As I wrote in my Ten Years post, I’ve become interested in leveraging my digital life style as a way of further simplifying my life. My post on everyday carry is an example of this: searching for ways to minimize the things I have to take with me when I leave the house.
It turns out that there’s a related movement that is also concerned with simplifying your life: minimalism. The idea—or at least the main idea—is to simplify your life through reducing the number of your possessions by getting rid of everything that you don’t need or love.
It’s an attractive idea in many ways but, of course, many of its adherents have turned it into a cult. They’ve made it into a religion that they use to define themselves rather than using it as a way to make their lives better by emphasizing the things that matter. These people are really annoying and give minimalism a bad name. Sadly, most people writing about minimalism are like this.
They like to argue about how many forks or t-shirts you should own and proudly announce that they got rid of their couches. For many of these folks, it’s a game of count your objects; the lowest number wins. They put me in mind of the New Luddites in their forsaking of convenience to show how morally superior they are. The rest of us, of course, think they’re a little nutty. That’s too bad because there is a point to minimalism.
Of course, not all minimalists are like that. This guy, although he owns practically nothing, seems to me to be doing it right. It’s all about making his life simpler, not about reducing his possessions for its own sake. Another minimalist whose approach I really like is video blogger Matt D’Avella. Matt’s latest video, published as I was working on this post, describes what happens When Minimalism Goes Too Far. Like his video on You can’t be a minimalist if… he pokes fun at those humorless souls who want to drum folks out of the minimalist cult for owning too many things.
I’ve been taking tiny strides in the minimalist direction and they have made my life simpler and better. I will never, I’m sure, reach the point where I can pack everything I own in a small suitcase and move at a moment’s notice. Nor do I want to. It’s just nice to get rid of complications when you can.