Editor’s Note: This is a guest post from Rose Lounsbury.
How many towels do you need? This was the surprisingly life-changing question I faced on a Saturday afternoon in early 2012, as I scrutinized my linen cupboard.
I had just started on a minimalist journey, inspired by my 1,500 square foot house that could no longer comfortably contain the possessions of me, my husband, and our three 2-year-olds (yes, you read that right… triplets).
A few weeks earlier, we’d returned from visiting out-of-state relatives for Christmas with a van absolutely packed full of presents. As I walked into my house and assessed our already stuffed surroundings, a slow, frightening realization came upon me:
We didn’t have room for the things we already owned. Where was I going to put this new stuff?
I felt defeated and overwhelmed. I knew the gifts had been given in love. I knew they were supposed to make me and my children happy. But more than anything, they added stress to my already stressful full-time-working-mom-of-triplets life.
Luckily, though, a change was coming.
About a week after Christmas I had lunch with a good friend, and I explained my problem. I thought the solution was to either buy a bigger house or allow no one to buy my kids Christmas presents again, ever.
But my friend looked at me between bites of soup and casually suggested another idea, “Or… you could just become a minimalist.”
I immediately thought of monks living in a cave or college students traversing Europe with all their possessions on their backs or black-clad hipsters lounging on white couches in apartments that doubled as art galleries. None of that sounded like my real life in the Ohio suburbs with three kids, two cars, and a mortgage.
But my friend reassured me that minimalism was just a philosophy, a less-is-more approach to living, and that any modern American could adopt it. Skeptical but intrigued, I went home and started reading. I was hooked.
Which brought me, a few weeks later, to January of 2012, when I went to put away some towels in my linen cupboard and asked myself the aforementioned life-changing question:
How many towels do you need?
Now I want you to realize, this wasn’t the first time I’d asked myself questions about my stuff. Unbeknownst to me, I’d been asking myself questions about my stuff my entire life (and you probably have, too).
But those questions sounded different. They sounded more like this…
“Rose, how much stuff could you AFFORD to buy?” I was a dedicated closeout, clearance, and coupon shopper, always scouring the racks for the best “deal” I could find.
Another favorite: “Rose, how much stuff could you FIT in here?” I used every spare inch in my snug home to cram in as much as possible, often resorting to space saver bags and bins stacked precariously high in my attic.
And, finally, the Big Daddy of them all, the question I continually asked every night as I spent hours putting away toys, shoes, sippy cups, and errant paper: “Rose, how could you better ORGANIZE this stuff?”
I thought organizing was the answer, the Holy Grail, the thing that—if I could just master it and buy the right bins with the right labels—would solve my problem. I’d finally have the home in the magazines. I’d finally stop feeling like every day was a continual battle between me and the chaos.
But that Saturday afternoon, I wasn’t asking myself any of those questions. That day, fresh in my nascent minimalist awakening, I was asking myself a very different question:
Rose, how many towels do you NEED?
That’s the kind of question that just might change your life.
The answer was surprisingly clear: two per person.
Which immediately felt wrong. Because if you passed third grade math you know that’s only 10 towels for a family of five, which certainly wasn’t the number of towels I’d registered for on my Bed, Bath, and Beyond wedding gift registry. It wasn’t the number of towels in my friend’s homes. And it certainly wasn’t the towel message I received from Better Homes and Gardens magazine. They were telling me I needed pink towels for spring and yellow towels for summer and towels with festive reindeer prancing across them for Christmas! Ten towels just didn’t feel right.
So, I did something I rarely do. I entered the sanctum of my husband’s man cave on a Saturday afternoon (aka prime sports-watching time) to ask him a very serious question, “Honey, is it okay if we have just 10 towels?”
Josh paused. He looked at me for a long time. I’m certain that during this time he was deeply pondering the critical issue of the towel supply. He eventually responded with a somewhat confused, “Yeah, I guess. I mean, that sounds about right.”
That settled it. Ten towels.
Now remember… that was EIGHT YEARS ago. In that time, I have not increased our number of towels and everyone in our family has been dry when they needed to be dry.
This early venture into minimalism taught me two very clear things:
- I can live with a lot less than I think I can.
- I can definitely live with a lot less than society tells me I should.
