Hello, everyone and welcome
back to an all new episode of The Financial Confessions. It's me, Chelsea Fagan,
your host, founder and CEO of The Financial
Diet, and person who loves to talk about money. And if you've seen the title
or the thumbnail of this week's episode, you might
be a bit surprised at who I'm speaking to. I'm someone who on
this channel and sort of in my own personal
life has been a bit critical of minimalism. Not of the art movement,
of which I really don't have an opinion, but
more sort of the life ethos. Particularly as it intersects
with politics, policy, regulation, and how we
perceive the various struggles that we live with
in American consumerism. We talk a lot on TFD
about the choices that we make in terms of
our purchases, our spending, our consumer habits,
and it can be very easy to frame those choices
through individual preference. We decide what we want to buy. And of course, there is also
an enormous impact of things like advertising, marketing, the
people that we're living with, the standards we might
feel we need to live up to. But there's also an
enormous policy impact. For example, I live
in New York City. I live in a two
bedroom apartment, I haven't owned a
car in 10 years. And those are choices that feel
in many ways natural to me, and on some objective scale
are probably more minimalist. But I also live in a city with
incredible bike and walking infrastructure. I live in a city where
I don't need a car. And it's important to remember
that these choices didn't happen in a vacuum. They're policy driven,
they're political, and they're also much
more about the collective than the individual. I often think about
the fact that when I was living the most
objectively minimalist lifestyle was when
I was a child, and my family was
extremely low income. The fact that we wore
hand-me-down clothing and up cycled, and only
bought what we absolutely needed at the grocery store,
wasn't a lifestyle choice. It was something we
were forced to do. And beyond that it wasn't
looked at positively. We were judged for it. We were shamed for it. And it's for those
reasons that many people feel like minimalism
is at some level just another luxury of who
can afford to choose it, and who is living in an area
where it's even achievable. Now I want to say all
of this with the caveat that I do believe
that minimalism can be a powerful lifestyle choice. We've hosted a lot
of content on TFD from people who
objectively choose that lifestyle for themselves,
identify as minimalists, and believe it has
completely transformed their relationship to money. We recently hosted a four week
mini series here on the channel from Hannah Louise Poston,
which many of you watched, all about her no buy
year, which changed her life in every respect,
and led her on a path to more general minimalism. So I want to be
clear that if you're someone for whom minimalism
has been life changing, I have nothing but
respect for that. But I also think from a
financial and socioeconomic perspective, it's important to
pull the lens out a little bit and look more at what
the structural cost is of turning minimalism into an
individual lifestyle choice. With all of that said I'm quite
honored and flattered to have my guests here today
who have not only built a staggering media empire-- I mean, you should
see the setup going on over on their end of the Zoom-- but who also create content with
a very powerful ethos and sense of mission, something
I enormously respect even if I
don't always agree with every individual point. So without further ado, I'd
love to welcome my guest today to talk about
all of that and more. Josh, Ryan, and TK, hosts of the
Minimalist and the Minimalist Podcast. Thank you so much, Chelsea. Really appreciate you. Yeah, thanks for having us. It's going to be a great combo. I think so too. I know that was a bit
of a long winded intro, but I wanted to make
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about student debt if you refi today. No purchase or refi necessary. Void where prohibited. So first and foremost, before
we get into the nuances here, I would love to hear
from all three of you, or whoever wants to
take it, how you define a minimalism both
as a lifestyle, choice but also a
sociological phenomenon. So minimalism is the thing
that gets us past the things to make room for life's
most important things, which aren't things at all. So for me, the reason why
I looked at this minimalist lifestyle 12 years ago-- we've
been doing this a long time-- it was really because I was
lost in this sea of consumerism. And minimalism, for me,
was kind of this compass that helped guide me to go a
different direction in life. Yeah, a few events
happened in my own life. Ryan and I were sort of
living the American dream. I've known Ryan since we were
fat little fifth graders, and we were really poor
when we were growing up. Ryan lived in a trailer
park, I lived in a low income neighborhood. We were on food stamps,
government assistance. There was a lot
of alcohol abuse, drug abuse, physical
abuse in the households that we grew up in. And we thought the reason
we're so unhappy growing up is we didn't have any money. And so we spent our 20s
climbing the corporate ladder, and by the time we
were 30 we sort of had everything we ever wanted. The six figure salary,
the luxury cars, the big suburban house with
more toilets than people. We had all the stuff
to fill every corner of our consumer driven lives. But those things weren't
really making us happy. The average American household,
according to the Los Angeles Times, has $300,000 items in it. And how wonderful would
that be if those things made us more joyous, more
content, more tranquil? But often it's
doing the opposite. It's increasing our
discontent, increasing our misery, our stress, our
debt, our overwhelm in life. And so two things
happened to me. My mother died, my marriage
ended, both in the same month. And I started looking around
and questioning everything that had become my life's focus. I realized I was so focused
on so-called success and achievement. In our culture
achievement really has to do with the
accumulation of stuff. Do I have the status
symbols of success. Then I'll be happy, right? Well, no. I was overweight. I was stressed out. I was working up
to 80 hours a week. And man, I kind of lost myself. I lost what it meant to
live a meaningful life. In fact, I could have told
you what my values were. But I wasn't living
by those values. And so I started letting go. I stumbled across this
idea of minimalism, and I found a whole
community of people who were simplifying
their lives, and they seem freer and
happier and lighter, not because of what they were
bringing into their life, and also not because of
what they were doing. But because of what
they were letting go of. For me, minimalism
encompasses three things. Number one, the decision
to live intentionally. By that I mean, identifying what
are the kinds of experiences you want to create
with your life. The second thing
is, the commitment to cultivating an attitude of
mindfulness towards the things that are within your
locus of control. There are some things you
can't do anything about, but there are a lot
of things that you can do something about. What's your relationship
to those things? And then the third element is
establishing a relationship to things, both tangible and
