Great Recycling Site

I just found a great website called Preserve Gimme 5. I was looking for a place to recycle my Brita water filters (I couldn't bear to throw the used filters away) and this website will take them. They will also take No. 5 plastics either by mail or at certain locations if your recycling program won't. I got to recycle and declutter something that has been sitting in my pantry for over 2 years. Yay.

Here's a little video from their website:

Defining Minimalism...for me

Over the past few days I've been mulling over what exactly the goal is with this quest for simplicity and minimalism. Of the many blogs I follow, the definition of minimalism differs between the authors. Everett Bogue (Far Beyond the Stars) gave up his car, quit his corporate job, pared down his belongings to less than 100 items, has a location independent career and works, on average, 2 hours a day. Leo Babuta of Zen Habits advocates a similar sort of minimalism but less intense. Simplicity by Sunny is another woman's search for what it means to be a minimalist and her personal journey in figuring out what exactly it means to her.

Over the last 4 months or so, after reading all these blogs, I kind of feel the need to get a clear idea of what it is I'm doing, why specifically I am doing it, and how I will proceed. Right now I'm mostly just decluttering a la 365 Less Things. And so far, I have noticed a huge difference in the free time and space I have created merely by getting rid of, well, crap. Keeping the house clean(er) is so much easier now. There is less guilt about stuff I should be doing (straightening up, filing receipts, clearing off tables and counters) because the things that were giving me work are ...poof!...gone. Yay for me. As a side note, if you like being lazy, start decluttering. It'll give you plenty of guilt free time to lounge around!

There is more decluttering to do and it will keep me busy for the next year, I'm sure, as I only do it for about 5-15 minutes a day. But this isn't the sole focus of my desire to simplify my life. Ultimately, I want more. I want simplicity, I want peace and I want calm. And here is why (this is my first pass at brainstorming and clarifying my goals):
* I want aspects of my life that used to be very chaotic to become simple and streamlined (banking, bill paying, decreasing number of accounts I have, paying off things so there are less bills to pay, going paperless, planning meals, etc.)
* I want to finish my secondary degree.
* I want to focus on my art and continue to improve my skills
* I want to put more emphasis on my art as my career
* I want to travel more
* I want more more lunches and long drawn out dinners with bottles of wine with friends
* I need to know I'm making as small of an impact environmentally as I can by not consuming or consuming mindfully
* When the time and space has been created, due to the void of all the unnecessary stuff, I want and need to focus more on what's going on in my mind, heart and body (It is easy to avoid these aspects of life when you're caught up in superficial, unimportant stuff).
* I want more time to work on compassion, on stepping out of my world to help others in some way.

So, those are my reasons off the bat on why I want to stay on this path. As far as my definition of minimalism...I'm not giving up my car, I'm not quitting the job (hey, I like it and I actually have fun there), I'm not going to try and live off of my blog. I admire those who can do these things but I have to figure out my limits on this quest. One of my goals is to be more self sufficient food-wise and I'm getting there slowly. I have my chickens for eggs, bees for honey, lots of fruit trees, lettuce (when I remember to water them!), sugarcane. I'm saving for a huge water tank to collect rainfall to irrigate the plants and trees. I'd like to buy another worm composter since the first one is doing so well, which will take care of my fertilizer needs. I'd love to get some of our electric on solar but that's a big project for some time in the future.

It's a long winded post but I thought it was important to define what this all means and where it is going. I'm sure things will become clearer and my focus more thought out as I continue.

I'd love to hear anyone else's personal definition of minimalism and why they want to live this lifestyle. And if you're up to it, write a guest post. Just shoot me an email!

Minimalist Gift Giving

A friend of mine went on vacation and brought me back a wonderful gift from the quant town she spent time in. Her comment to me was something along the lines of "I know you're on this minimalism kick so I got you something you could use that wouldn't be clutter." It was homemade soap from Star Lake Soap. What a perfect gift! I could use it everyday, it wouldn't contribute to clutter, and it smelled super awesome. Honey Vanilla. I loved the packaging: just a bar of soap with a brown paper label wrapped around it.

This gift got me thinking about the kind of gifts to give those who are on their way to simplifying their lives. Naturally, food gifts are a great idea (especially homemade)! Soaps or bath salts, tickets to the movies, restaurant gift certificates, or veggies from your garden are a few of my ideas. I can't wait until next year when my bees have made enough honey to provide jars of it to all my friends and family for the holidays.

If anyone has given or received unique gifts that coincide with their minimalist mentality, I'd love to hear your ideas.

Virtual Uncluttering

I'm really enjoying going through everything and purging, purging, purging. I've noticed that the time I spend waffling on whether to keep or toss items is getting shorter and shorter. I think it's becoming addictive. The addictive part is not so much the act of getting rid of the stuff, but more so the idea of life getting simpler because of having less stuff to think about, clean, move around etc.

