Friday, February 25, 2011

Books Versus E-Books

A dieter’s greatest scourge is temptation. That luscious chocolate-encrusted strawberry croons our names until we respond. That succulent dessert begs to be devoured.
A minimalist diet, unfortunately, has the same nemesis. Temptation draws us whenever we deprive ourselves of those things that we have elevated to the status of delightful. Minimalism, though, holds that “doing without” is the epitome of success.
Since I chose the minimal lifestyle, the temptation imp has stood in my way frequently, and I have been compelled to choose what really is significant in my daily life. Reading is one of those essentials.
Yet, I am “old school;” some say, a dinosaur. I love the feel, the heft, the connection to printed and bound reading materials. Part of the joy of reading a good book is to collapse into a comfortable chair, or sprawl on a lush lawn with an engrossing book in my hands. It is a route to losing the reality of the world around me.
I have found that reading an article on my laptop lacks the tactile pleasure of savouring a pocket novel or hard cover classic. The LCD screen seems to flicker, or the sunlight makes reading impossible, or the computer must be plugged in after an hour or so. There are myriad excuses as to why e-books are inferior to bound copies of the same plots and documents. Yet, by the end of 2010, over 10% of all books sold were in electronic, or digital form. The world is embracing the new technology, while I cling to old ways.
Cognitively, I see e-books as an expression of minimalism. No wasted paper, no bulk or heft to them. A hundred thousand books takes up no more space than a hundred on my shelf. The physical impact of a wall of leather bound books smacks of achievement and intellectual superiority. The display of the newest best seller, in hard cover, says “I have the money to pay the price of this collection of pulp,” while the discreet nature of an e-book offers none of the status or prestige of a bound copy.
The guilt of indecision, and the social pressure of always conforming to the world’s perception of what constitutes a minimalist drives my choice as to whether I should purchase an e-book or a printed one. The very decision to buy either is at the heart of the minimalist dilemma.
Yet, minimalism is about prioritizing. In the end, I choose to buy bound readers when I want the joy of relaxing and reading. I do not want to be tied to a darkened room, or carry my laptop (or Kindle, if I owned one) with me, in case the mood to read attacks me. I choose to read digital media when I want to conduct research, read a technical paper, or am investigating a more formal document or topic.
Minimalism requires choosing and prioritizing, but it also requires getting every last drop of living out of life, at the least cost to the world around us. I will relinquish my deeply-rooted preference for the tactile experience of reading, only when that experience already is soured by routine and mechanical written materials that offer none of the release of fiction or exploration of the unknown. After all, my minimalist diet allows for the occasional indulgences!