intangible, that keep you from being weighed down,
and that free you up to pursue the healthiest
version of your life that's possible for you. So the most important
feature of minimalism to me is that there is no universal
number that applies to everyone for the amount of things
that you should own, or the amount of things
that you shouldn't own. It's no-- what does it
mean for you to be free, for you to be successful,
for you to be healthy. And then how can you relate
to things in a way that's conducive to that. Yeah, Chelsea, the only
thing I want to add here is we don't go around judging
people for their things. We don't talk poorly
about a relative that maybe has boxes that have been
unpacked and sitting there for-- I mean for us it's not
a matter of convincing anyone of anything. It's really about
Josh, TK, and I kind of sharing our story of
how this tool, this compass, has kind of helped us
live a meaningful life. So yeah, there's no there's
no judgment on our end. I know we call ourselves
The Minimalists, but that that's because the
domain was available for $7. Listen, I am no stranger
to the importance of branding and getting a
good domain name, and we-- I settled on the fight-- my co-founder and I settled
on the Financial Diet eight years ago,
and looking back I don't know if I would have
chosen Diet as a word. But once you get it, you
kind of roll with it. But you know, I personally
resonate with a lot of what you guys are speaking to. And I do think, as
I said in the intro, like there are a lot
of objective ways. So one of the things
that we talk about quite a lot on the channel is things
like how the suburban sprawl and car culture in
America really undermine a lot of people's
day to day abilities to have that level of
autonomy over their own lives, and to live with less. And lead them into all
kind of spending traps, and credit card debt, and
all of that kind of stuff. And I do think that there is
a way in which even wanting to rid yourself of a
lot of things outside of a few concentrated areas in
the US, it's not impossible, but it's very, very
difficult to downsize in very meaningful ways. You can't get around without a
car, most of the single family homes that are available
are objectively larger than the average family
needs, all of that. To what extent, I believe
you guys are all based in Los Angeles, is that right? Yes. Yeah. To what extent do you
believe that geography is, to some extent,
destiny when it comes to the degree
to which a person is going to be consumerist? Well, TK, he's our
resident suburban here. We brought him on
the team because we needed a little diversity,
and by that I mean we need a suburban perspective. And so TK, what are your
thoughts on this question? Oh, that's funny man,
the suburban perspective. Representing Chicago. So the first thing I'll say
is, geography absolutely has a huge impact on the kinds of
things that you'll need, right? Because geography
dictates in so many ways what your lifestyle
is going to be. If you're living in New
York or Los Angeles, those kinds of environments
place very different types of demands on you than if
you live in Charleston, for instance. And so the first thing
I would say about this is that we teach people to
never apologize for the things that you need. This is why I made that point
in my definition of minimalism, that there is no one universal
number for how many things you should own. Oh, it's a mortal sin
for you to ever own more than five t-shirts. Oh, there's something wrong
if you own more than 20 books, or if you have a second car. Well, I don't know about
the details of your life. Where do you live? What are your
family commitments? What kind of work do you do? What constitutes
happiness for you? For some people can
have a lot of things, and it might still
not be enough, because of who they
are, and what they're supposed to be doing
with their lives based on their own preferences,
principles, and priorities. And some people can
have a few things, and it can be a whole lot. But we have to look at more
than just the quantity of things that people own, and we have
to look at the quality of life that they want to live
as defined by them. But to your point, geography
absolutely makes a difference. Does it determine destiny? Absolutely not,
because there is always something within our locus of
control, and to me compassion is about equipping people with
the conceptual and practical tools that allow them to
take control of their lives gradually, even if it
is not going to be easy. So that they can rise
above those limitations. So it has an impact,
but I wouldn't say that it determines
a person's destiny. Yeah, Chelsea, I wish it
was that easy to just write like a list of 100 things. And say, here is what you--
if you live in New York City, here's the 100 things you need. And if and if you live
out in the boonies, here's the list of 100 things you need. And you know
obviously, we can all realize that life
doesn't work that way. And everyone has
different circumstances. So I think minimalism
shows up differently for different people. Their different
socioeconomic backgrounds, their different
geographical locations. I mean for me, yes, I was
living in the suburbs, in Ohio, I was making
really good money. So I fall on that
side of the spectrum where you talk about
someone with money choosing to be a minimalist. So for me it did
start with the stuff, because I was
overwhelmed by my stuff. And what I quickly learned, and
this is why Josh and I started the Minimalists,com is that
minimalism goes so much more past this stuff. So much further. So after I was kind of
confronted-- the way I started my journey is with a
21 day packing party journey. So Josh and I, we packed
up all my belongings. I pretended like I was moving. And then I unpacked
things as I needed it day by day for 21 days. And I was just shocked
after those three weeks, I had 80% of my stuff
left in my boxes. But what that
experiment did, yes, it helped me downsize my things. But it really helped me to get
clear on what my values were. Because what I
saw in front of me is really where I put
all my time and effort. It was into racking up debt,
and making a bunch of purchases. And I really had a question
what my life's purpose and what my values were. And for minimalism, it's about
using things deliberately. And I clearly was not using
my resources deliberately. And that's what I would
say just for anyone who's looking at minimalism,
is just look at it as a tool to kind of help you
be deliberate with the resources you do have. And money's an
important resource, but there's also
our time, there's our attention, our creativity. There are so many more important
resources that we certainly have some choices over. Yeah, what I would say is
because part of this question is like, hey, is there a
type of person out there who can't maybe afford
to be minimalist? Because of their
geographical location? And what I would say
to that is, look, you should never get
rid of anything in life because you feel
like it's morally wrong to own possessions. You only get rid of
things because what you're getting rid of is
holding you back from being a healthier
version of yourself that you want to be. Not that I want you to be. And so when it comes to
our relationship to stuff, right, it's what
we ask people to do is, hey, let's
think strategically about the good life as
