Joshua Becker's Blog, page 44

Defining What’s ‘Enough’ in Your Home

Note: This is a guest post by Julianna Poplin of The Simplicity Habit.

The world constantly tells you to do more, have more, and buy more. So how do you decide when you have ‘enough’? 

Advertisers would have you believe that there is no such thing as enough because once you believe you have it, you’ll stop buying. And that’s the opposite of what they want. They benefit from you constantly feeling like you’re lacking.

Determining your definition of enough will help you to feel more content with what you already have. It will also help you resist getting pulled back into the cycle of excess.

When you determine what is enough in your home, it brings clarity to what’s become clutter. It also helps you to decide whether or not to bring additional items into your home.

Why determining ‘enough’ can be tough

Deciding what is enough in your home can be a challenge. Here are a few reasons why.

It’s not the same for everyone.

What is enough for you is likely not the same as what is enough for someone else. Different people have varying comfort levels with the amount of stuff in their home.

Some people prefer to own significantly less, as they see stuff as a barrier to freedom. Others find comfort in owning certain things and don’t want to part with them. 

There is no magic number of what is enough. It’s something you have to determine on your own.

Some people will become minimalists. And some people won’t. And that’s ok. 

It’s more complicated when you live with other people.

Having different definitions of enough can create a challenge when you live in a house with other people. You may be perfectly happy with the number of things you own, while your partner may think it’s far too much (or too little).

Getting to a place where you’re both happy takes work, compromise, and a lot of communication. 

I know because I live it. When I decided to start decluttering our home, my husband wasn’t thrilled. Seven years later, it’s still not something that he loves. His enough is a lot more than my enough, so it’s something we have to work through together. 

It’s countercultural.

In a society that says you never have enough, it can be more challenging to decide when you do. The messages you read will continually tell you that you need more. 

It’s easy for your identity to become tied up in the stuff you own and the things you do. 

Get comfortable with not being normal. Know that determining what enough is won’t be encouraged or supported by the culture at large.

It’s helpful to follow pages and voices that encourage a simpler way of living for support in your journey.

You can intentionally release the hold that stuff has in your life. Defining enough is the first step in the process.

How to define what is ‘enough’

So how do you determine what is enough for you? These two questions can bring clarity. 

Is it moving you toward your goals or distracting you from them?

Whether you’re decluttering your home or considering buying an item, ask yourself if the item is moving you toward your goals or distracting you from them.

Your stuff is meant to support the life that you want. The things you own should help you to create the life you want and reflect your values.

Having excess in your life can take your time and attention from what matters most to you. With practice, it will become clearer which things are hindering your goals.

Benefit or burden?

Ask yourself if the item is (or would be) a benefit or a burden in your life. Despite what marketing will tell you, you can have too much of a good thing. When you own too much, your stuff stops feeling as beneficial and becomes more of a burden.

As you sort through the stuff in your home, be honest with yourself about what you truly love and use. Let go of the things that are weighing you down.  

You’ll know you are living with enough when you’re less stressed over your stuff and more at peace in your home.

Maintaining your ‘enough’

Once you’ve defined your enough, it takes work to maintain it. Here are two strategies to help you…

Create your own rules 

Adopting decluttering habits into your life will help you to maintain your enough. Create rules that work for you and your family. A popular rule is one in one out. With this rule, if you bring something new into your home, you must also declutter something from your home. This will prevent you from adding more stuff without also taking things out. 

Create rules with shopping to help you maintain your enough. Don’t make impulse purchases. Be intentional and thoughtful with how you use your money and what you decide to bring into your home. 

Re-evaluate periodically

Increasing your awareness of your stuff is one step to finding your enough. It also takes re-evaluating your things from time to time to make sure it stays under control. 

Review your stuff seasonally to make sure that you’re not exceeding your definition of enough. Realize also that your definition may change with time and in different seasons of your life.

After becoming an empty nester, for example, you may want to further simplify and downsize. Your enough may look different at this point. It can evolve over time as your circumstances change.

The benefits of finding your ‘enough’

Establishing and maintaining your level of enough has many benefits in your life. Here are four of them.

1. More gratitude

Focusing on your enough helps you to feel more grateful. When you look at what you have and create a habit of looking for things to be thankful for, you’ll feel more content.

2. Less envy 

When you opt-out of the messaging that tells you that you need more and you stop comparing yourself with others, you can embrace your life as it is now. Defining what’s enough allows you to stop feeling jealous of others.

3. Save money

Defining enough helps you to save money. When you stop chasing the newest and greatest things, you spend less. As you learn to be more intentional with shopping, you stop the cycle of clutter coming into your home. 

