Ultra Minimal

Posted on November 28, 2007
Filed Under Personal |

Sometimes, I think about selling everything I own, and starting from scratch.

It would be nice, wouldn’t it, to have a clean slate? Of course, it’s incredibly unlikely that I’ll ever sell everything I own, but minimalism still appeals to me a great deal.

When I think about the minimum I could live with, and still be comfortable, it actually comes down to very little.

As much as I love my vinyl and my little plastic discs (CDs and DVDs), I could easily transfer my entire music and movie collection onto a hard drive or an mp3 player of some kind. I’d have all the same music, but it would take up substantially less space.

I could donate the vast majority of my clothing to charity. I have far more clothes than I need. Like most people, I tend to wear the same few sets of clothing all the time. I wear my favourite items of clothing very frequently, and wear the rest of them very infrequently. I have items of clothing that I simply do not wear. Why do I keep them?

I have a relatively small amount of furniture. I wouldn’t necessarily want to decrease the amount of furniture that I own, since I do like having guests over, and they need somewhere to sit. But, if I were to forgo inviting friends over, I could probably do with nothing more than a bed, a TV stand, and maybe a table (although, I’d be just as good with a counter-top and a stool).

My camping supplies take up a fair amount of space, but I could probably store it more efficiently than I currently do.

I could survive with a smaller kitchen, even if I’d rather not.

My books…my books I’d have to keep. Until there is a decent e-book reader, I’d have to keep my books. The Kindle comes close, but it’s not quite there. But, give me a great e-reader, and I could remove the paper tomes from my shelves.

I could live comfortably in a bachelor apartment, or smaller. In fact, after reading and viewing things about living in small places—like this article/video about turning a tiny Manhattan bachelor suite in a slick, modern home—I’m kind of tempted to buy a bachelor suite condo and see what I can do with it.

Really, if I could manage to build a loft-style bed, a bachelor would be all that I’d need.

Unfortunately, most bachelor suites don’t have balconies, and as a BBQ fan and cigar smoker, I do need a balcony or some other outdoor space that I can use.

There’s also the issue of resale. A bachelor suite will probably be difficult to resell if the housing market cools down at all. Then again, if I could build a loft for the bed, that might be enough to make the place look bigger, and trendier, than a typical bachelor suite.

I admit, it’s unlikely that I’ll do this, but the idea really does appeal to me. A small living space would force me to live a more minimalist lifestyle, which would be great for all kinds of reasons that I’ll get into in a future post.

What do you think of this idea?

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