Monday, February 14, 2011

Minimalism Defined By Degree of Dependence on Assets

Minimalists place almost exclusive emphasis on getting rid of “stuff,” as if that is the panacea. Get rid of clutter, get rid of duplicate materials, get rid of ostentatious, overindulgent purchases, and so on.
While reducing dependence on assets is laudable, affluence is not the enemy, or is de-cluttering the solution to simplifying one’s life. By exerting oneself to part with items that have a link to your emotional or pedantic life, you are likely to experience a feeling of deprivation. It is one of the reasons why many advocates of minimalism recommend decreasing assets bit at a time, rather than immediately and thoroughly.
Why are we choosing to reduce our belongings? In many cases, it is due to the realization that we are wrapped up in a tornado of acquisition, seeking continually to own the best of everything.
Again, many minimalists suggest that the goal of minimalism is to reduce excess, so that we can focus on the remaining, valued items in our arsenal. What we are doing, then, is redirecting our efforts away from a blanket embracing of goods toward a bond with only a few, but a much stronger bond. In other words, we will be as reliant on assets as always, but we will cling to fewer of them!
For this reason, I urge that anyone who is considering a conversion to the minimalist lifestyle reflect very carefully on their reasons for doing so.
Is it because of the clutter? Then just reorganize! Is it because of the cost? Consider how to make your dollar work better for you. Is it because of the glamour of saying that you are unique? Consider how many “minimalists” live in the poor areas of your city, not by choice but by necessity.
Minimalism, as one blogger writes, has become the fad of white people. But few take the time to consider the impacts and consequences on oneself and those around us. Most importantly, we rush into minimalism like a crash dieter, and just as quickly fall of the regimen wagon.
Over twenty years ago -- ten years before I embraced minimalism -- I learned, firsthand, the impact of stuff on our lives. At the time, I had just entered into a business partnership that led into a huge growth of our operation. We went from annual revenues, between the two of us, of $125,000 per year to annual revenues of $1.8 million, in the space of a few months. We had hit the big time!
One of the “urgent” purchases I needed was a new car, given that I would be on the road for at least 80,000 kilometres each year.
I fell in love with a Plymouth Laser – hardly an expensive car, but what I really, truly wanted. My partner purchased a Mercedes – just what he wanted. However, I did not purchase the Laser. I imagined myself driving it, polishing it, speeding along Alberta highways in it. It had sex appeal! So I bought a Plymouth Colt 200 – a subcompact. I liked the Colt.
The reasons were simple. Because I loved the Laser, I would spend hours each week, cleaning, polishing, maintaining and driving it. Because I liked the Colt, I would keep it clean and in running condition. The Laser got 25 miles to the gallon, the Colt 42. The Laser cost $23,000, the Colt $12,000. I could repair the Colt myself. I could not repair the Laser. But the Laser came ever so close to winning the purchase lottery!
That one decision revealed to me that it is not the amount or the cost of the stuff we own, but the significance that we place upon things that controls us.
The big screen television may be more important than our daughter’s braces!
Not long ago, I walked through a coastal village in Mexico that had been devastated by a hurricane three years earlier. In beaten to the ground, I found a shell of a former home, now covered with six separate utility tarps, blowing freely. Two of the people who lived there were returning with 5-gallon jugs of water. The place was absolutely destroyed. Yet, in front of the home (where clearly, kids still lived), among the disarray of junk and broken lumber and two derelict cars were two –not one – satellite dishes!
The importance of that connection to television was so important that all other creature comforts paled.
There certainly was no doubt that this family lived minimally. But is it a choice that any of us would make?
If you are considering adopting a minimal lifestyle, I ask that you do one thing, above all. Sit down and evaluate, not the quantity of things you own, but the quality and tenacity of your attachment to items. Consider, thoroughly, what those items mean to you. If you do not, you’ll be like the impulsive parachutist who decided to jump, and then thought of putting on his parachute!

Friday, February 11, 2011

Converting to Minimalism? Know Before You Go!

Minimalists place almost exclusive emphasis on getting rid of “stuff,” as if that is the panacea. Get rid of clutter, get rid of duplicate materials, get rid of ostentatious, overindulgent purchases, and so on.
While reducing dependence on assets is laudable, affluence is not the enemy, or is de-cluttering the solution to simplifying one’s life. By exerting oneself to part with items that have a link to your emotional or pedantic life, you are likely to experience a feeling of deprivation. It is one of the reasons why many advocates of minimalism recommend decreasing assets bit at a time, rather than immediately and thoroughly.
Why are we choosing to reduce our belongings? In many cases, it is due to the realization that we are wrapped up in a tornado of acquisition, seeking continually to own the best of everything.
Again, many minimalists suggest that the goal of minimalism is to reduce excess, so that we can focus on the remaining, valued items in our arsenal. What we are doing, then, is redirecting our efforts away from a blanket embracing of goods toward a bond with only a few, but a much stronger bond. In other words, we will be as reliant on assets as always, but we will cling to fewer of them!
For this reason, I urge that anyone who is considering a conversion to the minimalist lifestyle reflect very carefully on their reasons for doing so.
Is it because of the clutter? Then just reorganize! Is it because of the cost? Consider how to make your dollar work better for you. Is it because of the glamour of saying that you are unique? Consider how many “minimalists” live in the poor areas of your city, not by choice but by necessity.
Minimalism, as one blogger writes, has become the fad of white people. But few take the time to consider the impacts and consequences on oneself and those around us. Most importantly, we rush into minimalism like a crash dieter, and just as quickly fall of the regimen wagon.
Over twenty years ago -- ten years before I embraced minimalism -- I learned, firsthand, the impact of stuff on our lives. At the time, I had just entered into a business partnership that led into a huge growth of our operation. We went from annual revenues, between the two of us, of $125,000 per year to annual revenues of $1.8 million, in the space of a few months. We had hit the big time!
One of the “urgent” purchases I needed was a new car, given that I would be on the road for at least 80,000 kilometres each year.
I fell in love with a Plymouth Laser – hardly an expensive car, but what I really, truly wanted. My partner purchased a Mercedes – just what he wanted. However, I did not purchase the Laser. I imagined myself driving it, polishing it, speeding along Alberta highways in it. It had sex appeal! So I bought a Plymouth Colt 200 – a subcompact. I liked the Colt.
The reasons were simple. Because I loved the Laser, I would spend hours each week, cleaning, polishing, maintaining and driving it. Because I liked the Colt, I would keep it clean and in running condition. The Laser got 25 miles to the gallon, the Colt 42. The Laser cost $23,000, the Colt $12,000. I could repair the Colt myself. I could not repair the Laser. But the Laser came ever so close to winning the purchase lottery!
That one decision revealed to me that it is not the amount or the cost of the stuff we own, but the significance that we place upon things that controls us.
The big screen television may be more important than our daughter’s braces!
Not long ago, I walked through a coastal village in Mexico that had been devastated by a hurricane three years earlier. In beaten to the ground, I found a shell of a former home, now covered with six separate utility tarps, blowing freely. Two of the people who lived there were returning with 5-gallon jugs of water. The place was absolutely destroyed. Yet, in front of the home (where clearly, kids still lived), among the disarray of junk and broken lumber and two derelict cars were two –not one – satellite dishes!
The importance of that connection to television was so important that all other creature comforts paled.
There certainly was no doubt that this family lived minimally. But is it a choice that any of us would make?
If you are considering adopting a minimal lifestyle, I ask that you do one thing, above all. Sit down and evaluate, not the quantity of things you own, but the quality and tenacity of your attachment to items. Consider, thoroughly, what those items mean to you. If you do not, you’ll be like the impulsive parachutist who decided to jump, and then thought of putting on his parachute!