4. Enjoy life more 

Defining what is enough helps you to refocus on what matters most to you. It takes away the drive to continually accumulate more, and it allows you to give your attention to more important things in life.

Determine what is ‘enough,’ and find the freedom that comes with it.

***

Julianna Poplin blogs at The Simplicity Habit. She is a wife, mama, and professional declutterer who helps people create margin, so they can say yes to the great. You can also find her on Facebook.

Inspiring Simplicity. Weekend Reads.

Fill your life with stories to tell, not stuff to show.

The simplicity/minimalism movement is a beautiful community. And I enjoy any opportunity to promote writing that encourages people to live more by owning less.

I invite you to fix yourself a nice warm cup of coffee or tea. Find a quiet moment this weekend. And enjoy some encouraging words to inspire more simplicity in your life today.

A Life of Meaning Without Buying | Zen Habits by Leo Babauta. What we really want can’t be found outside of us.

The Minimalist Mindset Shift – 9 Ways Minimalism Changes the Way You Think | The Simple Lionheart Life by Melissa Russell. Once you have fully embraced a minimalist mindset, the way you think shifts and changes. You think differently about what you have in your home, how you spend your time, what your priorities are and what you value.

I No Longer Want to Shop | The New York Times by Arsh Raziuddin. A year-plus without shopping has wrought a whole new perspective on stores, and the nature of my attachment to them.

How I Kicked My Fast Fashion Addiction | Live Kindley by Charlotte Pointing. There are ways we can change our habits and make a difference. Here are three tips from a fast fashion addict (recovery in progress.)

7 Daily Habits to Change Your Life Forever | Joshua Becker on YouTube

How I Broke Up With My Piano

Note: This is a guest post by Rose Lounsbury.

I’m not a relationship expert. I got lucky in love, married for nearly 17 years to my hometown sweetheart. But I do know something about certain kinds of relationships: the kinds we develop with stuff. 

Some stuff is easy to part with. Freebies, for example. These are the one-night stands of stuff. That key chain from your insurance agent? You can probably toss that sucker in the trash with only a twinge of sweet regret. (It was a moment of madness when you plucked it from the dish in his office, after all.) 

But other items give us pause. These are the kinds of items we’ve developed long relationships with. Items like… my piano.  

I had my piano for years. My parents had it before me, and my grandparents before them. The story goes that my grandfather bought the piano for $50 from my mom’s college sorority house when they upgraded their piano in the 1960s. (Just imagine being the guy turned down by an entire houseful of sorority sisters, ouch!) 

The piano was a nice guy, humble, no frills. But dang, was he big and heavy! I let him hang around my house for about a decade. I knew things weren’t working out for us, but I just couldn’t bring myself to have that awkward, “It’s not you, it’s me” conversation.

Why? Two big reasons: 

Reason #1: I can play the piano

The key word here is can. As Yoda would say, Do or do not, there is no can. (That quote may not be exactly right, but I earned major points from my husband for attempting to quote Star Wars.) 

Yes, I can play this piano. But do I? Not so much. When faced with a moment of free time, I usually choose to go for a walk or read a book. We’re only given so much time in life and we get to choose how to spend that precious time. I don’t choose to play the piano. And that’s okay.

Reason #2: My kids might want to play the piano

The key word here is might. As every kid who ever took piano lessons would say, “But I don’t wanna practice!!” I have no guarantees that my kids will ever want to play the piano, and keeping it for that future possibility is like keeping a trapeze in my backyard in case one of them wants to become an acrobat. (Note: Given the suggestion that acrobatics is a future career possibility, I’m sure my kids would immediately commence high-pressure trapeze requests, so let’s keep this on the down-low.) 

To combat this “What if…?” fear, I nudge budding musicians in my household toward trumpets, violins, and the like. All these instruments are portable yet still quench the musical thirst. And if my kids ever insist on playing the piano, I will count on good karma to bring another free piano into my path. 

Speaking of good karma… 

It was a fateful Tuesday afternoon. I took a deep breath, snapped a picture of the piano, and posted it for free on a local buy/sell/trade Facebook group. Within 10 minutes, one lucky lady had herself a new piano to love, and I began imagining more open space in my living room. 

I remember the day the piano movers came to part us forever. I watched them carefully carry him down the front steps toward the truck. I felt my heart squeeze as they loaded him onto the lift, knowing that the moment he disappeared into that truck bed, I would never see him again. 

I almost ran outside and breathlessly yelled, “Wait! I’ve changed my mind! Let’s stay together!”

But this wasn’t a romantic movie. It wasn’t raining. There was no orchestra playing an emotional soundtrack. 

It was time for us to go our separate ways.  

