T. Whitmore
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Introduction
In many of his stand up shows, the timeless George Carlin talked about the problem we have with piling up our stuff. Born in 1937, he remembered the days when we didnt had many options and we were still happy. There was Sprite and there was Coke. There was no Vanilla Coke, Coke with Lime, Raspberry Coke, Cherry Coke, Cherry Vanilla Coke, Diet Vanilla Coke, or Diet Coke with Lime, there was just regular Coke. Soon the companies everywhere realized that they can hook us up on all kinds of meaningless, empty, material stuff, so well occupy more and more space around us, just to keep all of our stuff together. Before this starts to sound like a tribute to Carlin, lets agree that his points will always be valid. Or at least until the human kind wakes up and realizes: its all just stuff.
But, lets make our own point. Most of the things we own, we dont even pay attention to in our day to day lives. You must keep finding things around your home you see only once a year, and yet you keep finding them every spring cleaning. You clean them up, meditate a bit on the memories they bring back, and put them back in their secret place. Then you forget about them for at least a few months. And its not just about the things we dont use daily. Its about the attitude, the desire to own so many things. Its a vicious circle we draw ourselves, and we keep following the line like our lives depend on it.
The good news is: its a curable habit. We want to be around the things that connect us with our past, with the things weve done and places weve visited. They make our entire life come together and make sense. We want our surroundings to speak of our journey. To tell everyone our story. The truth is: no one is really paying that much attention to your stuff. They may be curious and glance through, if you have fancy or interesting objects lying around, but they are not really getting the whole picture. When you go to their home, you may look around their stuff, but you are not reading the story behind their arrangement. All you see is someone elses stuff.
So its really about the story behind the things we own, which makes them so valuable that we dont want to let go. And the stories will stay as long as you remember them. Sometimes a story can really be a sad one. If your boyfriend broke up with you and you maxed out your credit card to make yourself feel better, and bought three outfits that cost as much as your rent. Thats not even a story. Thats your goodbye party for a different story. That party ends when you end up with a lot less money, and more stuff you dont know where to put. Afterwards, you never feel good about the stuff you bought because they remind you of the ending, so you might buy something new to cheer you up.
And it all goes around in a big, fat circle. The companies are happy; you think you are happy; you have new shiny glasses that are exactly like the ones you already own, but these are your new ones! Remember that when you hit the lights at night and close your eyes, all your stuff disappears. Its you and your thoughts again. You cant throw money at them and you cant dress them up to make them look better. They are the ones that create your story, not your stuff.
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Chapter1: Living Big Is Not Always Living Happy
Living large is what many people dream and work for. The big apartment, hotspot vacationing, assistants, cleaning ladies, 5 cars, a garage that can hide a train. All that work, and sweat and tears, sometimes even blood and friendships, just to own more and bigger stuff. Thats an endless marathon to run, because there will always be better and bigger stuff.
We should wonder why big corporations are not all working together to save us the trouble of buying new stuff every season, by making a new revolutionary invention. We should care that people all across the Third World are slaving so we can have the nice things. Its not the thirteen century anymore. We are not allowed to act as savages, at least not to our own species. We should aim to make the world a friendly and abundant place for everyone, not just the rich and the popular. We should stop supporting that world, that consuming machinery owned by the rich at the expense of the poor.
Who knows, maybe one day you or your loved ones will be at the short end of that machinery? What if ten years from not, the other part of the world becomes a world superpower? Would you feel good knowing that you dont have enough so that others have more than they need? Would you support and help build that world? Would you gladly work 10 hours a day in a factory for a minimum salary and no benefits? We shouldnt build that kind of world, so stop lending a helping hand to the mega-corporate bodies.
Because at the end, you are not helping yourself, only them. They dont care whether you have enough money to cover your bills this month; they just want you to buy the new product. And there will be new products until they convince the last man on earth to make a purchase. For the rest of us, the blissful customers, they are happy if we just keep wondering what wouldve been if you bought the other product. The one we left behind un-purchased. Then they will invent a new, third product, a combination of the previous two. And instead of being angry as customers who have been lied to, we end up purchasing the new, improved version of the same product.
And our lives depend on them. We anxiously wait for everything new. Trends and fads rise and fall weekly. The propaganda is successful and it will make you believe that you are not good enough if you dont have their products. You are not successful if you dont own an iPhone, not cool if you dont have expensive glasses. Or at least not good enough and cool enough as you could be with your glasses or your iPhone. Wow! Those artificial things say so much about you! Good for you! Now you dont have to try to be a better person. You can just buy the pieces that are missing and pose as the thing you want to be.
If your aim is to buy all the pieces that make the living large, you should work on changing the definition you have about living large. It should mean that you are all invested in your life. That you are soaking every minute of the day and have something to smile contently about at the end of the day. It should mean you are embracing your passions and leading your own way. The material things come and go. You wont tell your grandsons about the iPhone 9 you had when you were young. They will want to hear stories with meaning and substance.
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Chapter 2: Your Definition of Minimalism
Minimalism may be a relative term. For Buddhist monks it means a room with a bed and blanket. You may have been inspired by the whole concept and decide to just get rid of the duplicates. Some may think living off grid is a way to live life to its fullest, or moving into a self-sustaining home in the woods its best for us and the environment. It depends largely on what you want from your life. The important thing is that youve realized that you will be much happier owning less stuff. Think about the different areas where you can cut back, and make de-cluttering changes everywhere you can.