
It’s Friday! Which means that it’s almost the weekend, for most of the working world. I want to leave you, at the end of this week, with one observation that I had this morning.
I was calmly walked towards the train, I noticed that my mind was exceptionally clear. I hope you’ll share this observation that I had with a friend, if you know someone that would understand.
Minimalism and meditation go hand in and with forming a clear and healthy mind.
Think about it: meditation is about taking your thoughts, sitting with them, and simplifying them until they no longer trouble you. Until your mind can sit still, you can release all of that psychobabble that the inside of your brain is constantly engaged in and let it all go.
This is why Buddhist monks renounce their possessions, so the brothers can meditate without worrying if they need to dust their television set off, or if they need organize their closet.
If you begin to live simpler, your mind will become calmer.
With less worry, you’ll get more done.
You’ll accomplish more, and feel more fulfilled.
By aspiring to live an existence at minimum level, we open a path for ourselves to achieve greatness and also to be free.
Have a safe and peaceful weekend, everyone.
-Everett
Written by Everett Bogue | Follow me on Twitter
I’m going to say a slogan that you have probably heard before: spend less than you earn. It’s the only way to get out of debt. We nod, we get it. It makes sense, right?
So we spend less than we earn when we’re in high school, and then we spend way more than we earn in college, and then get out of college and most of us spend less than we earn and try to pay off those loans.
Than an interesting thing happens, if we have one of those day job situations that most people are in.
We get a raise.
And suddenly we have this extra thousand, or two thousand, or ten thousand extra dollars. Oh my! What are we going to do with all of this money?
I can tell you: most people spend it.
People are exceedingly good at spending all of the money they earn. I’ve known people who were making $12,000 a year and getting by fine in New York, I’ve known people making over $100,000 a year and struggling to save anything in New York. They were living in the same house, paying (nearly) the same rent.
But what if you spent way less than you earn?
What if you said to yourself: I don’t need to fill up my life with useless crap anymore. I don’t need my cable TV bill. I don’t need my first car, or my second car, or my third car.
I can tell you the answer, if it hasn’t already occurred to you. You’ll save money, you’ll pay off your debts, and then someday if you’re really lucky, you’ll be able to spend that money on your dream.
The stuff that dreams are made of.
If you live a minimalist lifestyle, spending exactly the bare minimum to survive every month. You’ll someday be able to do something. Or better yet, quit your job right now and you’ll be forced to spend the bare minimum to survive, and eventually you’ll actually do something.
Something that’s yours, something that you own, that you’re responsible for. Something so important that your actually passionate about it. These are the kind of dreams that you should be dreaming.
But all of this is confusing, they told me I wanted a house, that I wanted a full time job.
Some people get really confused here, which is understandable. You’ve been conditioned your whole life into thinking that dreams are a bigger house, they’re a bigger yard, they’re a new kitchen set, they’re keeping your old kitchen set in storage.
Dreams are not made of bigger houses.
I’ve seen where that old kitchen set sits in storage, and it’s dusty and not used very much. It’s in fact, useless.
A fork is just a fork, and a plate is just a plate. It doesn’t matter how fancy they are, and you certainly don’t need twenty five of them to eat dinner.
A dream isn’t a dream unless you do it.
You can’t have the money to do a dream if you spend it.
If you stop spending your money on perpetuating a corporate cycle of consume, destroy, consume destroy, you’ll be able to do something important.
How to save for the future, minimalist style.
- Make sure every cent you spend is for absolute necessities.
- Move to a smaller house, rent a smaller house, one costs less.
- Abandon cars, take public transportation (move to an area with public transportation.
- Save the rest for your dreams. You’ll have way more than you would if you spent it all.
Here’s an article and a blog that will help you.
The True Cost of Stuff [Mnmlist]
And basically read everything on GetRichSlowly
Written by Everett Bogue | Follow me on Twitter.
Leo Babauta just blogged at Mnmlist.com about a hypothetical minimalist society where no one owned anything, I think this is an outstanding idea.
These are ideas that I subscribe to already, but there are limitations to how far you can take them in a society that feeds on permanent ownership and throwing objects out when you’re done.
However, there are methods that we can put into play to make a system like Leo describes work.
Let’s develop some of those ideas, in my real world situation.
Obviously these get harder to execute with the more belongings you accumulate, but I think that’s kind of the point. If you cut down on your personal possessions than you can start to live in this society that Leo describes.
Car Libraries:
Zip Car has this down. Next week when my girlfriend flies in from New York we’ll be renting a Honda Hybrid and driving up to Seattle. We never would have been able to do this without Zip Car
Housing Libraries:
This isn’t easy, but I’ve seen it done. I’m doing it now, by renting a room month-to-month in Portland. I’m going to move out at the end of November and head to Chicago. We had a kind of a housing library system set up at The School House in Brooklyn–we had ten rooms in the place–and we subleased when someone was traveling. It was kind of like a housing library system, the only thing is that socially it was a lot more complicated than renting a house.