At first, I struggled with the urge to rebound. The space in my living room looked so bare! If you’ve ever gotten out of a long relationship, you know what I mean. I need something, anything, to fill this empty space! I considered cruising the scene at local piano bars or seeking lonely pianos online, (Pianomatch.com, anyone?) 

But I stayed true to my minimalist ideals and allowed the space to just be. After a while, it didn’t seem so empty. Soon after that, I started to like it.

I was free.

Is there a stuff relationship in your life that is going nowhere? Are you holding on to things that no longer reflect how you choose to spend your time? Are you keeping things because you hope they will become useful in the future?

We all know this, but it bears repeating:

We do not live in the past or the future. We live now.

I urge you…

Let go of stuff relationships that are holding you back from enjoying the present moments of your life.

Take the plunge, make a clean break, and open up to the beautiful possibilities of open space.

***

Rose Lounsbury is a simplicity coach, author, speaker, and still-sane triplet mama who helps busy people live happier lives by owning less stuff. You can read more of her words on minimalism, simplicity, and intentional living at roselounsbury.com or get to know her on Instagram , Facebook , and LinkedIn . 

How to Live in this Modern World

Note: This is a guest post by Mike Donghia of This Evergreen Home .

This modern world that we live in, like any age, has its blessings and challenges. If you want to live a flourishing life, then it’s especially important to be aware of the drawbacks of your culture and time, in order to protect yourself against them. 

In this post, I’m going to be speaking specifically about life in the modern Western world for those who are living at least a middle class lifestyle. The principles likely transfer well to other scenarios, but I’ll keep myself from speaking about that which I have not experienced first hand.

The challenges of modern life

I’m not here to make the case that our modern world is any better or worse than what’s come before. Of course, it’s going to be a mixture of both. But it’s absolutely true that our world still has its challenges. Just look around at so many people struggling with obesity, depression, and addiction. 

We don’t have a binary choice between the past or the present. We can keep what is good from our modern world and learn what we can from the past. There are 3 particular challenges that we face in modern society:

An abundance of food and information. Modern agriculture, technological changes, and rising incomes has made it so that most of us have a nearly limitless access to tasty food and pleasing content to consume. It would be foolish to say that abundance is purely a curse, when so much of the world still goes without essential needs. But it’s also true that many of us have been destroyed by our appetites, unable to adjust to a reality that has only existed in the last 75 years of human history. We don’t yet have the skills to live in an age of abundance.

Too much consistency, predictability, & convenience. We eat 3 meals a day, spaced out perfectly throughout our waking hours, with a small snack in between. We leave our 72 degree homes to climb into our temperature controlled cars and then spend our evenings in front of a screen. Where is the variation? Where is the possibility for surprise or even inconvenience to slip in? We’ve removed it completely, at potentially great cost to our health and happiness.

We’ve removed too much mystery and texture from everyday life. Ever since the industrial era, our world has become increasingly fixated on efficiency and optimization. Since the enlightenment, we’ve been driven by the idea that reason and rationality are the only sources of authority. These movements brought many good changes, but even a good idea can be taken too far. We’ve lost a sense of wonder in our lives by removing much of what is mysterious and that which was built on faith and tradition.

A way forward

Below are a few rules of thumb that we live by in our family and have found to be useful ways to push back against some of the negative forces of modern life.

Embrace restraints.

So much modern advice is about what to add to your life: a new diet, another self-help tip, a new product. But adding things is fraught with all sorts of complications and unintended effects. There is far more wisdom to be found in the minimalist school of thought. They seek to improve life by taking away. Addition by subtraction. This method has and will continue to stand the test of time.

Simplify your life by removing what is unnecessary (101 simple living tips to get you started).Leave a few evenings and days completely empty.Spend less than you earn.Do 1 thing at a time, and be fully present.

Look at that which has stood the test of time.

Human history is a storehouse of wisdom. If something has been practiced for hundreds or even thousands of years, you can be pretty certain that the practice is 1) safe and 2) carries forward some wisdom, even if modern science has not yet caught up. Anything “invented” in the past 100 or so years has not yet withstood the filter of time. That doesn’t mean it’s wrong or bad, just that you should be skeptical. Those trying to do good, have often done the most harm. 

Be skeptical of chemicals that have been significantly added to our environment in the past 100 years (household cleaners, bug sprays, sun screen, plastics, etc.)Eat mostly foods that humans have been eating for more than 500 years.The sedentary lifestyle is largely a product of modern life. Stand up and walk around regularly.

Add stressors and challenges.