you define it, and then let's take inventory of
your life and ask yourself, are any of these things holding
you back, whether it's beliefs, relationships,
commitments, things, is any of that holding you back? Is there any room to let
any of those things go? Because the goal
here isn't to have a closet with nothing in it. The goal is to have a life
that's open to possibility, no matter where you're from. Yeah. You bring up a great
point here, also, that consumption
isn't the problem. Consumerism is the problem. Right? Because we all need some stuff. And so as the minimalists, we're
not ascetics, we're not monks, we're not saying get rid
of everything that you own, live in a cave, or live
with no possessions. We're not saying you will own
nothing, and you will be happy. No. I mean, that can be true, right? But consumerism is
the real villain here. Consumerism is the
ideology that buying more will make me happier, or
a more complete person. Now many of us have
tried that, and realized that oh, well, maybe I
didn't buy the right things. So I need even more things. And it's sort of
the disease of more. More, more, more, more. That's what consumerism does. Consumerism is really seductive
because it over promises on what it can deliver. That's what seduction does. It's saying you can be
happy, you can be complete, and then you get the
things, and you end up with a sort of
consumption hangover, especially when that credit
card statement shows up. And now we're going
into debt to buy things that we don't need to impress
people we've never even met. The word consumerism I
think is very interesting. We at TFD are, I would
say equally critical of I wouldn't say
necessarily consumerism point blank, because at the
end of the day literally to survive we need to
consume something, right? We need to consume water. So not all consumerism
is inherently bad. But mindless consumerism,
meaningless consumerism, the kind of consumerism I think
that you're talking about, I think we definitely share
a belief that it is pretty inherently negative,
and if it can be avoided should be avoided. And I think there's all kinds
of nuances there in terms of, for example, we talk a lot
about the destructiveness of the fast fashion industry. But are also aware
that for many people those are some of the only
affordable options for them. Or they maybe live in
an area where there are only these big box stores. A lot of people, their
only local grocery store is a bodega or a dollar store. So we want to be careful
to talk about the problem without, as you guys mentioned,
stigmatizing the individual for making these choices. But I'm struck by something
in the term consumerism. So I'm personally
of the belief, and I would say in general our
company is kind of the belief that consumerism, this
sort of mindless race to the bottom consumerism, is
an inevitable outgrowth of very poorly regulated capitalism. Right? Like capitalism which by
definition prioritizes profit in the case of publicly
held companies. The profit of the shareholders
over things like employee compensation, or environmental
practices, or things like that. As long as perpetual
growth by these companies is what is most valued,
based on their own sort of internal metrics, and as long
as the regulations around them are pretty insufficient,
you're going to have a SHEIN, you're going to have
a Walmart, you're going to have these
absolutely destructive environmental practices,
and amongst other things, we're both of us work on
social media, extremely poorly regulated advertising,
especially on places like the internet,
that are driving people to consume these things
and prioritize them over a lot of other
values in their life. And I noticed in watching
your documentary, which was obviously beautifully made. You guys killed that thing. There's a lot of talk of
consumerism, but by my count there was never a
mention of capitalism. And I'm interested to
know where you believe that consumerism, as
an individual practice, ends and capitalism
begins, or even how it fits into the picture. I'd like to make a distinction
between consumption and consumerism. Consumption, you're right, we
all need to buy some things. And so I'm not
against consumption. It's about identifying what is
the appropriate amount for me, for my family, for my
community, et cetera. And I think that varies greatly
from individual to individual, from household to household. Yes, we all have some
certain commonalities, but what is enough for me
might not be enough for you. And so I want to recognize
that, because I'm not prescribing a particular
set of beliefs that everyone needs
to subscribe to. Rather I want to
identify the things that add value to my life. But constantly question
those things as well. But I also agree
with you with respect to advertisements on
The Minimalist Podcast we've never done a single
advertisement or sponsor. We think advertisements suck. We think they're awful. We think they are one of the--
and this isn't a moral stance, by the way. It's just we're grossed out
by the amount of advertising, because advertisers do a
really great job making us, as individuals, as
consumers, feel inadequate. And the way to be
adequate is if you were to simply purchase
my product or service, then you are worthwhile. You are a better human being. I'll let TK talk a bit about
regulation and capitalism, with respect to minimalism. Yeah, so I talk about
this all the time. And I'm game for this
conversation any day of the week. I think about the proponent of
capitalism, Milton Friedman, who said something
very interesting about the version
of capitalism that is rightly demonized today. He said that in a
truly free market a business is not
only free to succeed, but it is also free to fail. And we live in a society now
where businesses can totally dissatisfy their customers,
completely disregard their customers, fail
them in every way, and still be bailed out in a way
that you and I, the individual, the so-called little guy,
would never be bailed out. That lack of accountability
to the customer is the true heart
of true capitalism. But I agree with everything
you said about capitalism. My only difference is I
would call that something like corporatism,
or crony capitalism. Because we truly do live in
a society where people are-- where profits are not only
prioritized over people, but people are able
to pursue profits in a way that is at
the expense of people without being accountable
to the very people that they're profiting from. We agree 100% that
absolutely is a problem. One of the things
that I do regularly, and I have a bias
towards this demographic, I'm in inner city schools,
talking with young minorities, talking with young poor
people, and talking about things like economics. Talking about things
like entrepreneurship. Because we live
in a society where there's this kind
of like stereotype that thinking intentionally,
or minimizing excess, is only for the privileged. Like our only
concept of handcuffs today is the golden handcuffs. The person that's
making like $250,000, they're like I'm swimming in
money, I have too many things. How do I deal with this
having so much stuff and not knowing what
to do with all my bank? That's our only
concept of handcuffs. But there are psychological
handcuffs, mental health handcuffs,
relationship handcuffs, philosophical handcuffs. We have so many things
that are holding us back. And when I talk with
