Every Monday I post Real Life Minimalists, a profile of one of my readers in their own words. If you’d like to participate, click here for details.
Today, Dan tells us how he practices minimalism not just with regards to possessions, but in his daily life and work routines. (I’m all about efficiency myself, and love the idea of streamlining business matters!)
Dan writes:
So I’ve been a minimalist my entire life, I just wasn’t aware that minimalism was a “thing” until a couple of years back.
I had always strived to remove clutter, both of items and in my writing, work and personal life. The idea was that less things to think about, the less stress I would have and the more I could focus on the important things in my life.
As I write this I own 99 total items, I recently got to 101 (which is the most I have ever owned due to a trip to Las Vegas and buying clothing out there (hat and flip flops). But now that I am home I have thrown them away and committed them to the memory banks.
Minimalism works for me across every single area of my life, some examples:
- I choose from 5 of my favourite meals for every meal, so 5 breakfasts, 5 lunches and 5 dinners, this allows me to have a fairly simple and healthy eating routine, although I’m not too strict on this, I’m happy to go out for dinner and eat takeaways when the opportunity arises.
- In my decision making, I don’t concern myself too much, I make a decision and then stick with it, no regretting decisions with me, I just make one and move on.
- I don’t concern myself with small problems, I understand that I can’t control the world and people around me, so allow things to happen without worrying about them, did my favourite team lose a game? Oh well, maybe next week, is my girlfriend mad at me? I’m sure I haven’t done anything too wrong and she will forgive me etc etc I like this video from David Foster Wallace, it keeps things in perspective that you don’t know the situation of other people, so try to not judge them based on a single interaction https://youtu.be/pfw2Qf1VfJo.
- I run my business in a manner that is extremely minimal, I offer a single service that is part of whole, by choice, this allows me to focus one one aspect that can be controlled. For this service I have developed systems and processes to remove myself as much as possible from the everyday running, this allows me to spend my time doing things that I enjoy while rarely working and still making a very good income. This is all a bit geeky but it works for my lifestyle.
- I have a similar approach to my personal relationships, if I think about somebody then I make contact with them, either with a quick phone call or a text, facebook etc this means that the people that I care about the most (and therefore think about the most) get the most contact from me. This has allowed me to maintain some very long relationships with people who I can’t see regularly and have lost touch with our mutual friends.
- Activities are the same, if I want to do something and it’s possible both financially and timewise then I go and do it, while inviting all of the people who I would enjoy it with to come along. This can come across as very spontaneous but really I just think, I want to do it, so I see if it’s possible and then do it. Things like a recent trip to Las Vegas for my 31st birthday, planned the day before.
All in all minimalism has helped my life in so many ways, it is hard to pin down a core concept that has had the biggest effect, but the part that I kinda like the most is the freedom that I have based on my financial situation, the amount of time I am required to “work” and my ability to sustain long term relationships from a distance.
Oh and the fact that I can fit the majority of my possessions in a rucksack, means that if I decide to move to Nicaragua tomorrow i can do just that, in fact…..
I don’t have a minimalism based blog, but minimalism is reflected through all of my work (you might even notice it in my writing), my business site http://raydigitalmarketing.com is very minimal in design and pages, and my marketing blog http://danray.me explains a lot of the processes I use in my business.
{If you’d like to learn more about minimalist living, please consider reading my book, The Joy of Less, A Minimalist Living Guide, or joining my email list.}
Great story! Also, your meal plan is fascinating! I hate trying to think about what to eat, so it seems really smart to create a menu for yourself and then just choose off that menu. It would also make grocery shopping easier, because you’d always know what to keep on hand. Great idea!
I’d love to take the credit for it but I stole it from somebody a few years ago (can’t remember who). The philosophy behind it was that we only have a certain amount of decision making ability in a day so remove as much as possible.
Whoever it was also did the same with clothes, wore the same 2-3 outfits all week depending on the occasion, this is something I haven’t taken on board at the moment, I like clothes too much haha.