Modern life has removed so much of the variability from life. We rarely ever feel hungry, thirsty, hot, or cold for more than a few minutes. How rarely do we find ourselves out of breath panting for air, or completely alone and quiet for more than an hour? Much of our lives is optimized for consistency and sameness, but the wisdom of nature and tradition suggests that we may be missing something. Many religions, for example, practice periods of fasting and feasting. The seasons give us periods of warm, hot, cool and cold weather. Our muscles respond to acute stress and rest by getting stronger. There is much wisdom here to be rediscovered.

Occasionally skip a meal throughout the week (and allow yourself to anticipate your next meal rather than just expecting it).Expose yourself to hot and cold temperatures as a normal part of seasonal change.Take regular fasts from digital screens, reading the news, productive work, and more.

Add novelty, variation, & randomness.

Why do modern people turn to distraction, debt, or addiction? To escape the boredom and monotony of their lives. Boredom, without doubt, has been around since the beginning of history, but in our modern world we have created the perfect environment for it to flourish. By allowing volatility, randomness, and periodic change back into our lives we’ll better appreciate comfort when it comes, and learn to embrace the joy of serendipity.

Embrace different habits and traditions depending on the season.Explore all of the parks and trails within 2 hours of your home and become a connoisseur of life’s free pleasures.Try living with one car and embrace the challenge and potential inconveniences that might result.

Re-enchant your world. 

A flourishing life is filled with beauty and wonder. Without these ingredients the world can feel cold and mechanical, and the void will get filled with something less good for your soul. The re-enchantment of life starts by slowing down, it cannot be rushed. Find ways to add non-productive, not-economic activities back into your life. Let them lead you towards delight and gratitude.

Revitalize family traditions from your childhood.Practice a faith, even without all the answers (Christianity, for example, has proved to be an enduring way of life for over 2,000 years across many cultures).Take long, slow walks without a destination in mind.Add beauty to your home (houseplants, cut flowers, candles, string lights, etc.)

With the right tools and mindset, the modern world can still be a place where humans live and flourish. We can be grateful for all the areas where real progress has been made, without forgetting that tradition, simplicity, variety, and wonder still have an important role to play.

***

Mike (and his wife, Mollie) blog at This Evergreen Home where they share their experience with living simply, intentionally, and relationally in this modern world. You can follow along by subscribing to their twice-weekly newsletter .

To Declutter Faster, Identify What You Need

Quick tip for you as you pursue a life of owning less:

Begin by identifying what you need, rather than identifying what you can remove.

Often times, when we set out to declutter a space or a category of items in our home, we begin by looking for things that we can remove.

We identify the shirt that doesn’t fit, the kitchen utensil we don’t use, the toy that doesn’t get played with, or the old make-up we stopped using years ago. We scan our closets and drawers asking the question, “What can I get rid of?”

To declutter faster, change the question you are asking.

Rather than asking, “What can I get rid of?” Ask, “What do I need to keep?”

The new approach will change everything.

For example, let’s say you want to declutter the clothes you wear to work. You could go to your closet, try on every outfit and every accessory, looking for things you no longer love or no longer fit. When you finish, you’ll probably identify a small pile of clothes that you could donate at your local drop-off charity.

This is the approach of looking for things to remove.

Or you could try a strategy of identifying what you need.

If you go to work five times each week, theoretically, you only need five different work outfits (assuming you only want to do laundry once/week). Go to your closet and identify the five outfits you love the most and would choose to wear each week. This is all you need to keep and everything else could be removed immediately. After all, you’ve kept everything you need.

Now, this is your life and your closet. I may be comfortable wearing the same clothes every day, but you may want a little more variety than five outfits. It’s up to you (obviously). You may look back at your closet, after identifying five outfits, and notice a few other outfits that you want to keep. You know you don’t need them, but you may still want a few more. Take them out and set them next to the others.

You can keep what you want, but your mindset will have changed—knowing that you are now keeping things you don’t actually have to have.

In the end, all the remaining clothing in your closet can be decluttered. Your donation pile will almost certainly be larger than the previous approach.

And this principle can be applied in countless areas in our home.

How many sets of bed linens do you actually need?  

How many towels per person are required?

How many place settings or coffee mugs do you need?

How many televisions do you use at a time?

How many coats, decorations, spatulas, scissors, pens, hobby supplies, tennis racquets, or toys are actually needed?

Identify the minimum. You can keep more if you want, but you’ll find the process of decluttering goes much faster when you start by asking, “What do I need to keep?” Rather than, “What are the things I can get rid of?”

You’ll love owning less.

Clarity Comes at the End

When a project concludes, there is a natural opportunity for evaluation. This is because clarity always comes at the end. And in some cases, the evaluation cannot be avoided.

Take for example, a sports team. At the end of a season, the team has either won or lost. If they have lost, the team will undoubtedly evaluate their season. Even if there is no formal meeting among the team, the reality of not winning will force introspection.