a lot of my students, one of the things I find
is that because they have been given a
consumerist notion of success with so the important
intangible elements left out of the equation, because
they don't have any role models to mentor
them, they don't have any positive
influences in their lives, they're just looking at things
on TV that says buy this, and you'll be cool. Own this and you'll be
a player in the game. And then by the
time they turn 18, they're given easy
access to money. Right? Here's a $2,000 credit limit,
here's a $5,000 credit limit, with a really high
interest rate, and you're about
to be a debt slave. Why? Because you've been sold on
a vision of reality that says you get to be a player in the
game if you own those shoes, or if you own that stuff. And very few people are talking
about that aspect of poverty. Like that is a huge tragedy. We need people going into these
communities saying, hey, look, I know you want that. I know you need that. But there is a better,
healthier, albeit more painful way to go about doing it. Well, that's easier
said than done, TK. It's easier said than done. But all the good things are. Anything worth having is
easier said than done. And not only is it
easier said than done, but it's better done than said. And I think the conversation
around minimalism centers on economic thinking, and
entrepreneurial thinking. Because without those
two tools, we're bound to just look at
minimalism as some sort of mathematical game where
it's just about, hey, I own three things. I'm better than you
for owning five. That has nothing to do with it. When it comes to the economy, if
everyone stopped spending money right now, today, in the United
States economy, it would crash. When we spend too much money,
as we saw in 2008, it crashes. And minimalism to me is kind
of like that middle ground. I know it sounds
maybe really extreme to say to consume
like a minimalist, but it's actually kind of
falls in the middle there. Because minimalism is buying,
purchasing, bringing things into your life that add the
most value to your life. Does it serve a purpose? Does it bring you joy? And that's going to be
different for everyone. So yeah, I know minimalism
kind of sounds extreme, but I would posit that it's
almost the middle ground when it comes to the
economy and spending. I think fiscal
policy, regulations on things like
advertising, when it comes to things like taxation
and all of that stuff. I think those are sort of
one set of policy positions that can have a really, really
immediate impact on the degree to which Americans consume. But even kind of
setting those aside, so as I mentioned
in the intro, there are a lot of ways
in which my life is more minimalist than
the average American. I personally consider myself
much more minimalist when it comes to my use of time. As I mentioned, our
company is quite small. It's only 11 total. But we do a four day workweek. We're all women in the company,
and we offer a very competitive maternity leave. And these policies are
possible for us in large part because, for
example, our company is based in New
York State, which offers a huge subsidy to
small businesses offering maternity leave. Or it's about 12 weeks of it
is covered for us by the state. Or even in something that's not
necessarily related to work, but I mentioned
I bike everywhere for the most part, which I
didn't do even as of a year ago, and a large part of that
is because in a very, very short span of time where
I live in Manhattan, they've added however hundreds
of miles of new protected bike lanes. And so these are
relatively small changes, but they have a very,
very tangible impact in not just the average--
not just the consumer choices that I'm making,
or the choices that I make as a business owner. But the framework in which
we're making these choices. So from your
perspectives, whether it be about the more sort of
economic or transportation or infrastructure or
housing, any of these things, are there specific
areas of advocacy that you guys really believe
in in terms of these smaller tweaks, can make massive
changes to how and what Americans are consuming. Absolutely, several of them. But my number one, if I had
to order them by priority. I would say education. Who gets to control
your definition of what it means to be educated? Who gets to control the
options and resources that are available to you in
the formation of your mind, in the development of your
concept of the good life, has all the control
over your destiny. And there is a gross
lack of school choice, of optionality,
when it comes to how we are educating
their children, how we are educating our children. And I'm a big advocate of
parents having more say, having more control. We live in a country
where you want to talk about geography
being destiny, so much of what educational
resources are available to you, not only in terms of
influencers and mentors and people that
are in your life, but in terms of the
quality of teaching, the quality of your access to
technology, the kinds of things that you're studying,
how passionate, even, the people who work with
you are about what they do. So much of that is heavily
influenced by where you live. Which is why many adults, when
they go looking for a home, they pick it based
on the zip code, because of what school
district they can be in. Because they know if
you live in one place, you don't have options
for your children to get an education over
in that other place. Even if you want
them to go there, it's actually illegal for you
to educate your children there. So we've got a lot
of problems there. I'm a huge advocate of
creativity in education, in entrepreneurial
approaches to education, alternative forms of education. Apprenticeships. All of those sorts of things
because I believe that parents need to have as many options
as possible for how they can educate their children. So many of these problems
flow downstream from that. Yeah. Chelsea, you brought
up a really good point. I think you at
least alluded to it. You talked about
being more minimalist than a lot of the
population, because you've dealt with clutter, but
not just physical clutter. When we think about
minimalism we're often thinking about physical clutter,
our material possessions are sort of a
physical manifestation of what's going on inside us. So as we start dealing with that
external clutter, what happens? We start looking inward, and
we see the mental clutter, the emotional clutter,
the spiritual clutter, the psychological clutter. But then we start looking at
other areas of our life, right? The financial clutter. Look at all this debt I have. The average American household
has somewhere around $97,000 in non-mortgage debt. And so we have a lot
of financial clutter. There's advertisement
clutter, which you alluded to. We have career clutter. We certainly have
calendar clutter, right? We're so busy, busy, busy,
busy, is the worst four letter word in the English language. And yet we do it to ourselves. We use it as a
status symbol even. Oh, what are you up to? Oh, Ryan, I've
just been so busy. As though Ryan's going
to congratulate me for my busyness, right? Well, when I say I'm busy,
what am I really saying? My life is out of control. I've allowed everyone
else's urgency, everyone else's emergency,
to become my urgency. Right? So everyone else is dictating
what is on my calendar, or in my inbox,
