Becoming Minimalist. Again.

Photo by averie woodard.

As the coronavirus destroys lives and businesses worldwide, Sin City is being shaken to its core yet again. I was living in Las Vegas when the economy crashed in 2008, and to say it was devastating would be an understatement. Work was hard to come by and over 100,000 of us were scrambling to make ends meet after unexpected job losses. People were being pushed over the edge and murder-suicides popped up on the local news more than a few times. Familicide. And the motivator was financial stress. We moved place to place because countless condominiums were privately owned, and those owners were going into foreclosure.

Today, people are still feeling the effects of the 2008 recession. I met a cashier recently who mentioned that he was from Las Vegas. Before I could say a word, he said, “That recession hit me so hard, I’ve been in Louisiana since 2010.” The economic crash had turned his world upside down and ultimately changed the trajectory of his life.

In a city where the rewards were well worth the risks, the 2008 recession forced us to reconsider what really mattered and what we were willing to sacrifice just to keep our heads above water. We were swimming against the currents of unexpected change, and one of the weights on our backs was our habits — what we were accustomed to and the conveniences we felt were deserved.

I was young and unreasonably immature at that time. I couldn’t see that so much of this crash was because we continue to rely on systems that don’t work. Instead of buying into such faulty systems with complacency, we should rise to the occasion to change it — but that’s another story.

But even in my naiveté, I could clearly see what was right in front of me, and I realized that I had collected so much stuff I didn’t need. Clothes, shoes, accessories, and random knick-knacks that could warrant a few quick “oohs and ahhs,” but I really didn’t care about most things I owned. To be honest, I spent most of my time in my pajamas. This has not changed.

And yet, I’d somehow convinced myself that I needed to be clothed in the glitziest and glamourest of threads. For the record, I know that glamourest is not a word. I just made it up because it fit the style of my narrative. Anyway, the point is that the grade for my expectations vs. reality was a capital F. Failing. And the failure in my ability to live authentically was a major cause of stress in my life.

So how did this expectations vs. reality fail happen? The struggle often starts young. We come out of the womb watching television, being bombarded with images and messages that tell us what to buy to improve our lives. Depending on your upbringing, maybe you had parents teaching you what you needed to buy to show your “worth.” If you were a young have-not, you may have been ostracized or felt just isolated enough that your dream was to one day own all the things you couldn’t afford in your youth. Our identities have been shaped as consumers NOT individuals since the beginning of our lives, and we create habits that are so hard to break because many of these habits are unconscious.

There has also been an immediate halt to our habit of unnecessary consumption, and some will emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic with a new level of awareness and consciousness. Within this conscious awakening, we will acknowledge what we don’t need and focus on what truly matters.

On a personal note, I’ve discovered that while I was waving my minimalist flag and traveling throughout the states with one duffle bag, I’d neglected to keep my mental space clean. My health and time spent meditating need improvement, and where my thoughts wander should be checked at the door more often.

It’s time for some mental decluttering, and I’ll start by creating what I’ll call a Love List. My Love List will list 50 things I love at home or in nature. I’ll match my Love List with 50 things (or thoughts) I should release for my mental well-being.

I’ll read my list daily as a reminder to self, a gratitude list layered with some necessary compromise to help curb my decision fatigue. After all, studies have found that we make roughly 35,000 decisions each day. And if our brains can filter and prioritize up to 80,000 thoughts daily, shouldn’t it be easy to find 50 things we can love (and eliminate) from our cluttered mental box?