There is nothing superfluous: the good and bad minimalism
A Life / / December 19, 2019
We offer you to get acquainted with the arguments Brett McKay, who has his own unique perspective on minimalism.
Minimalism - it's a lifestyle / direction, and, like any phenomenon, it sometimes becomes popular, and sometimes goes down. In the last few years it has become a popular minimalism. On the Internet you can find a lot of articles entitled "100 things which you need to be sure to get rid of", which are in great demand.
Even I blogged a couple of times and wrote about minimalism in general, I do not have anything against him. There is something inspiring in the idea of "life without too much", and this certainly has its advantages.
This will help you avoid becoming an unwilling consumer, your life will not do unnecessary things, your brain will not be overloaded useless information, you will be able to be mobile and to travel light, to save money and focus on what really valuable.
But, despite all the advantages, not all is rosy.
Excessive minimalism - the prerogative of the wealthy
The first thing that made me a more critical look at the minimalism - an article I read a few years ago in The New York Times. It began like this:
"I live in a studio apartment with an area of 420 square feet. I have a bed-transformer. I have 10 small vessel, that I use for salads and main dishes. When visitors come to me, I get a folding table. I have no CD- and DVD-ROM drive, and now I have only 10% percent of the books of those who have been before. "
Further, the author of this article Graham Hill talks about how his life today is fundamentally different from the one he led before. Richer in 90 years, Hill began to buy their own stuff is not cheap, and at some point discovered that his life is literally littered with all sorts of expensive junk.
Everything changed when he fell in love with a woman from Andorra: he simply packed their belongings into a backpack, to follow her around the world. Traveling light, he revised his attitude to things and now lives deliberately light.
After a history of Hill I came across a small sketch of Charlie Lloyd.
"Wealth - this is not the number of dollars or material goods. Wealth - is the ability to choose from a variety of options and the ability to take risks.
If you see a person on the street who will be dressed as a representative of the middle class (say, in neat jeans and a striped shirt), as you will understand, whether he belongs to the lower middle class or a member of his top? In my opinion, the best indicator - this is how he keeps.
Recently I could classify themselves as middle class most Nizam. Especially clearly I understood it when I had to deal with my backpack. The backpack is my old laptop, which for three years now, and it almost does not hold a charge, so I carry a power supply. In it is also a paper and pen if I want to write or draw something, but this rarely happens. In addition, in my backpack still lies charger from my old phone, chewing gum, sometimes eating a quick lunch. If it is summer, in my backpack appear sunscreen and water bottle. If the cold weather - rain gear and gloves. Sometimes I carry a book, so as not to get bored.
If I were rich, I would have carried a MacBook Air, iPad mini, and wallet. Go out and take a look - I bet you will notice that rich people carry a few things.
The same applies to the rich life as a whole: they have all the little things.
When rich people say that have learned to live lightly, they often mention that to come to this way of life helped them wealth. That is, to come to this, it is necessary to go through the richness.
If you buy food in bulk, you need a big fridge. If you can not afford to repair the car in the cabin, you will have to carry a bunch of tools.
To be rich - a good way to save his life from a variety of stuff. "
In general, minimalism - it is the prerogative of the wealthy because of their wealth - is a kind of airbag. If they get rid of anything that you may need them in the future, they will simply go to the store and buy it.
They have with them should not be a lot of things simply wallet if they need anything, they just buy it on the go. No problem. However, if you are not rich enough, you have to carry a bunch of things.
Minimalism still puts things in your life center
How ironic: on the one hand, the goal of minimalism is that you no longer pay much attention to things, but on the other hand, minimalism continues to put things in the center of your life.
Materialist focuses on how to acquire more things, while the minimalist constantly thinking about how to get rid of these things. In the end, they both concentrated on things.
This is well illustrated by the following example. There are two people: the first is suffering gluttony, and the second - bulimia. First loves food and always something to eat. Second food and hates himself for what he was eating, so that then follows the ritual "cleansing" - a man makes himself vomit to get rid of the food. First loves food, the other hates it, but they're both obsessed with food.
First, you are happy, when you buy a thing, and then rejoice when getting rid of it. Funny, is not it?
moderate minimalism
As I mentioned at the beginning, I believe that minimalism - it's a great thing that can not be reduced to the extremes. A person must be a healthy attitude to his property: he should think about it, but do not need to do this the purpose of life.
Most great peopleI admire, know what they need. They buy things because of their practical utility, or simply because they receive pleasure from them. They buy quality items that do not require constant repair, and certainly will serve its owner for a long time. They do not accumulate rubbish and surrounded themselves with a variety of waste.
They did not do things the center of their lives - they can find much more worthy causes to which you can pay attention to.
They did not have time to worry about that in their library too many books that their shop cluttered art supplies, or that one of the rooms so many trophies that they have a negative impact on the psyche.
But they were minimalists, where it was necessary: they do not waste time on useless things, which could prevent them to create something great, that they have left us a legacy.
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