Thursday, February 3, 2011

The Minimalist's Diet

Minimalism has elements in common with dieting, such as the giving up of something that may seem important to you, in order to gain something else. However, it is radically different from dieting, in that, if properly structured, it is something that you do not consider to be a loss or forfeiture in the long term. It is harder to return to materialism than it is to remain in minimalist mode, unlike dieting which requires constant vigilance to “keep the weight off.”
It is also substantially different from dieting, in that it can be done in degrees. Try dieting by first reducing calorie intake by 1,000 calories per day, when you are overeating by 2,000 calories per day. The weight will still pile on. “Going minimal” allows you to reduce some of your excess, and still be on track to becoming more economical. This advantage gives you the psychological impetus to continue on your path to reduction, while eating 1,000 excess calories each day still is the wrong direction towards weight loss!
Because of the flexibility in approach to the new program, it is easier for a new convert to “test the waters,” and, at the same time, indoctrinate family, friends and associates into your new view of the world.
Unless the decision is made through necessity, it is unwise to become totally minimalist. For most of us, intrinsic feelings of value and self-significance often are measured by the degree of comfort that we have acquired. To deny ourselves of every physical pleasure creates an emotional void. At its worst, it can be unhealthy. For example, to deny oneself the enjoyment of a comfortable bed means that we also deny ourselves the value of a good night’s sleep. To insist on eating only the minimum of quality food, or to substitute nutritious food for poor quality food will impact severely on our health. We should not aspire to be material anorexics.
On the other hand, overindulgence brings equally undesirable results. An excess of food leads to unhealthy bodies, while an excess of material goods leads to a narcissistic view of life and our role in it.
Whether you opt for either an extreme approach, or a more reasonable, middle-of-the-road tact, it is the rejection of acquisition and consumption of goods that is at the heart of minimalism. Minimalism should never be used as the rationale or excuse for becoming slothful, and aiming low in the input that you provide to the world around you. I know of several people who have chosen to work minimally, and contribute to the world around them in the least possible way, and use their “goal” of being less focused on materialism as an excuse for their indolence.
Minimalism should focus on using your gifts and abilities for the greatest benefit, while seeking ways to be less of a draw on the resources around us. Even that definition, though, fails to recognize that, as you do so, you will gain immensely from the enjoyment of the moment, with a reduced dependence on material goods to generate that enjoyment.
Planning for the conversion to minimalism will be of benefit if you look not only at what you want to eliminate from your life, but what you want to gain. What are your goals and objectives? Do you plan on using the “free money” to retire on a tropical island? Do you want to devote more effort to community service? Is it your plan to spend your free money and time on inventing the next greatest invention? Is minimalism a route to something else, such as saving for that ultimate purchase of a yacht in order to sail around the world? Are you hoping to be able to secrete a nest-egg to leave for your children and grandchildren when you die? Having a focus, as to what you want to do or acquire, as well as what you want to give up provides a more solid base on which to build your efforts at changing your way of living.
Few people diet with the sole purpose of losing weight. They lose weight to feel more energetic, or to improve their health, or to become more attractive. They have a focus, a goal. Similarly, approach minimalism with the same focus, and your journey will become that much easier.