One area that I've been completely determined to declutter is my email. I am addicted to my iPhone. I'm not proud of this addiction and I am repeatedly trying to pry it from my emotional death grip. That project is a work in progress and a discussion for future posts. For now, it is considered one of my appendages and it serves as my primary computer much of the time. The amount of emails that get sent to it drives me insane so I decided last week to, instead of deleting messages from Old Navy, the Company Store, Ticktemaster, NRDC, (the list is never ending), to UNSUBSCRIBE from them ALL. These are not spam messages. These are emails that at one point in time since the inception of the internet I have subscribed to either by buying something from a company or signing up for a newsletter that I was certain I would be so interested in that I would welcome weekly emails. These are choices I made at one time in the past to keep me completely connected to companies or organizations that, for the most part, were trying to get me to spend my money. I am not a big shopper at all, but I have fallen prey to buying 5 tshirts at Old Navy because they were 30% off. I have 20 tshirts already. I don't need more. So one by one, as these emails pop up on my iPhone, I scroll to the bottom, follow the link to unsubscribe and get sent to a webpage which says something along the lines of "You have been removed from our email list. We're sorry to see you go but if you want to enjoy our deals in the future, come visit us at www.blahblahblahwasteyourtimeandmoney.com." I close that webpage and feel a sense of satisfaction that that's one less email I have to delete in the future.

It's been about 8 days and now when I open my email I can be assured that 99 percent of what will be in my Inbox is something that I need to read, want to read, and will make the time to read.

Financial Clutter

I have been reading Adam Baker 's e-book Unautomate Your Finances and so far, within the first 15 pages I've learned a huge lesson that was like a smack in the face. Now most of us who have or have had credit cards, probably had more than one. That's not so unheard of or crazy, right? But what about checking accounts, savings account, money markets, 401k accounts, Paypal accounts, etc? When I wrote down every account I have open I almost fell out of my chair. How many do I actively use and seriously pay attention to? Just a handful. It hit me that I have been collecting financial clutter for the same reason that I have accumulated material stuff that I don't need...because it was on sale, or had a low interest rate, or in the case of some accounts, a higher interest rate (by a quarter of a percent. I mean really, will this really be a real source of added income? Doubt it!), or because it symbolized a new start. "This account will just be for saving for that trip to India," I'll tell myself. Flash forward a year and that money was spent on...I can't even remember on what. So my pact for this month is to figure out what financial baggage I'm dragging around and get rid of what isn't essential. Close accounts, cancel cards I don't use, and create more space in my life. I'll have less paper to file (filing is one of my least favorite tasks), fewer boxes of paper to file, and some peace of mind knowing more clearly what my financial picture is without all the extra stuff.

Decluttering sputtering

As I continue to declutter and purge drawer by drawer, room by room, I keep thinking about what my end goal is. I can see it very clearly. As I look around my future decluttered home everything is put away nicely, there are open counters, bare tabletops, and space in my closets. Kind of like an Apple store before it opens the doors. And I imagine how awesome that will feel. So why then, do I waffle over keeping a pair of jeans that i KNOW will never fit again? Why is it so hard to let go of some of these things that clearly need to go to clutter heaven (or hell)? I thought about that particular pair of jeans and realized that tied up into to that worn out denim are memories of things I did and places I went in them, my identity (when I could get away with super low waisted jeans and halter tops) and the desire to go back in time to when they did fit and were in style. Not to mention the goal setting to try and get back into them. All this emotion in a pair of pants. It amazes me how much energy I can expend going back and forth trying to decide whether to toss or keep. As I keep decluttering though, I am noticing that it is getting easier to let go of the emotional garbage that I've assigned to my material belongings. Not easy, but easier. I am telling myself that the more I can let go the more I can start to live in where I am at now and not where I was. The less stuff I have, the more time I will have because I won't be stressing about putting it away, cleaning it, worrying about organizing it or stuffing it in a closet. And at some point that will create more peace. So onward and outward (out the door!).

P.S. And yes, the jeans are in the "outbox." Put them there this morning!

Day One- Step one to Simple

Day One. Two words that are loaded with expectations, excitement, hope and a whole bunch of other feelings. Day one is the day where everyone has all the confidence in the world and the best of intentions. And then comes Day Two. And Seven. And soon Day One is the day you have to label either a failure, a false start, or a practice run. This is my attempt at creating some lasting change after trying a whole bunch of different ways of attempting a simpler life (that didn't really work!).

This is Day One of my blog. I've blogged before (about drawing and art) and it's been awhile since I've done it actively. Mostly I've been reading other peoples' blogs and thinking of what I wanted to accomplish with a new blog. I've been on a quest for simplicity and I thought what better way than to do it with the help and community of the blogosphere. So this is the purpose of my blog. To focus in on a simple life, connecting with others who desire the same lifestyle and exchange ideas with those of you out there who are looking for the bigger things in life by embracing the small things in life.

So where will I start and where will I go with this? I'm not sure. It will be as much a surprise for me as it will be for the readers (of whom are very few on Day One!). But I do know where I am starting today.

A lot of my inspiration for this blog and for me personally come from the blog 365 Less Things - Reducing Our Stuff One Day at a Time. It essentially is about getting rid of all the extra stuff that we keep in our lives that we just don't need. I have been doing this almost on a daily basis and I've made 3 trips to Salvation Army and it feels awesome! I have a lot to do still but the fun is in doing it over time, room by room, drawer by drawer as you move through your home. I encourage everyone to try her challenge, even if you don't do it 365 days a year. Try it for a week and see how you start to look at things that you own. It will even change how you consume things because you will take an extra look and wonder how long it will be before you are purging it from your belongings. Do I really need another Pier One candle holder when I already have 5 of them? Probably not. Do I need to keep the 5 that I have considering I only use one? Probably not. So out go the 4 that I don't use. Give to a friend, sell it on eBay, donate it.

For any of you early readers, thanks for visiting! Looking forward to this journey.