and that's creating a lot of inbox clutter. And of course, with social
media, and our smartphones, and all of the glowing
screens in our lives, we have a ton of digital
clutter in our lives, as well. And so minimalism, yes,
it starts with the stuff. But then it permeates all of
these other areas of our lives. Education clutter is another
one that TK just brought up. Right? And so we talk about letting go
what we're really talking about is making room. Making room in our
hearts, in our minds, in our lives for the things
that actually amplify or enhance or enrich our lives, and
letting go of the rest. TFD believes that having a good
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about student debt if you refi today. No purchase or refi necessary. Void where prohibited. One thing that we hear
a lot from our audience when we talk about
consumerism in general, but specifically as it comes to
aspirational spending, spending on luxury items, on clothes,
on driving a nice car, on all of these things
that really mess up a lot of people's
finances, and you guys are absolutely right that
being caught in a cycle of debt is incredibly common, and some
of it is unavoidable, right? I mean, some of it, people
have very little chance to opt out of, especially
when it comes to things like higher education. But then there are also
a lot of consumer choices that aren't necessary. That could be opted out of. And when we talk
about those things, obviously we will often get
the push back that again as I talked about in
the intro, and as we've talked about already
a bit, like there is an inherent level of
luxury in the ability to opt out of certain
things, to have that choice. But kind of on a more
psychological level, and I would say sociological level,
there is a certain pressure, the less you have to
appear to have more. And it's something that is
increasingly stratified in how people can opt out of it. So for an example,
I'm familiar enough with your work to know
that the black t-shirts are a bit of a signature. It's definitely-- it clearly
echoes your brand ethos, and it's also a really strong
calling card of the brand. And there has been a lot of
really interesting sociological research in the past
decade or so about how increasingly while it used
to be that the wealthy, and I'm sure you guys are all
doing great for yourselves, about how the wealthy
used to increase-- used to more prevalently sort
of demonstrate their wealth and declare their
social status by having very overt symbols of luxury. And we especially look at the
tech boom, and Mark Zuckerberg, and his t-shirts, and Steve
Jobs and his simple black turtleneck, and all of this. And it really has become
a documented sociological phenomenon in the
past several years and in recent decades of now
discretion being an even more powerful status symbol. To be able to walk
into an elite space and be dressed in an
extremely casual way, wearing athleisure,
or wearing something without a label on it, and still
be able to assert social value and social class is
increasingly prestigious, and is something that even
the wealthiest in society now sort of go actively
out of their way to embody. So to a lot of people, when
we talk about opting out of status markers and
these luxury symbols, we'll hear commentary of like,
sure, if you're well off, and you don't have to prove
yourself to anyone, that's something that you can do. But if you don't
have these things, if you are kind of
struggling to get by, you're applying
for a job, you are needing to assert
your value, it can be incredibly difficult to
opt out of those sort of, quote unquote, superficial
markers of success and value. So what is your
message to people who feel that they don't
have the ability to not seem like they have it together? Yeah, I mean, Chelsea,
I wore a black t-shirts because they're slimming. That's what I feel best in. I never even looked at it as
kind of like a status symbol. It's interesting. But I totally see
what you're saying, and I could see where
it would go that route. I mean, for Josh and I,
and TK, like we don't have anything we're trying to prove. So we're not trying to display
or flex any type of style. But for someone who, let's say,
works in a corporate setting, and they have to
wear a suit and tie. That's appropriate. Someone who wants
to go to church and wants to look their
best going to church, great. Like wear the suit and tie. It's again, like there's
not a specific set of rules. There's not a
specific dress code. Anyone who's in that position
where they feel like they can't opt out of, let's say let's just
go with a suit and tie example, then yeah, I would have
them ask themselves, like is this something
that I need for my job? Is this something
that is giving me a front that I can go
to work, and make money to provide for my family? I would try and help that person
not feel so guilty about not having the option to opt out. Yeah. I think I would call
this in some ways the layer cake of consumerism. Because I think you bring
up a really important point here, Chelsea, is that when
we acquire a bunch of things to try to look as though
we are successful, we do this at some of our live
events sometimes, I'll say, hey, can you describe for
me a successful person? If I took a picture of
a successful person, what would they look like? And it's the same
no matter whether we are in Sydney, Australia,
we're in Saskatoon, Canada, we're in Austin, Texas,
or we're in New York City, they describe the same
person almost every time. And it generally looks like
an advertisement of some sort. It's usually a guy, that's
the successful person. People-- he's wearing a suit. He has an expensive watch. He has a luxury car. Sometimes there's an enormous
boat in the scenario. A large suburban house. Right? 2.3 kids or whatever
the stat is. People start throwing out all
of these sort of statistics, and all of these status symbols. Because in our
culture we've been taught that we can buy things
that make us look successful. We are signaling success. And as you brought
up, then there's the non-materialist who shuns
all material possessions and says, look
how virtuous I am, because I don't own
any of those things. I don't need to be impressive. I'm impressive because
I'm not impressive. Right? And it becomes a different
type of consumerism. And that can be a
type of problem. I know when Ryan and
I grew up really poor, when we thought we were unhappy
because of the lack of stuff, the lack of money, yes, I mean
there was a lot of discontent in our household. But when we started climbing
the corporate ladder, guess what happened? Throughout our 20s we dragged
our habits from childhood forward, and that money merely
amplifies some pretty poor habits. And so I was broke
when I grew up, but when I was successful
and making a lot of money in the corporate world,
I was way more broke, because I leveraged. Leveraged, that's a fancy word
for saying going into debt. I borrowed from my future. I went into debt to
buy a bunch of things to make me look successful. And I think that's
a giant problem. Because if we have money,
it's going to be an amplifier. It's not going to
solve all our problems. It might solve some
of our money problems. But if I'm carrying forward
the same poor habits from a previous life, or
from a previous experience, then that money is
going to be disastrous. When it comes to minimalism,
