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My Journey to a minimalist life
Today I’ll share with you my radical honest view and experiences about my journey to minimalism and living a minimalistic life for the past 3 years.
As you know, I only share about the tools, wisdom, and techniques that I personally incorporated, experienced, or explored with an intention that you can also achieve the similar transformative benefits in life if you incorporate it.
In this article, my intention is to introduce you to the philosophy of minimalism, the benefits, and tips to get you started. You can expect 100% of my personal view without any bias.
Before we deep dive into this topic, let me share two personal stories with you that indirectly lead me to start the journey of becoming a minimalist.
How I got into minimalism?
First Story
Almost over 3.5 years ago, I was moving from a 4 bedroom single story house to a 5 bedroom double story house (not quite minimalistic, right?). As the moving day was approaching, I was frantically busy packing all my possessions by myself for the move. I kept putting off the kitchen area as I was dreading to be honest.
Back then, I had a different lifestyle where I used to frequently host parties at my place. I loved cooking and entertaining. So I knew a have a fair bit of stuff to pack in the kitchen. Eventually night before the move, I had to force myself to pack. As I started packing, I realized there are so many pots, pans, dishes that I haven’t even used. They were all brand new with the price tag on it.
Till today, I vividly remember that scene, when I was holding two identical sets of cutlery set from IKEA which I had no recollection of buying and even knew existed in my pantry. I felt so disappointed and mad at myself thinking of what a waste of money. What was I thinking when I was buying this? I could have used this money for other things or even donated to charity.
Looking back now, I can connect the dots where I went wrong. I was filling my internal void with external possessions by IKEA trips during weekends and buying things. This memory often reminds me of a quote “We buy things to impress people with the money that we don’t have to the people who we don’t even like.”
I’m sure many of you can relate to this feeling if you are honest with yourself.
Second story
In the past few years, my career was going well and I was climbing the corporate ladder pretty quickly. Soon getting and expecting the next position up in the ladder became my norm. As soon as I get the next position up in the chain, I work harder, hustle more, and push myself to get the next one. So a few years ago, at one point I was trying to get the next role but for some reason or other, it wasn’t happening according to my timing. This delay made me frustrated and even more obsessed to get that position.
I knew I’m deserving and I’ve done enough hard work but it just wasn’t happening. I felt like all of my happiness were just revolving around that position. Fast forward, after 6 months, I got that role. My old team organized a farewell dinner for me.
That evening everyone was congratulating me and genuinely happy for me. I remember after I came home that night, I sat down on my couch holding the job offer letter and feeling so empty inside. I wasn’t happy. That promotion did not give me happiness as I seeking.
I kept asking myself, why I’m not feeling happy? What’s wrong with me? If this is not making me happy then what else will? What is that I’m missing here?
I know the answer now that happiness, joy, and fulfillment mostly comes from internally and also sometimes from externally if those are aligned to our purpose, value system, and life vision.
Well I know, some of you must be saying “duh how did you not know that before? Well, we all hear or read about these things but I guess sometimes we just have to experience for ourselves to get that deep realization. It was similar for me.
By this point, you must be thinking what’s these stories got to do with Minimalism?
Well, you’ll be able to connect the dots by the end of this article if you keep reading.
What is the Minimalism Philosophy?
In my opinion, Minimalism is best defined by Joshua Fields Millburn & Ryan Nicodemus from The Minimalist.
Minimalism is a lifestyle that helps people question what things add value to their lives. By clearing the clutter from life’s path, we can all make room for the most important aspects of life: health, relationships, passion, growth, and contribution.
- Joshua Fields Millburn & Ryan Nicodemus
Intentionality and Prioritising things that bring joy and fulfilment are the two key fundamental aspects of Minimalism that intrigued me initially to learn more about this and also helped me incorporating this into my lifestyle with ease.
Minimalism encourages taking an individualistic approach to intentionally design and create a life worth living with essential items. It’s personal and the best thing is there are no set of rules or standards you must follow to become a minimalist.
Minimalism is a concept of living a simplified life with essentials or fewer distractions to create the maximum effect in life.
You can think this as similar to the Pareto 80/20 principle, where you are still getting 80% of the benefits by having the right 20% of essentials in your life according to your life purpose, goals, and value system.
What Minimalism means for me?
To me Minimalism Means
- Journey – it’s a journey to design and create an abundant and fulfilling life. It’s not a milestone or goal that I need to reach. Rather it’s enhancing the lifestyle to fully live and experience life.
