The minimalist living lifestyle: a few reasons to get rid of unnecessary items

Mobility

I had to come back home several times for my things during my first move (even though I moved from one end of the country to the other). As a result, I hadn’t used half the things for 2 years of living in a new city. I didn't need a second pan (because I hate cooking), old favorite jeans (I couldn’t fit into them because I didn’t lose weight), eye shadows (because I don't like bright makeup), red high-heeled shoes (because I prefer comfortable shoes) etc. The same problem followed me in my journeys: I took with me everything that came under the "just in case" category. And this stuff usually didn't come in handy. The need to carry loads of things kept me from changing places: when I imagined heavy bags which I had to carry, I had no desire to go anywhere. As soon as I revised my list of things necessary for survival, my suitcase became lighter, I started to travel more often. And that opened up for me a lot of career opportunities.

Saving money

I always ready to go or move somewhere. And when I buy new things, I think about it and ask myself “Would I take this thing with me if I need to change my place of residence tomorrow? How useful is this thing?” It saves me a lot of money and frees place in my suitcase. For example, I never buy costume jewellery (my friends usually present it to me), paper books (because I have an electronic book), I don’t bring food and cosmetics with me (because I always move to civilization and am sure that I will find there a store), I don’t take dishes with me (I usually live in rented apartments with all needed cookware in the kitchen). I have only the essentials and that is enough for me to live a full life. And that’s how I save money for travel and study.

Eco-friendliness

The less I buy stuff, the less I produce garbage. For example, I prefer clothes that are comfortable and quality. I wear my clothes longer than one year and I take them with me when it’s time to change my place of residence. I give to neighbors, sell or donate everything I don’t need anymore. And what I like the most is that minimalist lifestyle helps me to be more eco-friendly.

Sense of ease

I‘ve noticed that I feel psychological discomfort  when there is a large amount of things around me. I don‘t like when clothes fall out the wardrobe, I don‘t like to breathe book dust, I become tired of looking at the same paintings/statuettes/trinkets in the apartment every day. I get a great pleasure and relief when I get rid of unnecessary items.

How Europeans feel about a minimalist lifestyle

The topic of minimalist lifestyle is gaining popularity In Europe in the light of the current discussion on over-consumption and climate change [1].

European Union is the second largest consumer market of the world [2]. There was an article with title „If EU consumption was the global norm, the Earth’s yearly budget would be exhausted on 10 May” published on the site of WWF EU in May of 2019. This publication was held in conjunction with Earth Overshoot Day - the date on which humanity's resource consumption for the year exceeds Earth’s capacity to regenerate those resources that year [3].

In the winter of 2019, the popular streaming service Netflix released a reality television series "Tidying Up with Marie Kondo". Marie Kondo is a Japanese organizing consultant and author, she claims that tidying up makes life easier. According to reviews in media, which are popular in Europe (Independent, BBC, Forbes, etc.), this series caused a real boom among millennials. Nowadays it is popular to tide up, throw away and live a minimalist life [4, 5, 6].

[1] http://climatetracker.org/minimalism-trend-will-it-save-the-planet/

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_consumer_markets

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_Overshoot_Day

[4] https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/marie-kondo-netflix-tidying-up-konmari-method-millennials-cleaning-organisation-a8722816.html

[5] https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20190222-what-marie-kondo-says-about-our-new-era-of-self-help

[6] https://www.forbes.com/sites/brianscudamore/2019/05/28/why-is-everyone-still-talking-about-marie-kondo-including-me/#26b5d4806c4a