you have two kinds of people, broadly speaking. Some people feel a
need to have less. Some people feel a
need to have more. Both of those are
equally legitimate. If you're poor and you have
a need to acquire more, or if you're wealthy and you
have a need to have less, both of those are legitimate. Interestingly enough,
however, the path forward both of those
groups is the strategic art of letting go. Well, what do you mean? Well, if you're poor, there are
three things you need to do. Number one, you need to learn. Number two, you need to earn. And number three,
you need to invest. You're not a bad
person if you don't know how to do those things. You're not a bad person if no
one's ever taught it to you. But we absolutely have
to teach it to you. There's a difference
between saying, here's something that
you need to know, and you're an idiot
for not knowing it. No, you're not an idiot
for not knowing it. Unfortunately no one
taught it to you. But let's talk about it. In order to learn,
have to minimize, because learning
means that you have to subject yourself to
the discomfort of feeling incompetent. You have to sacrifice
the opportunity to do things that might be
more convenient and more fun. You have to be willing to look
like someone that doesn't know what they're talking
about in order to become someone who knows
what they're talking about. Learning is a huge sacrifice,
it's an incredibly difficult thing to do. And you've got to
be able to know what to minimize in order to do it. In order to be able
to earn, you've got to make tough sacrifices. One of my mentors, he
spent his entire 30s working 16 hour days, but
then coming home every night, reading for an extra
two to three hours, just so he could learn basics
about financial principles. It's tragic that he
even had to do that. It's tragic that nobody taught
him how to do that earlier. But sometimes that cost
of earning what you need, and learning as you earn,
it's incredibly difficult, because you've got
to say no to fun, you've got to say no to
comfort, no to convenience. It's another aspect
of letting go. Investing, it's all about
deferred gratification. I have some money in my hand. I've worked hard to get
this money in my hand. I could use it to enjoy
something pleasant, but I'm going to go
without because I want to apply what
I have learned about investing in order to
get that money working for me. Even though the results are
not going to be sexy overnight, I'm playing a long game. I'm playing a game of legacy. I'm playing a game of
building generational wealth. All of those types of things
require the minimalist mindset of saying, let me look for
things that I can let go of, or live without. Let me look for those
aspects of discomfort that I can endure for a time. Let me do something
that I hate in order to create a future that I love. And that's the way out. So whether you want to
get less, or whether you want to get more,
it still requires that art of learning
what you need to let go of so that you can
create better possibilities. I mean, for sure. And those are, I
mean, things that we talk about a lot in
our channel as well. And I should be
clear, by the way, I want to stress that
I love the black look. I think it's very cool and chic. And more importantly, I
think the broader point for me is that you guys have
achieved a level of success where you no longer
have to impress someone when you walk into a room. Your work speaks for
itself, in the way that a lot of people's
simply doesn't, right? And I do think that
there's an important-- it's important to remember that
opting out of a lot of consumer choices can be very difficult
on the individual level, when there is such a massive
societal pressure to display a certain level of competence,
or wealth, or value. And I want to be-- I mean listen-- Chelsea. Yes, please. Really quickly,
just because I want to make sure I'm giving my
mother proper credit here, I have not achieved the
level of success that has given me that permission. My mother taught me to give
myself that permission when I was broke. I know what it's like to
not be able to get a date. I know what it's like to
not be able to get a job. I know what it's like to not
be able to impress people because I was broke and I
didn't have the status symbols, and I had somebody in my
life who taught me how to respect myself before that. I had somebody in my
life who taught me that if you want other
people to respect you, you've got to learn how
to respect for yourself. Respect yourself. And this is something
that I teach, and this is something that we
need to teach our young people. It is a shame if no
one respects you, because you are intrinsically
dignified as a human being. However, when you wake
up in the morning, and you look yourself
in the mirror, know that you are somebody that
is beautiful, and brilliant, and powerful, and
filled with potential, even if you don't have anything. Is the world going
to agree with me? No. But you need to
agree with yourself. There will always be people
who look at you as a loser, who will look at you
as somebody that's not worthy of their
presence, of their time. But in order to grow, you have
to learn to love yourself, and to respect yourself, before
the world gives you permission. None of us are ever going
to get anywhere in life if we wait for the world
to say, yeah, you're worthy to enter into the room. Success starts with learning
the self-respect of saying, no matter where I
come from, I'm not apologizing for how I dress. I'm not apologizing
for my existence. I am here, I am an
entity in your world. You will reckon with me whether
I have status symbols or not. That's the message we need
to be teaching the poor. That's the message we need
to be teaching the rich. And I just want to
make sure that I don't get lumped into the
category of someone who needed to become successful
in order to respect myself. I'm blessed to have mentors who
taught me that a long time ago, and I dedicate my life to
being that mentor to people who don't have it. Yeah. Yeah. And Chelsea, I'll tell
you, I do think a lot about the impression
that I make on people. I mean it's not
about impressing, it's not about being
better than, it's not about wowing someone. But in my everyday
life with our podcast, whether it's with our
listeners, whether it's with your listeners, whether
it's with my friends, Josh and TK here, and everyone else
in the studio, with my family, like I'm always worried
about that impression that I'm making because
what Josh and TK and I do, we really go out of our
way to kind of offer people a recipe to heal their
relationship with stuff. And having that responsibility
I don't take lightly. And TK mentioned role models. And I know that there's at least
one person out there that might look up to me as a role model. So I'm very, very concerned
about the impression that I make on certain people. I think the impression that
I'm worried about making, though, you are
correct in the sense that I don't have to
wear a three piece suit, or flex a watch, or drive
a certain car to make that impression. But I certainly am thinking
about the impression that I'm leaving on
people, for sure. And it wouldn't be morally wrong
if you did wear a three piece suit in here, also. I think that's the other key,
because we don't wear what we wear, do what we do in order
