I need a show of hands, if you’d be so kind, because I need this question answered as soon as possible. I’ve been trying to figure it out for a couple of weeks now, but haven’t had much luck. I need to know where in this vast, kind of green, Earth is the nincompoop that decided minimalism is nothing but a synonym of frugality? I have a few choice words for them.
I had always been familiar with, and greatly favoured, minimalism as an artistic current; from a design and architectural standpoint, it had always called to me. In late 2016, I began to see it in a different light and became aware of minimalism as a lifestyle, as part of a whole.
The minimalist lifestyle, as I organically learnt, revolves around living in a space that is decorated minimally, yet tastefully. It’s about living without clutter, having only enough so that your life is full and plentiful without bordering in ostentatiousness. Minimalism, as I understood it, is about living with the essentials that fill you with joy — the term essential here is, of course, relative to each person’s lifestyle. I thought it was a pretty clear cut definition that allowed for lots of leeway on what could be essential, without lending itself to being misinterpreted.
Well, apparently I was wrong.
Minimalism, as the fad that has been blossoming in recent years, is about decluttering, purging, foregoing necessities, “sticking it to the man” by attempting to fight consumerism by foregoing personal hygiene in the guise of conscious living (family cloths, anyone?), and a rampant thirst for frugality, bordering on good ol’ fashioned cheapness. The core concept is the same, living with only what brings joy to your life, yet twisted and carried to such an extreme that makes you wonder if it’s still the same thing.
In my quest to find like-minded individuals with kind souls that would aid and guide me through my minimalist journey, I stumbled upon dozens of forums with lots of resources and information, the biggest source being Facebook groups. Ah, I can feel tears begin to cloud my vision as I remember those first few tender weeks, where my naivety lead me to believe everyone saw everything the same way as I did… because, seriously, how different could someone’s definition of minimalism be? Surely, they were aware of how minimalism sprouted as a lifestyle, taking after the artistic currents and all that. Wrong, little one — so. very. wrong.
“Decluttering stresses me out so much!”, “I get very anxious if I’m not constantly purging everything!”, “Went through my son’s toy box and threw away 90% of it all! Hah!” and such other notions that I saw more often than not in the aforementioned groups I briefly belonged to, have lead me to realise that, damn, minimalism is much broader than I believed it to be… or worse yet, one of us (in this “them” vs. me scenario) is pretty damn wrong on what minimalism is.
As it stands, it’s not my place to tell people what to do with their lives, pointing out how flawed (I believe) their system is, or how I personally think they’ve missed the point entirely. Funny, really, because no one skipped a beat to tell me just how incredibly wrong I am for not saving myself a quarter by making my own soap instead of buying it at a grocery store, or how horrible it is that I want an IUD to try and forego periods (minimalism unrelated, yet somehow it was brought up) because, diddly darn, reusable cloth paths are great and I don’t need hormones pumped into my body — screw the big pharma! Screw capitalism!
In any case, here we are. I, a self proclaimed minimalist, know nothing about minimalism, and there are a good twenty thousand and then some people on Facebook who feel it’s their God-appointed duty to tell me just how poorly I’m doing. Yikes.