In my closet right now, you would see five bath towels—because the other five are in use. You would also find 5 pool towels on the bottom shelf. So yes, technically we have three towels per person: 2 bath towels + 1 pool towel. The surprising thing about this is that my kids are on a swim team every summer and we’ve gotten by on this number of towels.
The most interesting thing about minimalism is how it changes my mindset.
Every June when I see the pool towels on sale at big box stores, I think, “Maybe I should just buy a couple more.” But then we get through the swim season just fine and I’m reminded again of lessons #1 and #2.
My towels are just one example of minimalist thinking. After I decluttered my towel cupboard, I went through the rest of my house, asking myself different variations of that original question:
Rose, how many coffee cups do you need?
Rose, how many pairs of shoes do you need?
Rose, how many boxes of holiday decorations do you really need?
And slowly, over a period of almost one year, my home physically transformed. My cluttered corners turned into open spaces. My formerly crammed cupboards had room to breathe. My now unstuffed drawers opened and closed easily.
So yes, my home looked neat and tidy, but that wasn’t the point. That wasn’t why I kept doing what I was doing. The reason I kept doing it was because of how I felt. At the risk of sounding melodramatic, I felt free. I felt at peace. I started to find myself, at the ends of my long working + parenting days, relaxing on my couch instead of frantically picking up my stuff.
So today I want to encourage you: ask yourself a life-changing question.
Insert any word you like (towels, sweaters, hammers, wine glasses, email subscriptions, volunteer commitments, etc.) into the blank space:
How many _______________ do you need?
My wish is that this simple question starts you on a journey toward a more peaceful life, full of the possibilities of open spaces.
Cheers to less stuff and more you!
***
Rose Lounsbury is a minimalism and simplicity coach, speaker, and author of the Amazon bestselling Less: Minimalism for Real. Rose spends her days speaking, writing, coaching her clients and online students to stuff-free freedom. Rose’s advice has been featured in USA Today, and she’s been a guest on Good Day Columbus, NPR, Good Morning Cincinnati, and Living Dayton. You can find her online at RoseLounsbury.com.
Alicia Molina says
When we were moving from one place to the next we each had 3 changes of clothes per person. It was so easy to keep everything clean. After we moved more clothes, then the dirty laundry started piling up because we didn’t have to wash as frequently, things quickly got out of control. I will never forget that feeling, and strive to feel it again. Difficult though working 9 hours a day, vs 0 hours a day like before.
Kelly says
Do you have a list of how many items is recommended for other basic household items?
Aisha says
I am a mug hoarder. I have mugs for every season, reason and everything in between. It makes my mornings hard – because I can spend anywhere from 3-5 minutes debating which mug to use. It’s such a waste of time and unnecessary. How many mugs do I need? Definitely not the 25 that are in the cabinet. After I went to Ghana I felt so ashamed…we have SOOOO MUCH STUFF. I used the same mug every day there for 2 weeks – guess who survived?! This girl! I came home and wanted to simplify my life. I’m glad I came across this website. But I did have a question about the towels – what do we do when the family and/or friends come over to stay?
nyran ghani says
They bring their own towels.??♀️
Katrina says
When our exchange student came from Mongolia he brought his own towel. Maybe it’s a western cultural idea (as opposed to Asian) that we need so much of everything.
Hse N says
don’t know if this is true but it sounds like it, our au pair came and had everything he needed and no extras to pay fro
Sherri says
Friends or family who come over to stay can use those additional towels that are in the linen closet. Then they go in the laundry and back in the closet for when you switch out the towels the family is using.
Janet Byrum says
I buy my guest two towels, wash cloth and hand towel
And they return home with them;)
Alicia Molina says
Use the spares in the linen closet. Then launder when they leave. Easy.
Evelyn Dickinson says
This all sounds great if you have nothing else to d but wash clothes. I don’t know about everyone else, but my husband and I work full time. We also have other obligations besides the fact of “how many do we need”. I do not have time to waste just doing laundry every day.
Rebecca Nichols says
Well, I have two thoughts:
1. Minimalism doesn’t mean not having enough. But the point is that when we slow down and think about it, most of us will find that we have waaaay more than we need. The balance will be different for everyone, but the trick is to be brave enough to ask yourself the questions, and to answer honestly.
