Why Going Minimal-ish?
Let's be clear first: I am not striving for full-blown minimalism. I am not looking for the perfect minimalist coffee tables, sneakers, wristwatches, speakers and what not. Neither am I looking to reorganise my stuff based on Marie Kondo's approach.
I started considering going minimal-ish in 2013. Back then, I had to sort out 20+ years of stuff as I was relocating from London to Hong Kong. The pain of packing and organising aside, I came to realise that I have SO MUCH STUFF. They broadly fell into one of the following categories:
- I forgot that I had them;
- I kept for their sentimental value but I never use them;
- I thought they might come in handy but I never use them;
- I have no use for them but it would be a waste to throw them out.
In short, I have no need for them in my everyday life, so why should I keep them?
This got me thinking. Everything that I acquire, they have either been abandoned or I have grown attachment towards them over time. Abandonment is easy but in no way a good approach, as it is bad for our world to create waste just to satisfy our never-ending desires. Attachment is the killer of time, as the stuff would occupy our mind without our conscious awareness, which in turn affect our freedom implicitly.
As I acquire more stuff, I am saying yes to giving up my time on thinking about stuff, handling stuff rather than things that really matter. I could have used the money to achieve my personal goals, e.g. saving for a property, investing to achieve financial freedom, learning a new skill, etc. I could have spent my time on the next adventure, or with my family and friends.
This thought resurfaced again when I moved from Hong Kong to Tokyo in 2015, and again when I moved from Tokyo to Hong Kong in 2018.
It is no surprise that we have come to where we are. We are living in a capitalism society, which encourages spending to fuel economic growth. We are driven to "keep up with the Joneses", with advertisements constantly promoting the next best thing, which claim to improve our well-being and increase our happiness. However, does acquiring things really serve as the solution to our happiness? Research says otherwise, highlighting that spending on experiences versus possessions advances more immediate happiness. Indeed, experience tends to stay with us longer and in a more meaning way than stuff. I could recall most of my travels and yet could not remember what was the last thing I purchased from a week ago.
And it is not only on stuff that I am spending my resources on. I spend so much time consuming media and entertainment that I believe I am slowly loosing my creativity and critical thinking skill. This is related but on a different topic, to be covered in a separate blog post. I see hoarding stuff and consumerism as part of the modern struggle, which Naval has summarised nicely as follows:
The modern struggle: Lone individuals summoning inhuman willpower, fasting, meditating, and exercising... Up against armies of scientists and statisticians weaponizing abundant food, screens, and medicine into junk food, clickbait news, infinite porn, endless games and addictive drugs.
To address the challenge, I have come up with rules of thumb that I use every time prior to a purchase...
My Rules of Thumb
- If I desire something, I would walk away from it to think it through.
- Does the stuff have an impact on my life? Is it functional or purely desirable?
- Does the stuff warrant my commitment, or time, in the long run?
- Consider the tradeoff between having the stuff and the time that I spend thinking about the stuff. I would buy it if I spend too much time pondering over it and getting myself distracted. Time is worth more.
What have I done Well so far?
Over the years, I have transformed my spending habits based on my rules of thumb. Nowadays, I limit my spending to mostly food, coffee, books, my passions (e.g. camping, hiking) and work-related clothes. I admit that I am spending more on Kindle books because they are not material, thus I don't see them as stuff. In parallel, I am continuing to buy physical books but I check out the books thoroughly online before I part with my money. My love of papers is not going to go away any time soon.
My money pot has definitely grown faster than previous years. I am not sure whether I am freeing up time as I am still a big consumer of media and entertainment... But at least, I am not spending time thinking and wanting stuff.
What can I do Better?
One of my biggest hurdles is my love for all things papers. I have this desire to keep a record of important events in my life through papers, thus I find it incredibly difficult to let go of even the most minor stuff if I perceive them as having some sort of sentimental value. The best example is my hoarding of bus tickets, plane tickets, entrance tickets to museums, etc. from my travels. There is no way around this but for me to be ruthless and either throw them away, or consolidate them somehow into a collage or travel journal. More the formal than the latter as I don't want to spare the time.
Another big one for me is food. Eating has evolved into a major distraction. It does not help that I am a big foodie and that I am in Hong Kong... Since there are so many choices here, I tend to fuss over my meals as I don't want to 'loose out' by eating things that I don't want to eat. I will need to shift my mindset away from this and find satisfaction in adopting simple eating habits.
Finally, I need to get on with throwing out unused stuff and tidying up my living space.
My Goals
To summarise, things to work on such that I become better at living a minimal-ist life:
- Hold onto less papers, even though they might have sentimental value;
- Tidy up, throw away or give away unused stuff;
- Move to simpler eating habits;
- Contrary as it may, spend more on work-related clothes (as frankly I don't have enough!)
