{"id":53,"date":"2008-06-12T22:40:17","date_gmt":"2008-06-13T02:40:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/becomingminimalist.wordpress.com\/?p=61"},"modified":"2012-12-29T09:11:31","modified_gmt":"2012-12-29T16:11:31","slug":"benefit-not-tied-to-the-past","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.becomingminimalist.com\/benefit-not-tied-to-the-past\/","title":{"rendered":"Not Tied to the Past"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.becomingminimalist.com\/slow-guide-to-minimalism\/slow-guide-to-minimalism3\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-8683\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-8683\" alt=\"slow-guide-to-minimalism3\" src=\"https:\/\/www.becomingminimalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/slow-guide-to-minimalism3.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"290\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.becomingminimalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/slow-guide-to-minimalism3.jpg 600w, https:\/\/www.becomingminimalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/slow-guide-to-minimalism3-300x145.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Soon after becoming minimalist, I minimized my office. In doing so, I made a deliberate decision to throw out anything related to my previous place of employment 8 years ago. This included books, materials, trainings, etc. Working at a local non-profit serving local teenagers, it occurred to me that youth culture has changed so much over the past 8 years that even the things effective 8 years ago are just not as effective today. New problems call for new solutions. And so I got removed them.\u00a0And in doing so, I discovered an important benefit of minimalism: Freedom from being tied to the past.<\/p>\n<p>Clutter keeps you tied to the past. Your thoughts tend to dwell in the past as the things around you force your mind to reminisce. Solutions tend to be rooted in the past as the things around you\u00a0conjure up the same old thought-processes. Additionally, our minds are tied to the past because there is no available space for anything new.<\/p>\n<p>Minimizing my workspace (and life)\u00a0forced me to recognize the problems of today and solve them with solutions for tomorrow. \u00a0Some might say &#8211;\u00a0you have to release the past to create a better tomorrow. And this benefits every area of our lives.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Soon after becoming minimalist, I minimized my office. In doing so, I made a deliberate decision to throw out anything related to my previous place of employment 8 years ago. This included books, materials, trainings, etc. Working at a local non-profit serving local teenagers, it occurred to me that youth culture has changed so much [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false},"categories":[440],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Not Tied to the Past<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.becomingminimalist.com\/benefit-not-tied-to-the-past\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Not Tied to the Past\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Soon after becoming minimalist, I minimized my office. 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