Minimalism?! Isn’t that when people randomly get rid of all of their stuff and promise to never buy anything again? Or where people completely deprive themselves of every possible indulgence and impulse? And don’t you need to have all-white walls, zero decorations, and only wear reclaimed clothing?
Take a deep breath and suspend your skepticism for just a few short minutes! In this article, we are talking about the minimalist mindset—a way of thinking that can help you be more intentional about what you purchase, what you keep in your home, and how you spend your time and money. We are talking about intentionality, NOT deprivation! We are talking about one (very flexible) method of prioritizing your space, time, and money to elevate the things and people that matter the most to you.
What is the minimalist mindset?
One of the founders of the modern minimalism movement, Joshua Becker, describes minimalism as intentionally living with only the items that support your purpose. In other words, the minimalist mindset can help you focus on what’s most important to you rather than becoming distracted and bogged down by excess things, events, and obligations. The idea is to focus on finding joy and contentment with what you already have, rather than mindlessly pursuing the latest consumer trend on Instagram. The minimalist mindset encourages you to make purchases with purpose, rather than impulse. And instead of just living with the clutter around you, a minimalist mindset can help you see with more clarity what you can part with to make more room for what matters to you.
What are the key benefits of minimalism?
If you’ve been following Bee Organized for any length of time, you know that clearing away your clutter has numerous benefits, including:
- increasing your happiness and feelings of well-being while reducing your anxiety
- giving you more of your most precious resource—time—by reducing the amount of time you spend looking for lost objects, cleaning and dusting, and trying to be productive amidst the chaos
- improving your physical and mental health by removing hiding spaces for dust and allergens, reducing stress, improving sleep, and much more
Adding a minimalist mindset to the mix can help you save precious financial resources by encouraging you to be more thoughtful before making purchases. Focus your purchasing power on those items and experiences that match up well with your life priorities—and save yourself from the headaches that come with impulse purchases.
Practical steps to get started!
There is no single correct method of bringing more of a minimalist mindset into your life. In this section, we’ve rounded up a few of our favorite pieces of advice for wrapping your brain around this new way of thinking:
- Take some time to assess your current lifestyle. Ask yourself what feels cluttered either physically or mentally. Is it your bedroom? Your social calendar? Your shopping habits? Whatever part of your life is causing the most angst is the best place to start. Then you can use that successful momentum to keep rolling into other parts of your life!
- Use our famous Power Purge to make instant headway on clearing the clutter out of a specific space. Remember to start small so that you don’t get overwhelmed!
- Practice mindful consumption in whatever way works best for you. Don’t just add things to your literal or virtual cart. Stop and consider whether you need this item, whether you have something already that would fit the bill, where you will keep it, whether you will still be glad you bought it a month or a year from now.
- Try a 30-day declutter challenge, where you conscientiously remove something from your home every day for a month. Or make a pact with yourself that every item you bring into the home must be matched by two items that you remove from the home.
- Get rid of your duplicates! In our experience working with clients, homes tend to accumulate multiple versions of the same things beyond any point of reason—think extension cords, vases, charging cords for obsolete technology, grocery bags, travel mugs, baseball caps, and more.
- Embrace quality over quantity. How many times have you bought multiple of something when you only need one because it seemed like a good deal? The goal isn’t to ban all incidents of buying multiples—it’s to normalize the idea of stopping and actually thinking about whether buying extra is a good use of your money and storage space. Does it match with your priorities for your life?
What is standing in your way?
We know that it can feel overwhelming to start the minimizing process. If you haven’t made any attempt thus far to organize or declutter your home, looking around at all that you’ve accumulated can stop people in their tracks before they even start. We hear this a lot, which is why we rounded up our best advice for getting started into a five-step process.
We also know that it’s difficult for many folks to adopt a minimalist mindset because we are living in an age of consumption like no other! We are constantly bombarded on our various screens and in real life with social pressure to buy, buy, buy—whether we need the items or not! Find confidence in your own choices about how you want to spend your money, and what items you want to invite into (or out of) your home.
As you get started, understand that decluttering can be a very emotional process. Even objects that only have negative feelings attached to them (like guilt or stress) can be difficult for people to dismiss from their home. This recalibration of your emotional relationship with things takes time and practice. Give yourself grace as you work toward prioritizing the things, people, and experiences that bring you the most joy.
Remember that YOU have ownership over your life and your priorities, and therefore YOU get to have a major say in how objects and clutter and consumerism take up space in your mind and home. Make a plan to bring a more minimalist mindset into the new year—and if you need help simplifying your hive, you know you can call in the Bees!