- Intentionality – creating and designing a lifestyle and surrounding environment that sparks joy, happiness, and aligns with the purpose of my life. It’s a choice of intentionally selecting essential items, people, and activities to build a meaningful life. I use and appreciate fully every single material possessions I have and purchase.
- Prioritize – Prioritising time, energy, actions to create a more fulfilling life.
- Freedom – Minimalism liberated me from the traditional rat race of consumerism to breathe, enjoy, and appreciate the things I have in life.
- Productivity- when I stopped making trips to IKEA, shopping malls, I made time to go for a run to rejuvenate my mind, body, and soul. Minimalism allowed me to become more productive than ever before by removing distractions from life. Minimalistic lifestyle allowed me to continue with my demanding career, run this blog, make time to nourish and transform my mind, body, and soul daily.
- Abundance – when I removed all unnecessary distractions, I developed more appreciation of things, people, and relationships I have right now in life. Once I removed all the clutters, I have found the treasures I already have that I was not able to see or find. It’s almost like it was covered with a dense fog. At the same time, I’m able to purchase quality things, grow & invest financial portfolios, develop and nurture deep meaningful relationships.
What Minimalism does not mean for me?
To me, minimalism DOES NOT mean
- Depravation– depriving myself of having or wanting things that truly make me happy. An example, I’m still living in that 5 bedroom house cause this is something that allows me to create a space and lifestyle that’s 100% aligned to my mission and become the best version of myself.
- Getting rid of everything – Minimalism is not about owning nothing. Unlike other minimalists, I have never counted how many material possessions I own in life. However, I categorically know exactly each item I have, where it belongs, and the value it brings in my life. I can still have and own any sentimental items or hobby collection if I truly want. By the way, if you are curious, I gave away and donated those 2 sets of IKEA cutlery sets and some cookeries to charity. I realized that there are other materials that give me more joy than a cutlery set.
- Extremism – Minimalism is not about living an extreme or restrictive life which is hard, unrealistic, and not sustainable to live
- Only applies to material things – I can not only apply minimalism philosophy to material items but it’s even more powerful and applicable to all the other areas of life. I have applied this philosophy to developing a growth mindset, generate wealth, and develop relationships.
- Set of rules – there are no strict rules or standards that anyone has to follow to live a minimalistic life. it is a 100% customizable concept that you can adopt today and start that journey to create a more meaningful and purposeful life.
5 EASY Steps to start minimalism
Remember Minimalism is a journey and not a goal post. So you can get started today with one item and incrementally make further lifestyle changes. There is no right or wrong way to get started. However, I’ve outlined 5 easy and effective ways to incorporate into your life Right Now.
01
Find your WHY
If you seriously consider becoming a minimalist or just want to give this concept a try, it’s important to find out your reason first.
If you are sick of debt collectors or never able to find things or never having time to enjoy life with your loved ones…. whatever the reasons, write it down.
Your WHY’s will provide great motivation when you’ll find it hard to continue. your WHY will remind you of the reason you started in the first place.
02
Prioritise
it’s super important, to reflect and prioritise which areas of your life you need to start practicing minimalism.
Is it your physical living environment, mental & emotional state or financial?
The goal is here to start with one area and make incremental consistent changes to stick to this habit. it’s no use for you to tackle everything at once and feel overwhelmed.
03
Giveaway the duplicates
As I shared earlier, one of the pivotal moments for me was the realisation that I had way too many duplicate items in my household.
So look around your living space and see whether you have duplicate items which you can let go or donate to charity.
Like me do you have multiple cutlery sets, kitchen gadgets that can find a new home where it will be much loved?
One important tip is that you have to be radically honest with yourself.
04
Intentional purchase
This is one of my favourites. Be intentional with your purchase. Focus on quality and multi-purpose use aspects.
Next time, when you go shopping, ask yourself, Is this item an absolute necessity? If you splurging on something, is this going to spark joy in your life for weeks or months in time, not only one time?
When I started asking these questions before I bought things, I started to have a deep realisation of the things that truly gives me joy.
05
Reward yourself
Once you have started adopting minimalism, it’s important to celebrate your journey. Now that you have managed to create some savings through this journey, think how you can invest in yourself or donate or create more meaningful experiences with this money.
Initially, I gave myself a 4 month minimalism challenge and I planned to use the savings from this period towards my next holiday in Bali. To my surprise, I managed to save 70% of my Bali trip money within that 4 months.