2. The thing about minimalism (and waste-reduction) is that one question will often lead to another – actually, the surface questions make way for the deeper ones. For example, rather than asking “how will I find time to do laundry every day?”, my new question is how often do I really need to wash? How often do I really need to change my clothes? Who is it that tells me I need to be seen in something fresh and exciting every day? Notions of hygiene and cleanliness are somewhat socially constructed; they’re driven more by class, and societal norms and expectations, than any concrete measure of what will keep smelling good and staying healthy.
I am finding that, as I engage with this question, I am in fact washing much less. And my loads of clothing contain three to four times as many sets of underwear as outer clothing. I find that I can wear trousers about five times before they need washing, and tops maybe twice, depending on the season and the activities that I have been engaged in. Winter clothes can be worn longer than summer clothes. And let’s be honest – jumpers/sweaters only need to be washed when they are actually dirty which, for many of us, is very infrequent.
Marion Peckham says
Totally agree with your comments about washing too often – body and laundry ?
Towana Fuqua says
I agree wholeheartedly with your second point! I’ve been learning these things since retirement, too.
I’m still working on the idea of “going minimalist” because I really treasure my “stuff” that I’ve collected over the years. Especially the things that belonged to, or where made by, family members.
Dee says
That is very sweet of you. You ca continue minimalist ways once she’s gone but for now enjoy your time with her. 💞
C says
Terry robe & two small hair towels, wash on weekends. Works for me. Much less laundry & work.
Peggy says
The real secret to having less is to have things that do double or triple duty. I cannot believe that people have Christmas dishes, Valentine dishes, Easter dishes, 4th of July dishes etc etc. My dishes are white and a center piece for the occasion is all that is needed. Who needs salt and pepper shakers with Santa on them LOL.
Linda Carlson says
This is without question the best de-cluttering strategy advice that I have ever read. I spend a month teaching science in Africa each year, and comfortably live out of one medium suitcase (I carry 10 more huge cases full of science supplies, that I donate to my schools there) I am always amazed at how easy it is to live with minimal belongings. But at home in the US, I have 100 times too much. I will start today, emptying out one drawer at a time, and asking the question, “how many of these — do I need? That is so much better than trying to decide what to give away, what I might use one day, I need to keep this in case of… etc.
Brava Rose!!! You have absolutely nailed the: “Critical Strategy for De-Cluttering” question, where I am concerned :) Linda C. Ph.D.
Linda M. van Huizum says
Eye opening and inspiring! I think that everyone has different abilities and needs that we can take into consideration. Like, how accessible are washing machines and lifestyle needs in terms of how often do I shower. So, keeping in mind that the goal is to de clutter my space for my own serenity, I must also look to my personal needs, that is the balance I am striving to do with my intentions towards a minimalist lifestyle. Thank you for your wonderful article and inspiration.?
Raya Newbold says
I like the idea of 3 towels per person, but then my floor always needs some too. How many does my floor need?
Nabz says
Have you considered memory foam bathroom mats. One by the basin, one by the shower and maybe one by the toilet.
Sandra says
I don’t use floor towels. I dry myself in the empty tub before I step out. As I’m stepping out, I dry one foot at a time. My hub uses a towel mat, which he hangs up afterward and uses time after time. After all, only the bottoms of your feet are on it.
Ashani says
Sandra I can’t agree more with you…did the mistake earlier and my floor towels came to be used by my guests. Something I wouldn’t do again… because we now have a mat for the bathroom as well. Felt much better and owe to my guests coming to visit ….all of it will go away with the guests staying and feeling welcome!
mirranda says
I have about 15-20 towels. I don’t have a washer dryer in my apt so I have to go to the laundromat so I found myself buying more so I didn’t have to go to the laundromat as often because I hate the laundromat but what ended up happening is I have a ton of towels to wash and fold when I do. I’d love to get away with having only 2 towels but I would be going to the laundromat every other day for one towel and that does not sound practical. I don’t reuse my towels because that is how bacteria like mrsa spread.
CJ says
In that case I suggest you are washing your towels FAR too often. Towels are used to dry clean water off you. Hang them properly to dry once you’ve done that, and you can use them for ages without washing and without spreading whatever bacteria it is you’re talking about.
KS says
I am in my 70’s and I have always used my towel for a week then it goes in the laundry.. your body is clean after your shower
DB says
I have my own washer and dryer but I invested in two linen bath towels. They dry in minutes. I wash them and hang them in my bathroom. If necessary they could easily be washed out by hand. Use shampoo to hand wash as it rinses out easily. Cheers.