The players’ minds will naturally evaluate the team members, how hard they worked, what strategy they employed, and what they could improve for next season.

Smart teams (and individuals) will formally dissect “last season” looking for solutions to improve their performance “next season.” But everyone will look back in one way or another. Finality has that effect on us.

Failing in an objective particularly forces self-reflection. And failure can only be fully known at the end.

The current Olympic season is full of these moments, I’m sure.

The swimmer who falls just short of winning the race may wonder what would have happened if they trained just a little bit harder. The team who fails to qualify for the championship game may wonder what would have happened if they practiced together more. The coach whose decisions didn’t work out may wonder about the result had they studied more film.

But when the end arrives, there is no opportunity to go back and make changes. You can’t go back and train harder, practice more, lift more weights, or study extra film… the end has come and your opportunity has passed.

Albeit harsh at times, clarity always comes at the end.

Of course, this reality extends beyond athletics. We see it all around us.

When we receive our final grade at school, we know whether or not we succeeded in the course requirements.

When we set our sights on a weight loss goal, in the end, we realize whether we made enough (or the proper) adjustments to our lifestyle.

When we arrive at the end of a job, we can look back and evaluate whether we effectively fulfilled our role.

When we retire, we are able to fully analyze whether we achieved our professional objectives or not.

When our children move out of home, we are faced with questions if we did enough to prepare them for the road ahead.

When a relationship ends, we are able to look back with clarity on our contribution (or deduction) to it.

When we fail in a goal, we are left to wonder why.

And ultimately, at the end of our lives, if given the opportunity, we will undoubtedly look back with pride or regret at how we chose to live.

The end always brings clarity.

It also brings finality.

When the course is over, so is your opportunity. When your child moves out, so is that phase of parenting. On your deathbed, you can’t go back and change the previous decades.

Unfortunately, most of our lives are not lived with that sense of finality. As a result, we live many days with the assumption that “we can always do it later” or “there is time to change tomorrow.” And because we don’t believe we are at the end, we are less forced to look back and evaluate the trajectory of our lives and the decisions we make.

Urgency is difficult to manufacture.

But I believe this principle holds opportunity if we allow it.

The “end” of life’s major milestones are infrequent (for example: the end of an athletic season, the end of a career, the end of a parenting stage, or the end of life).

But every day provides opportunity for evaluation.

Every time I kiss my child goodnight, I can look back to evaluate if I was an intentional parent.

Every time I say good-night to Kim, I can evaluate if I was a faithful, loving spouse.

Every time I end the workday, I can evaluate if I gave my best to my work.

Every time I receive a bank statement or credit card statement, I can evaluate if I made wise decisions with my money last month.

Even every time I close a social media account on my computer, I can evaluate if I used the time and conversation in a healthy and productive fashion.

Clarity comes at the end. Maybe we need to recognize the significance of that more often.

Encouraging Simplicity. Weekend Reads.

Never underestimate the importance of removing stuff you don’t need.

Encouragement provides us with motivation to persevere. It invites us to dream dreams of significance for our lives. And it begs us to work diligently with optimism and promise.

Overcoming the pull of consumerism is a difficult challenge regardless of our stage in life. Simplicity requires encouragement. To that end, I hope you will find motivation in these articles below.

Each post was intentionally chosen to inspire simplicity in your life. For maximum effect, find a quiet moment this weekend and enjoy them with a fresh cup of coffee or tea.

Drowning in her Possessions, Jennifer Turned to a ‘Freeing’ New Lifestyle | Sydney Morning Herald by Evelyn Lewin. For years, opulence was considered the key to happiness. When it came to houses, “it” bags and cars, the attitude was the more the merrier. But thinking has shifted and there are now those who’ve found the real route to serenity is having less.

A Case for Holistic Minimalism in the Philippines | Rappler by Joy Therese Gomez. Essentially, a minimalist is not someone who owns little to no possessions; but a person who has specified what she values most in life, thereafter removing everything else that distracts from it.

Is It Hoarding, Collecting, or Archiving? Keep? Toss? | Psychology Today by Gina Barreca Ph.D. It’s hard to accept that stuff we treasure is not valuable to others. Not everyone sees the same potential, or the same uselessness, in an item.

The Financial Freedom of Owning Less | The Public Opinion by Rick Kahler. The control of an asset is often even more valuable than ownership.

It’s The Perfect Day To Give It Away: Clean Out Toys | Moms by Ashley Wehrli. July 15th was “National Give Something Away Day.” Get rid of some toys.

Decluttering is Great. Minimalism is Better. | Joshua Becker on YouTube

Of Course Minimalism is For Everyone

Occasionally, I hear chatter around the topic of minimalism that sounds something like this, “Minimalism isn’t for everyone. It’s only for _______.”