to impress upon other people a specific prescription. Here's how you should
be living your life. I think the world is
too full of shoulds. We're shoulding
all over ourselves because we are prescribing
things as though it will it's a one size
fits all lifestyle. And I think many of the
misperceptions about minimalism have to do with the sort of
caricature of minimalism, that it is legalistic, or that
it is heavily prescriptive, or it's mostly about the
material possessions. And while it's true that it
does often start with the stuff, because that's one of the
biggest problems we have in the Western world, rich
people and poor people have that problem alike, we are
so consumerized by corporations that we feel inadequate. And no amount of consumption
makes us feel more inadequate. In fact, it widens the void. Well, what's the
antidote to that? It's understanding the
void isn't actually a void. It's a beautiful empty space. We don't go into a museum
and say, oh, my gosh, look at this place. Why is it so empty? There's only a few
paintings on the walls. We say wow, what a beautiful
aesthetic experience. What a meaningful experience. We don't go to an open field
near the mountains in Montana where Ryan and I used
to live and say, oh, we need to fill this
place with condos. No, we look at it
and say, wow, isn't it awesome that we have
this great National Park that we get to visit. All this beautiful open space. We don't say it's a void. We say it's boundless
possibility. Totally. And I fully believe. I don't think you
guys are rolling into meetings like flipping
people the bird and stuff. I totally know that you guys
care about the impression that you make on people. It's just that you can pitch
a Netflix show without having to put on a suit, where
I think some people-- and they're maybe
wrong for thinking it, but I do think a lot of people
do feel that external pressure, and don't feel that
they can opt out of it. But I'm glad that you mentioned
the Western world, because as kind of a more
overarching theme, like you talked earlier about
you can be cluttered in time, you can be cluttered in work. In all of these different areas. And you can also over accumulate
in all of those areas. And my personal belief
is that the most toxic over accumulation is of money. I believe that wealth
inequality is the greatest issue in our country economically. But also from a more sort of
philosophical perspective, the unbridled
accumulation of wealth, like we know that for people
who are earning enough to meet their needs, who
are not getting themselves on the hamster wheel of over
consuming, and therefore living paycheck to paycheck, who are
able to focus on other things. There are diminishing
returns after a certain point where more money doesn't
make you happier, right? And beyond that there's
also increasingly high costs to the sort of boundless
accumulation of more and more and more wealth. And I think we now
are starting to have a more broad cultural
awakening, I think in the US, that hey, it's kind
of strange that we now have comparable levels of wealth
inequality to the Gilded Age, and that there are a small
handful of people who have more personal wealth
than the nation of Bulgaria, like some of our
favorite billionaires. And are starting to
look at that and say, not only is that in
and of itself a form of hyper consumerism, but
also when you look at, for example, like I think it was
Taylor Swift went viral earlier this year because she alone
through her private jet use was responsible for
like, I don't know, a million times more
carbon emissions than the next highest person
or whatever it might be. Don't come for me Swifties,
I don't the exact numbers. But point being, I think people
are starting to kind of realize that money is something that
can also be over consumed. And I would be really interested
to hear what you guys-- all three of you,
your relationship is to when money and
the accumulation of it, and the spending of it
becomes in and of itself a form of hyper consumerism. Yeah. So economically speaking, wealth
is a reward for creating value. The way that we make
money is we have to use our talents, our
abilities, or our skills to solve a problem
for someone who's willing to pay us for that
solution, or to meet a need, or fulfill a desire for someone
who is willing to exchange their resources for it. So if I'm a mechanic, and
you've got a car problem, the wealth that I
receive from you is a reward for my ability
to solve your car problems, and so on. So whenever we
give someone money, even if we give it to a stand
up comedian to go watch a show, it's because they're
solving some problem or fulfilling some desire
that we're willing to give up our resources to have. Now with that
being said, I don't think there is a morally
wrong amount of money to make. Because if money is a
reward for creating value, then that means I can
make as much money, you can make as much
money, as other people are willing to give you in
exchange for the services that you provide. And so if you make a billion
because a billion people want to pay you $1 for something,
or you make $10 billion, I've got no problem with the
amount of money that you make. The problem, however, is that
we don't live in an economy where freedom is
fully respected. Because we are
allowed, for instance, to create unfair advantages
by using policies to make it artificially
difficult for the poor to be able to create
wealth, and making it artificially more easy
for already big players to hold on to their wealth. So those types of things
are a real problem. In addition to
that, there's plenty of room for criticism, for
what we do with that wealth when we have it. Do we use it to
exploit other people, or to harm other people? I believe this is
where the issues lie. But in terms of the amount
of money, I'm all for people being able to use
their gifts and talents to be able to solve
problems for other people, and be able to be rewarded
with their wealth. I just want the
poor people to be free to enter into the
entrepreneurial game as well, and not be
artificially insulated by policies that are
designed by big players to insulate them from
consequences and competition. I think the other question is,
what do you do with that money once you get it. Right? I know over the last dozen
years since we started The Minimalists,
Ryan and I, and I don't like to do this as a
sort of virtue signaling thing. But I like to show that
it's really possible. When he and I walked away
from the corporate world, we were making a couple
of $100,000 a year in Dayton, Ohio, by the way. You were the Kings of Dayton. I took a 90-- what's that? Oh, I'm sorry. I was like you guys were
the Kings of Dayton, Ohio. Right, yeah. That's right. For the price of a parking
space in New York City, you can buy an entire
village in Dayton, Ohio. But what I'll tell
you is we walked away. I took a 90% pay cut. I made $23,000 that first year
after we had both walked away from the corporate world,
and Ryan made the same because we were 50% partners
in the same business. And so making $23,000, here
was the weird thing about that. Two things. One is I was more financially
free that year than I had been the previous decade. Now that's weird. Why is that? Well, first off, I got
my spending under control for the first time
in my adult life. That was important. But also I got my
desires under control. The sort of mimetic desires. The society and culturally