We need push for social change and start to install systems where it’s okay to rent a house for a week, or two months. We’ll call it Zip-house. Someone should get on this idea, there’s a lot of money to be made.
Bike libraries:
I’m really surprised that Portland doesn’t have these. They have a tool library, they have public libraries, but no bike libraries? I think I remember someone talking about how they tried to implement one and failed. Try again Portland.
How I’m renting a bike:
When I moved to Portland on September 21st, my first goal was renting a room, my second goal was buying an inexpensive bike that was nice enough that I could resell again just before I skipped town again. The bike cost me $140. I’m trying to resell it for at least that much before I leave on November 18th. It’s kind of like a free bike rental if I accomplish this.
Clothes rental:
This is harder, because clothes wear out. I personally just stick with a weeks worth of clothing, with a little extra underwear and socks thrown in. This way I just wear them until the clothes wear out.
It would be really nice if I could check a winter coat out of a library though, because right now my winter coat is in a box in my mom’s basement in Chicago, which I had to time ahead of time, because I knew I’d be in Chicago around the holidays.
Let’s build this minimalist society that Leo dreams of.
Written by Everett Bogue | Follow me on Twitter
We’re living in a society that is rapidly evolving to point where we won’t have to live in any one specific place. I’m currently working on a website for a woman in New York, I’ve been illustrating for a company in San Francisco. I’m working on a magazine with colleagues in New York, Mumbai, and Peru.
It doesn’t matter where you live anymore.
It used to be that humans had to wake up every morning and go into a place where they could communicate with human beings in order to get things done. But now communication has evolved to the point that people, who choose to, can interact with everyone all over the world.
Minimalism is the ultimate freedom from being tied to a place or location.
On November 18th I’m going to be getting on a train to Chicago, where I’m going to exist for the next few months, before returning to New York for a bit.
How often you move around is simply restricted by how much you should choose to build up your collection of junk in any one area. Many people are still renting large homes, and then slowly filling them up with stuff that they don’t necessarily use.
This makes it impossible for them to achieve this dream, this reality of existing without the need to be in any one place at any one time.
In broad strokes, this is how to achieve this dream:
- Limit your belongings to only the things that you can carry. The absolute essentials.
- Start interacting with the internet as a source of doing business.
- Start moving around. Just get on a plane and see where you end up.
Easy, right? Well, it’s not that easy, but it’s a goal you can achieve. It’s made possible by the technical advances of the last ten years.
Oh, I watched this Ted Talk yesterday by Seth Godin. If you haven’t watched it already, you really should. It’s about how ideas travel in the modern day.

A minimal kitchen (not my own, sadly.)
Yesterday, I discussed some of the fundamental problems that are associated with clutter. How we get it, where it comes from, why we have it, and how to get rid of it.
In today’s post I’m going to keep it simple and just discuss my favorite time-tested method to improving your clutter situation.
Clearing surfaces, a simple way to combat clutter.
Everyone has a number of surfaces in their household, how many varies by how big your house is. The most important ones are usually your kitchen counter, and your desk. If either of these spaces are cluttered, you’re bound to have trouble being productive making food or doing your work.
Ideally you want every surface in your household clear of things, except maybe intentional ornamentation. Like a tiny potted plant, or a picture of your cute girlfriend.
How to combat this clutter:
1, Start small. If you’re overwhelmed by the clutter, pick a small corner of your surface and start there. If you’re clearing the kitchen, do the dishes first, dry them, put them away. If you’re doing your desk, start by clearing objects blocking your mouse movements, and then move to the junk behind your monitor.
2, Find everything a home. Every object that is sitting out needs to have a place where it gets put. If it doesn’t have a place, you need to find it a place. If you can’t find a place than seriously question whether you need the object.
3, Get rid of things. If you don’t use it, you probably don’t need it! Don’t be afraid to recycle, donate, or trash objects that aren’t useful to you.
I have a one-month rule, if I don’t use it at least once a month than I probably don’t need it. Ask yourself whether or not you use each and every object, if the answer is ‘yes’, then keep it. If the answer is ‘someday’ than perhaps you should reconsider whether or not you need the object.
4, Try a thirty-minute cleaning spree. Sometimes I like to just go crazy, and I’ll set aside thirty minutes to just blow through cleaning a space. I usually do this by throwing everything into a bin and just making the surface completely clear. Then I use a dishrag to clean it, and then I deal with what’s in the bin.
5, Aim for absolutely clear. At the end of the day, your surface should be absolutely clear. Everything is put away, ideally where you can’t see it. I promise you that you’ll really enjoy looking around your house at all of the cleanliness.
Here’s a more comprehensive article on uncluttering over at Zen Habits.
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Let me know how you’re tackling clutter in the comments! (yes, I have comments now. Yay!)