Well, that’s hogwash. Of course minimalism is for everyone. And I’d like to share some thoughts about that today.

There are any number of versions to that sentence above, but here are some of the most common:

– Minimalism is great for me. But may not be right for you.

– Minimalism is only for the rich.

– Minimalism is only for certain personalities, like non-sentimental people.

– Minimalism isn’t for people who are crafters.

I can’t possibly speak to every version of the “Minimalism isn’t for everyone” argument, but I can talk about those four specifically.

But first, I think it might be helpful to remind ourselves what minimalism is and what it is not, because I think that will clear up a lot of the confusion.

Minimalism is not a set of specific rules or guidelines and the goal of minimalism isn’t to own the fewest number of things possible.

Minimalism is about owning only the possessions you need to accomplish your greatest goals in life. It is the intentional promotion of the things we most value by removing anything that distracts us from it.

And minimalism is always going to look different from person to person based on any number of factors: where you live, the size of your family, your career, your hobbies, your age, your socioeconomic realities, just to name a few.

All of these factors should influence the physical possessions you keep and the ones you remove. Minimalism is entirely freeing in this way.

It is also important to note that minimalism is about more than owning less, it is also about seeing the world differently and removing the unending pursuit of physical possessions.

Sure, many people own too much stuff and need to minimize their possessions to reach the optimal amount. But even someone with little can embrace minimalism as a means to not over-accumulate in the first place.

In the end, minimalism frees up our most important resources for things in life that matter more than physical possessions—however you choose to define that. And that is something that benefits everybody who embraces the lifestyle—regardless of any individual characteristic.

Of course minimalism is for everyone. We all have a finite amount of money or days to live, and the less we waste them on physical possessions, the more we can spend on meaningful pursuits.

Now, let’s look at some of the thoughts above in more specific terms:

1. Minimalism is great for me. But may not be right for you.

Minimalism offers the same benefits to everyone who embraces it: more opportunity to pursue greater passions than physical possessions.

Certainly, each person is going to define those passions differently. But a life lived pursuing happiness and fulfillment in places that can actually deliver it, is a recommendation that is absolutely right for everyone. We should be bold in spreading it.

2. Minimalism is only for the rich.

“Minimalism is for the rich” is a critique that pops up from time-to-time in articles written by people who do not fully understand minimalism.

You don’t need a lot of money to own less stuff, you need a lot of money to own more stuff.

Perhaps my thinking is skewed by the resident of an underdeveloped African country who approached me after a presentation and said, “This is a message that the people in my home country desperately need to hear. They are so focused on wanting and accumulating things, they miss the joy and happiness right in front of them.”

People who believe that minimalism is only for the rich, in my opinion, are focused too much on the process of removing possessions to achieve a more minimalist life and less focused on the benefits that arise when the pursuit is removed.

If someone has to declutter an entire home of unneeded possessions to begin living a minimalist life, then it is highly likely that person has excess finances. But again, minimalism is about more than “decluttering.”

Minimalism is about realizing there are greater pursuits than material possessions and that directing our focus and money towards pursuits of greater significance is always a better decision—whether we have little or much.

3. Minimalism is only for certain personalities, like non-sentimental people.

I don’t disagree at all that minimalism may be easier for certain personality types. But I do disagree that just because minimalism is harder for some than others, the lifestyle is not beneficial for all.

Minimalism is about owning only what you need to live your best life. And what possessions are necessary to live your best life is going to change from person to person—but there is always a point where excess possessions become a burden, regardless of your personality type. Minimalism forces you to discover it.

If sentimentality is beneficial to you in pursuing your greatest purpose, you will own more items of sentimentality than others. But you can still own too many.

If a cluttered desk is how you get your best work done, you will keep more stuff on your desktop than others. But it can still become too cluttered.

If you are gifted in keeping the family history, you will likely keep more possessions from past generations than others. But you can still keep too many.

Minimalism isn’t about forcing every individual into the same set of rigid rules on the number of outfits they can wear or items they can keep on their desk. Minimalism is owning the optimal number of possessions to accomplish the most with your life and removing anything that distracts you from it, regardless of your specific unique personality characteristics.

4. Minimalism isn’t for people who are “crafters.”

This thought extends beyond crafters, by the way. Some might say that minimalism isn’t for artists, or teachers, or outdoor enthusiasts, or photographers, or whatever.

When I was first starting on my journey toward becoming minimalist, I read an article by Karol Gajda who made a very helpful statement. “I love biking,” he said, “and because of that I own more biking equipment and tools than others. But I own less of other items than most people do and that is fine with me. Biking is a hobby that improves my well-being and will always require a certain number of things for me to keep in my possession.”

