply do not add value or serve a purpose in your life. Our time is precious and to think that some of us waste it thinking we need to do things we don’t love is heartbreaking. We have one life to live. I refuse to live it doing things I hate and being surrounded by objects that add no value to my life.
Thankfully, my best friend is also incorporating minimalism into her own life. We have been so encouraging to each other with getting rid of stuff and we had a yardsale this weekend. Everything we didn’t sell, we donated! It did not come back in the house so it could re-clutter.
Now that I have rambled forever, I’ll share what I learned in this first week.
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Scrolling through social media for countless hours adds no value to my life.
Quite honestly, I have known this for a while, but was too comfortable to change. After “social media binges”, I would always feel empty and almost guilty that I had wasted so much time doing something that didn’t serve a real purpose. In fact, I bought a domain for my blog in the fall of last year, and I never made the time to write any posts. Was I busy? yes. But could I have made time? absolutely. Instead, I scrolled through thousands of posts that did nothing, but keep me up at night because I just couldn’t put the phone down. -
Minimalism will help with financial stability.
I can’t 100% speak about this from experience yet, since I am still so new to this new approach at life. However, in the past at this point in the pay period (about halfway through) I have usually already spent most of our income. That is hard for me to say because I like to think of myself as a frugal shopper, but I was an addicted frugal shopper. It’s embarrassing to share this kind of information, but for you to truly understand how minimalism has changed my life, I feel that it’s necessary. This month, I have paid all our bills, put a significant amount into savings, taken our two dogs to the vet, and I’m still not worried about our bank account getting too low. For me, that speaks volumes as my shopping habits have sometimes caused us to live almost paycheck to paycheck in the past. -
It’s not a sale if you don’t need it.
This point is self explanatory and goes with the point above. Consumerism has taught us that if it’s on sale we need it. I urge you to not simply buy items just because there is a sale. And along with that, give up shopping unless there is something you absolutely need. I promise you that in a week of practicing these two things, I have remarkably less stress. Not only am I less financially stressed, but I also am much more relaxed because I’m not wasting my precious time looking through items that I know I don’t need. -
I have so much time!
This past week, I set a work schedule, so I don’t feel the need to stay until 4 or 5 in the afternoon. I get off at 2:00 now and I make myself leave no matter what. I now have time to go to the gym, cook and eat dinner with my beloved, clean up, and have hours to do more things that add value to my life before bed! Since our stuff has been minimized, I have much less to tidy up. Which in turn gives me more free time. The less you have, the less time you spend cleaning, the more time you have for things that are truly important to you. -
I’m the happiest I have been in years.
I rest so well at night. When I wake up in the morning I have time to cook breakfast for my husband, kiss him, and send him off to work. I play with my dogs before work while I drink my coffee. I listen to music that makes me happy on my way to work. While I’m at work I listen to music or a podcast that adds value to my life. I accomplish much more. When I get to the gym I think about how thankful that my body can do what it does, even though it might not be a lot to some. On my 30 minute drive home I call my Peepaw, something that I started to stray away from after my grandma passed away, but I knew was very important to both of us. When I get home I am excitedly greeted by my two little fluffy monsters, Charlie and Dallas. I start dinner just in time for my husband to get home and sit down to eat together. I clean up and take a long bath or shower, just relaxing and reflecting on the day. Then I light some candles and spend the evening doing something that I love, like watching my favorite TV show with my husband, or writing a blog (like I am now), or just being quiet. Around 8:30 or 9:00 I get in bed, put some lavender oil on the bottom of my feet, and sleep like a baby.
Yes, I just took you through one of my normal days. But I can honestly tell you, since starting this transition in my lifestyle, I have become so much more sensitive to the value of each of these tasks throughout the day. I acknowledge each of these things as I go through my day because I know that they serve a purpose and are beautiful. I notice nature more, I notice how good the January Florida air feels against my skin. I notice so many special things that I was just too busy to notice before. And it’s amazing.
I urge you to minimize something in your life today and slow down. Notice the little things. Spend your life being joyful and full of love, putting value into time spent with people. Not drained, tired and broke.
