I’m Not a Minimalist, but Maybe I Should Be

Over the past several years, many people have begun to hear and think about the minimalist lifestyle because of blogs such as The Minimalists or books like “The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up” by Marie Kondo.

However, even after selling our huge house and getting rid of a lot of my clothes by following the KonMari method for a bit, I am still not a minimalist. I love avoiding stores and trying not to buy a bunch of stuff, but I also tend to hang onto things for a long time, on the off-chance that I might actually use them. Recently, I even got rid of some clothes that I had since high school, so I suppose that I’m not exactly living the minimalist lifestyle.

But I have begun to think about minimalism a bit.

I suppose this came about because of two places we stayed at while we were on vacation in Hawaii. Like any vacation, our trip to Hawaii caused us to get out of our comfort zones and see things in a different way. For me, vacations also make me think about things that I usually don’t think about.  And because of the places that we stayed, one of these things was living a minimalist lifestyle.

The yurt versus the condo

Near Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park, we were fortunate to be able to stay in a yurt in the rainforest. Although this was a yurt, we definitely weren’t camping. Instead, we had 700 square feet of space, a brand new interior with high-end finishes, and a fancy kitchen with all the comforts of home.

On the other side of the Big Island, we stayed in a condo near Kailua-Kona. Just like the yurt, this condo was completely modernized with all of the comforts of home. However, unlike the yurt, this condo had two bedrooms, a full-size kitchen, and 1,700 square feet of living space.

After spending some time in the relatively confined quarters of the yurt, we definitely enjoyed the extra space of the condo.

However …

Besides the extra space in the condo, there were unlimited forks, plates, and glasses. It wasn’t quite as much as we have in our kitchen cupboards at home, but we certainly weren’t lacking for dishes!

However, we kept running out of spoons … and bowls … and plates. We weren’t leaving them piled up in the sink, but we would just use them, put them in the dishwasher, and eventually run out of them. After a couple of days of doing this, I began to wonder why this was happening.

We had more than enough, but we were still running out.

Back to the yurt

As I was trying to figure out why we kept running out, I thought back to the yurt. Like I said, the yurt had a full, modern kitchen. But instead of 30 spoons, there were 4 big spoons and 4 little ones. There were 4 big plates and 4 little ones. 4 bowls, 4 glasses, 4 wine glasses, and … well … you get the picture. There were 4 of everything and there were 5 of us.

But we never ran out of dishes at the yurt!

We basically had an unlimited supply of things at the condo and we ran out of them. Then in the yurt, we had a very limited supply and we always had more than enough!

Living a minimalist lifestyle

Did we value the things that we had more at the yurt than at the condo? We knew that we would need to use a bowl at the next meal, so we made sure that it was clean.

Did we utilize the dishes for more than their intended purpose? Instead of just using a coffee cup for coffee, we used it for juice, cereal, or anything else that would fit in it.

Did we take care of the dishes a bit more at the yurt? I broke a plate at the condo on accident, but that was OK because there were so many of them. However, breaking a plate at the yurt would have brought us down to 3 plates. Maybe subconsciously, I realized that I really should be careful with my limited resources.

Our life

You and I both know that our lives, especially if we live in the United States, are filled with excess. Unlike many years ago, it’s actually really cheap to buy brand new items. Even if we don’t want to buy anything, we can still find stuff in our neighbor’s garbage for free or at garage sales for next to nothing.

Because of this, it’s easy to value our possessions less and less as we continue to acquire more of them. Maybe we even find ourselves happy when we break something, because it allows us to get rid of it.

However, if we only had one bathroom, one car, 6 plates, or 5 chairs, would we value our possessions more?

Would living a minimalist lifestyle not only free us from a life of clutter, but actually cause us to replace clutter and random crap with happiness?

I’m still not a minimalist

My closet is filled with clothes, our kitchen is filled with dishes, and my garage is filled with tools.

Again, I’m definitely not a minimalist.

But would I be happier if I was one? Should I take a closer look at the KonMari method and apply it to everything in the house to truly determine if everything in there makes me happy? Doing this would definitely save me money. But would it make me happier? 

I’m still not a minimalist. But maybe I should be.

What about you? Do you consider yourself a minimalist? And does it make you happier? Let us know in the comments below.

And thanks for reading!

~Nathan

Let’s keep living a great life … with the help of money. So what’s next?

• You can travel for free by using rewards credit cards.
• You can get motivated and get out of debt.
• You can check out the next post or the previous post and continue to learn.

But no matter what you decide to do, let’s leave the ordinary behind and take action today!