Recently I received a comment from someone who was new to this blog. In her comment, she said, “Minimalism is not for everyone. Why would I ever give up my piano? I have played that piano every week for the last 15 years.”

Of course, the article had nothing to do with giving up pianos and neither does minimalism. If you play the piano every week and that is a hobby that enriches your life, you shouldn’t remove the piano from your home. But maybe you don’t need the basement full of possessions collecting dust, or all the items in your kitchen, closet, or drawers.

If you are an artist or crafter, keep the possessions required for your hobby and passion. But remove the other unneeded possessions in your home. Freeing up time and space and money may just allow you to thrive even more in your creative craft—whatever that is.

Minimalism doesn’t dictate what hobbies you can or cannot pursue. It doesn’t dictate what career path you can or cannot choose. And it doesn’t dictate what possessions you can or cannot keep.

It only reminds us that our lives are too valuable to waste pursuing and accumulating physical possessions. And that is true for every single one of us.

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I’ll plan to be active in the comment section answering questions you might have related to this article. I think it is an important one.

Designed for Significance

“Our souls are not hungry for fame, comfort, wealth, or power. Our souls are hungry for meaning, for the sense that we have figured out how to live so that our lives matter, so that the world will be at least a little bit different for our having passed through it.” —Harold Kushner

Deep down, we’re not all that different.

We strive for security. We long for love. We hunger for happiness. And we desire lives of significance. We want to know our lives counted for something—something bigger than ourselves.

Our lives are, by definition, finite in nature composed of limited resources. Each of us have a limited number of minutes, dollars, and amounts of energy with which to fulfill our purpose. And every passing day represents another opportunity to trade them for something else.

Unfortunately, most of our lives are unintentionally traded down, lived in exchange for a return of limited or temporal value. We never set out to purposefully trade our lives for things of lesser worth; we desire more.

But in a culture surrounded by similar pursuits, our lives conform too quickly.

At first, we work for security—a worthy and important pursuit.

We invest in our knowledge and skill as a means to earn a living. When possible, we choose work that aligns with our talents. We place the right people around us. We trade our time and talents for a steady paycheck with which to purchase shelter, clothing, and food—security, the baseline of our existence.

This is not an unwise trade. Security lays the foundation upon which many of our life’s choices can be built. It is essential for all other pursuits. And I’m all for it.

But, after achieving security, we invest many of our resources (time and money, energy and focus) into other pursuits.

Usually, we pursue comfort. For most, the essential elements of security—roof, meals, and clothing—are rarely adequate. And so we pursue comfort as an important addition to our baseline of security.

We pursue a bigger house in a nicer neighborhood, a softer couch surrounded by upgraded entertainment choices, a nicer car with more features, and trendier clothing that makes us feel more accepted among our peers.

Society makes comfort appear both attractive and deserved. Sometimes we intentionally seek it out; but often times, the pursuit is so common, we don’t even notice how much of our resources we have begun allocating toward it.

After achieving security and comfort, luxury lurks not so far in the distance.

We can see it. We can taste it. It appears overwhelmingly satisfying. And we know what it asks of us: just a few more hours each week at work, a few more dollars spent at the store, and a little more research to get it right. We are so close to luxury… why not reach out and take hold? And almost without warning, we begin trading the most precious resources of our lives for the luxurious offerings of this world.

Subtly, about that same time, alongside the acquisition of comfort and luxury, our minds create a ranking system to climb. We seek more money, more power, more prestige, and a more exciting lifestyle than our neighbor. And we attempt to prove our worth by beating out others in this entirely self-constructed competition of life.

Before we know it, we have traded our most worthy pursuits to win a competition that we have invented in our own minds.

But this trade is a foolish one.

Our lives hold far greater potential than the comfort and luxury most of us trade them for.

Our hearts cry out for love and happiness, fulfillment, and significance.

Our resources can be invested into beautiful art, moments of joy, and causes we believe in. We can help others overcome fear, heartache, or significant obstacles to their own fulfillment. We can trade our finite resources for the desires and values held deep within each of our hearts—the purest passions unspoiled by the culture around us.

We are designed to live for pursuits greater than comfort, luxury, and competition.

We are designed to live lives that count for something greater than ourselves. We are designed to craft a life that matters. This is where both happiness and fulfillment is found.

10 Common Life Assumptions I Don’t Presume to be True

Beliefs have a powerful impact on the lives we live. They can limit our potential or expand it.

The more we believe something to be true, the more likely it is to become so. That’s why the stories we tell ourselves are so important as well as the words we speak into others.