Great that you have found a way to live your life with minimum effort and maximum simplicity. By thrown away, as in your 2 extra items, I hope you meant given away to someone who might be able to use them?
I agree, the meal plan sounds like something I want to try. I hate trying to think about or shop for what to eat. I think my husband will go along with it, as long as we eat out a couple of times a week and he can choose whatever he wants — he’s not too picky about food.
I’m also intrigued by your thoughts about keeping in touch with the people you care about/think about the most. I’ve maintained some friendships for a very long time over distance by doing basically the same as you suggest, and I contact my (grown) children on the same basis, so we are in touch frequently. However, you don’t mention feeling any obligation to others (I presume you have no children or elderly parents). My elderly parents are somewhat of an obligation, and if I still had young children, they would also entail an obligation. I mean that my thoughts MUST turn to them often because of their needs, which can certainly at times complicate my life or even derail some of my personal plans. This is not a bad complication by any means, but it does mean that my life is not just mine to control or make decisions.
Hi Karen,
My meal plan works out great, I often substitute items too, so if I see something new that I like the look of then I simply replace something on my menu with it, it stops things from getting boring haha.
I don’t have either children or elderly parents, but I imagine if I did they would be forefront of my mind most of the time, which would essentially just mean that I contacted them more often.
I can see how this may derail you from your own ambitions, but with the life that I lead, I have a lot of free time in order to do these things.
I tend to do all of my work at night too, when I am most productive and can’t be disturbed. Maybe this is something you could look into? It would free up your day times to deal with all of the obligations you have to your parents.
On the meal issue, I usually have a set meal plan as we eat out twice a week at a home style cooking place with veggies, several meats, desserts, etc. For ex: green salads at main meal, cooked veg, then usually one day ground sirloin, turkey patties another day, ham, salmon and BBQ pork and rotate all this. Morn. it’s usually just fruit and or smoothie he eats cereal twice week, then lunch soups, mac & cheese, sandwiches. I make contact same way, when I think about them but as a retiree, I know less and less people out of my area as time rolls on. Local friends are more casual, make calls and meet up. I use Mari Kondo ideas in seasonal clothing purges and kitchen purge as needed.
Hi Karen,
My meal plan works out great, I often substitute items too, so if I see something new that I like the look of then I simply replace something on my menu with it, it stops things from getting boring haha.
I don’t have either children or elderly parents, but I imagine if I did they would be forefront of my mind most of the time, which would essentially just mean that I contacted them more often.
I can see how this may derail you from your own ambitions, but with the life that I lead, I have a lot of free time in order to do these things.
I tend to do all of my work at night too, when I am most productive and can’t be disturbed. Maybe this is something you could look into? It would free up your day times to deal with all of the obligations you have to your parents.
Wow, I really liked the way you wrote about making decisions, that you just make a decision and get on with it, now that is something I would really like to be able to do, just decide and no regrets or what ifs. That would make my life so much more simple and I am going to try hard to consciously do this more often. Your lifestyle sounds so good but as mentioned above I don’t think you have children complicating it and you are able to streamline accordingly. I hope you donated your hat and flip flops and didn’t really just throw them out. Thanks for your post it was a great read.
Yeah I think it takes a certain type of person to make decisions the way that I do, not everybody is able to let go of things the way that I can seem to, it’s likely a side effect of health problems I had when I was a child, now I just think “whatever happens, happens” and just deal with the results afterwards.
Haha I just left them in the hotel room, I never throw things away, always donate, along with 10% of my income.
Another older post I never read. Since only one of my three children is a minimalist, and nobody else I know enjoys getting rid of clutter, I have to read the blogs. I filled another bag for the local food pantry. When it gets cold outside, I have some sweatshirts to give them. I went to my favorite thrift shop to look for a navy or gray cardigan sweater. I have a black one, and many years ago I had a red one and a navy one. I have very few dressy clothes and I only buy classics.