I find it difficult to admit most of my life was wasted chasing the wrong things. Looking back, it has become increasingly clear how I spent the first 33 years of my life chasing temporal, material possessions. I thought my life would improve as I acquired them.
It was supposed to be the “American Dream.” But I was all wrong.
While my household possessions were not extravagant, they accumulated over years—especially as we moved into larger and larger homes. Each move would result in more rooms to furnish and more empty closets and storage areas to keep our stuff. Fashions changed and thus, we bought new clothes. New technology emerged and we purchased new gadgets. Kids entered our family and with them came toys, gifts, hand-me-downs, and purchases “necessary” to raise them correctly.
Eventually, our possessions began subtly to control our lives. We spent countless hours cleaning, sorting, organizing, repairing, replacing, removing, and maintaining our physical possessions—not to mention all the time we spent on the front end earning the money just to make the initial purchase in the first place.
Our pursuit of material possessions was controlling our checkbook, draining our energy, and robbing us of true, lasting joy.
But then, everything changed.
When I was 33 years old, we began giving away all the possessions in our lives that were not absolutely essential to our purpose and goals. Eventually, our family removed over 60% of our earthly possessions. And we couldn’t be happier. We found more time, money, and energy to pursue the things in life most valuable to us: faith, family, and friends. We discovered far greater fulfillment in life pursuing our passions than we had ever discovered pursuing possessions.
And now, my only regret is that we didn’t pursue simple living sooner—that we wasted so much time, so many years, and so many resources. If I could do life over again, I would have embraced a minimalist life earlier: my teens, my twenties, or as a newly-formed family. As a result, from the very beginning, we would have experienced:
- Less debt.
- Less clutter.
- Less financial obligation and debt.
- More savings.
- More intentionality.
- More presence with others in my life.
- Less need to get ahead at others’ expense.
- More passion.
- More contentment.
The life-giving invitation to minimalism holds benefit for every generation. It is never too late to start no matter what stage of life you are introduced to it. But my life would attest to the fact that today is the best day to begin living with less. And the earlier in life, the better.
Rose says
i just started myself, having turned 50 this year, it’s like a new beginning. I wish I would have started years ago but things happen for a reason. I love your blog and have begun my minamilist journey. Thank you!
Cintia Costa says
I am 40 and I started becoming minimalist last year. I have been enjoying life much more now than ever! I am happy my 20 year old daughter was able to experience this feeling being young. :-) Thanks for your great posts! They are inspiring! :-)
Sanne says
Being aware that we live our life forward and understand it backwards is just another basic feature of being a human being that can reflect upon itself. Acknowledging what we wished we had done different is not mind clutter – suppress these thought and they will become mind clutter. Next step is to forgive oneself and live the future we really want no matter at what age.
Toni says
I am relatively new to minimalism. I have been working on it since the beginning of February 2014. It is a very long process indeed! But I am enjoying the Process. I am practicing not watching tv so I can get used to being without it. I just listen to classical music while decluttering. I haven’t gone through the cds yet. I thought I didn’t own much, but everytime I finish one box, I find 4 more! I am 64 and am enjoying the feeling of having more space in my closet. It is liberating!
Kim says
I have just started my minimalist journey.
My challenge is for things I need sometimes. For example, I had to buy a new pair of shoes for a job interview. I won’t probably wear these shoes very often and dont like the idea of having to store them. So it’s annoying that I bought them in the first place! How to avoid these sort of dilemmas?
Secondly I am tossing up whether to get rid of my macbook pro. I dont NEED it anymore. I use it mainly for internet surfing and watching TV online and movies. I think its the group think culture of everyone in my house (shared flat) owning a laptop and we all jump on them to muck around. But what would I do without one?
Ideas anyone?
Tracy says
a laptop is perfectly ok! just don’t use it to buy stuff online haha!
Amanda says
I am in the beginning stages of getting rid of our excess and must say, your site has been an incredible encouragement. I agree, the earlier, the better. I am 32 and for the first time in my life, I feel like I am finally getting a grip on who I am and the value of the objects I own. The Bible says not to store up treasures on earth, where thieves break in and steal and moth and rust destroy, but store up treasures in heaven. That mindset is finally sinking in. It’s definitely hard to part with my earthly treasures, but they aren’t what is truly valuable in life.
tina says
Yes! The bible (Jesus) also says not to covet possessions because they will become your burdens. How true !!!
Łukasz says
I’m a 19 years old. I was at a meeting about minimalism and almost everyone was older. That’s weird because the idea of minimalism isn’t anything new. Monks have been living this way for hundreds years. In US there were hippies. Details change, but the idea is bulletproof. :)
Lindsey says
There must be something about the age 33, that’s when I began my total life rethink and started to really question what I actually valued in my life. I have probably purged around the same 60% of my stuff, and actually found it to be quite easy after the initial 6 months.
I’m 36 now and in the final stages of a giant declutter. After donating, giving away, repurposing and most importantly not bringing anything new into my home, I can say that I am in a much better mental and physical space.
Decluttering encouraged me to get control of my finances, pay off debt, vastly reduce my spending/bills, eat better, take better care of my environment, make my home chemical free, and best of all, learn to truly appreciate the simple things in life.
Not only was it life changing, I like to think that it allowed me to truly embrace life.
Anne Brien says
Heavens, you’re only in your early 30s! I was 59 before I recognised and finally acknowledged that I no longer wanted lots of “stuff”. Luckily my problem wasn’t as great as many people’s because I’ve never had the money to go too mad with shopping. Even so, there was a lot of clutter and I’m still working through it. Yes, there have been times when I’ve started to think about the wasted money, time, resources, but one thing you learn as you get older is that, as someone wisely said above, regret is pure clutter – it achieves nothing but wasting precious mental space, time and energy. So I put those thoughts aside and focus on how far I’ve come and how much I love my tidier, less cluttered home
Crystal says
Thank you so much for your blog and your books. A year ago or so, we were coming home from spending Christmas with our family, our suburban packed out with gifts that we didn’t need and I found your book on my kindle and downloaded it and read it on the way home! Later my husband and I found your blog and between the two our life was changed – really!
But we have since fallen off the wagon. Our house isn’t as full again, but I can feel it creeping up on me and I hate to have that feeling back again – I feel trapped in my own home. Why? Because I’m ALWAYS picking up things – ugh. People say, “With five, very young children, you need to expect to have lots of stuff” I would like to disagree but maybe they’re right.
How do you get that motivation back and how do you live with seven people in the house and live simply – or is that possible?
I would love to hear your thoughts.
Blessings!
Crystal
misty henry says
Personally with six children I think that kids drag everything they own out and play with it daily. This constantly makes it feel like you have a ton of stuff but maybe do not. I will tell you this as children get older the toys go and are replaced with more expensive phones etc. this is where you are going to say, you dont need a new phone because yours is a year old. Lol It does get better. On another note if your home is smaller because you enjoy saving then it seems like there are a lot more toys hahah
tina says
Put the toys away and just have one box of some toys out. After a few months, swap that box for some of the stored toys. It’s like having new toys ! Continue this until they outgrow all the toys then donate them. Kids don’t need many toys to be happy, just a few is fine. They will supplement using their own imaginations.
My Light Bag says
I completely agree with you. I started living with less a few years ago and I’m still working towards getting my possessions down to the bare minimum. It feels better and better every time!