There are a number of incorrect life assumptions in this world. But because people say them so often (to themselves and others), they end up becoming true.

No doubt I have fallen for many of them myself. But I can also look back and identify a number of life assumptions that I have never presumed to be true. And every time I hear them, I reject them.

10 Common Life Assumptions I’ve Never Presumed to be True

1. Parenting Teenagers is miserable.

I’ll start here because it is a perfect example. I used to work full-time with middle school and high school students and can’t count how many times I was told that parenting teenagers was miserable.

One person even said to me, “Little kids are so cute. But then they become teenagers and you suddenly can’t wait for them to leave.”

I’ve never believed that had to be true. Does parenting teenagers require intentionality and a shift in parenting strategy? Of course, but I’ve never believed it had to be unenjoyable or they would be disrespectful.

2. Spending extended time with extended family is to be bemoaned.

No way! I love seeing my family—including spending extended time with them.

Now, I realize not every family is stable and I still recognize the importance of separation for the purpose of establishing your own identity. But we go home twice/year to spend time with our families (usually close to 2 weeks each time).

Coming home is one of my favorite things in the world. And I always cringe when people crack jokes about how hard it is to be with family.

3. I can’t wait for retirement.

Retirement has been described as the new American Dream. And it seems, in many cases, people live as if the goal of work is retirement. But how can work be enjoyable if the goal is to get out of it?

I probably learned it from my grandfather who worked 40-50 hours/week until the age of 99, but retirement has never been a goal of mine. I prefer meaningful work and will continue to do so as long as my physical body allows.

4. A productive life is a busy life.  

When I was early in my first career, I made the mistake of stopping in the office on my first scheduled day off. I don’t remember the exact details, but I was either trying to impress my new boss or had forgot something at my desk (probably the former).

When I walked through the front door, the receptionist said to me, “Make sure you honor your days off—always. You’re going to need them. Because there is a lot to do around here.”

In one sentence, I learned that a productive life doesn’t require me to work every day. And that finding time for rest enables me to accomplish more.

5. We need debt to finance an enjoyable life.

Kim and I have never presumed that having or spending a lot of money was required for happiness or a meaningful life. In fact, we made less than $20,000 combined our first year of marriage—and the next 6 weren’t much more than that.

But we never outspent our means. We did take out a mortgage to buy our first house and I borrowed $7,000 to help offset the cost of graduate school in my late-20’s, but other than that we have added no other debt.

Sure, our life has never been extravagant. But that was necessary for an enjoyable or meaningful life either.

6. Mother-in-laws are difficult.

Lawyers and mothers-in-law are the punchline to quite a few jokes. And mothers-in-law are almost always portrayed as difficult to get along with on television sit-coms. Just picture how many times the mere presence of a mother-in-law standing at the front door prompted a laugh track.

But my mother-in-law, Kay, is wonderful. She is kind, thoughtful, fun, and a pleasure to spend time with. I don’t dislike being with her at all! I actually enjoy it quite a bit.

7. Money doesn’t change you.

Of course money changes you. Anyone who thinks money only reveals who you are, rather than changing our very hearts, isn’t’ paying attention.

Does this mean everybody with financial means is evil? Of course, not—that would include most of us. But it does mean that we should be aware of its potential negative influence on our lives and stay hyper-focused on our personal ethic in light of it.

It also means that money is not always worth all the work we put into acquiring more of it. There are, after all, better things to be than rich.

8. Religion is boring and weakness.

My faith brings me meaning, joy, peace, stability… In fact, I can’t imagine life without it.

When I was young, I used to think religion was stifling and boring. But not anymore. I appreciate the role it plays in my life and how it has brought me strength through difficult times.

9. Kids are terrible in their 2’s.

Children often rise to the expectations we place on them. (Not always, but often.)

When we were parenting younger children, we never wanted to let “2-years old” or “3-years old” be an excuse for tantrums or bad behavior. And we never presumed that had to be the case. Instead, we sought to understand their developmental phase and worked hard to instruct and help them properly through it.

We should always fight against the presumption that our kids are going to act a certain way just because that’s the assumption we grew up hearing and believing.

Even from the very beginning.

10. People are talking about me behind my back.

Perhaps it is because of my background working at churches or even my current role now, but I hear a good number of comments from people about “being judged by others.” In many circumstances, I wonder if that’s even the case or just projection.

I used to think people were talking behind my back, until I realized they were all too busy talking about themselves.

Reject life assumptions. In so doing, you will regain the power to craft your own life—the one you actually desire.

I had a fun time thinking through this list and what common assumptions about life I have never presumed to be true. Are there any common assumptions you’ve never accepted or intentionally rejected? Comment below because I’d love to read more.