created desires that told me I should consume
these certain things in order to improve myself,
better myself, complete myself. Those things weren't working. And once I got that under
control, I sort of decluttered the mimetic desires in my life. I was able to let
go of the things I thought I needed
because I realized they were nonessential. Not only were they nonessential,
but they were junk. It was someone
else's junk values that were thrust on to me. But also that same year, we
contributed more financially, and also through our time,
our energy, our attention to charitable causes
that year, and every year since we've contributed
more to other people who are in need, whether it is we've
built a few orphanages now. We built a non-profit grocery
co-op in Dayton, Ohio, which has the second
largest food desert-- well, had the second largest
food desert in the country. The entire West side of
Dayton where about 40% of the population lives didn't
have a single grocery store, so people were buying
their quote unquote food from liquor stores, or
really terrible fast food. And not only did we
provide the space for them to shop for healthy
food, but the food education, diet education,
health and nutrition education to help
people better understand how to make those choices. And so we've been
able to do that. Each year we focus on one
philanthropic project. This year, in fact, we
supplied financial education for every high school and middle
school student in Dayton, Ohio, giving them the curriculum
to understand they don't want to borrow from their future. And so setting them up
for a life of success now. Now how are we able to do that? Part of it is because
we've made more money, and so we can contribute more
money to things like that. But part of it has to do with
we've recognized what it means to live a meaningful life. And living a meaningful
life for me, has not-- it's not just about
living my meaningful life, but it's how can I
contribute beyond myself in a meaningful way. And if I can answer
that question, not only do I help
other people, but it's not completely altruistic,
because I feel more fulfilled as well. Yeah, well, I mean,
listen, some of the-- and even if they're
not necessarily the most altruistic, a lot
of these ultra billionaires are engaging in
wealth redistribution by going through really
messy divorces, right? There bequeathing
tens of billions of dollars on their ex wives. Yeah, well played. It's a good point. I mean listen, is
it Mackenzie Bezos? Either way, she's now like the
richest woman in the world, because he had a wandering eye. So there you go. All right, so before
I let you guys go, I know I just have a couple
of minutes left with you. We have a couple
quick rapid fire questions from our audience. A lot of them are
again, my audience is always down for the
revolution, so a lot of them are about capitalism. But we're going to go ahead and
choose some non Marxist ones. OK. You can get as
spicy as you want. We're fine with that. Yeah. We enjoy that. Yeah, OK. Well, this one's
like semi spicy, but I'm also as someone who
runs a media company very curious about it myself,
because I definitely-- and I actually have
a little addendum to this question as well. How do they reconcile building
a brand with being minimalist, as building a brand is a
pretty inherently not super minimalist activity. But also as an additional
question to that, so how do you
reconcile those things, and how do you make
your money as a company if you don't do ads? So man, minimalism, again,
it's not about being poor, it's not about showing
that we have nothing. So Josh and I, as
far as a brand goes, we go out of our way to
put our best foot forward. And it does create
a certain aesthetic. But branding isn't
what comes first. What comes first is adding
value to other people's lives. So we do that through, yeah,
high quality video, audio. We make sure that we look nice. My hair is a little off
today, but usually it looks pretty good. I mean, I'm going out
of my way to do that. But here's the thing,
is labels are important. It's very important. This is a microphone. This is a shirt. So in certain aspects
labels are very important. And I think that they can
be used in a good way. But yeah, I mean as
far as reconciling our minimalist principles
with building a brand, I guess the only thing
I could say really is, Chelsea, everything--
when you call yourselves The Minimalists,
everything you do is steeped in irony. Chelsea, it's the
first time you've interviewed three people, and
it's with The Minimalists. I know, no effing kidding. I've never spoken to more
than one person at a time, and now I'm like,
OK, The Minimalists are coming with a football team. Anyway, sorry. Right. Please continue. In terms of advertisements, like
we've just decided from day one that advertisements are-- they don't align
with our preferences. And so what we've
taken it off the table. And as soon as you take
something off the table, those limitations
breed creativity. Our show is audience
supported, and we have thousands of
people who subscribe to the private version
of our podcast. We also have a free public
version of the podcast, as well. And so we give
people some options. Obviously we've written
a few books together. We do some other things. I teach a writing class. But when you understand
what enough is, then I don't need to constantly
get more, more, more. We're not sitting down
talking about the implications for our brand. I don't think with
our team here, I've never used the
word brand once. Right? Because we're not a brand. We're some human beings who come
together with a common cause. And by the way,
all three of us we have different
political beliefs. We have different religious
and spiritual beliefs. We have different personalities. And that's what makes
our podcast, our show, and our friendship really
dynamic and interesting. We can get really curious
about the other person's point of view, instead of just
shunning them because, oh, I can't believe TK voted for
someone different from me in the last election. And as opposed to shunning
someone, I welcome it. And I show up really curious. And it helps me better
understand my position, as well. Absolutely. Yeah, I mean just to
reiterate what Ryan said, minimalism is all
about how can I minimize the things
that hold me back, so that I can maximize
the things that allow me to be a
blessing to the world, and the way that I want to be. And to enjoy life as much
as I can possibly enjoy it. And so you can be a millionaire
and be a minimalist. You can make $100,000 a year and
be a person living in excess. Why? Because it's not
about the number. It's about the mindset. It's about your
relationship to the stuff. It's about what you
do with this stuff. And it's about whether or
not the stuff owns you, versus you owning the stuff. And so that would be
my thought on that. But one example of
the branding question, which is pretty
interesting, and you can talk about this a little
bit better than me, Josh, is the community experiences
that we create with our Sunday symposiums, as an example. This is something that we not
only don't generate revenue with, but we actually
lose revenue with. And so it takes a brand to
be able to put on events like this, to be
able to let people know that we're out
there, and that we're making this available. And so sometimes you
invest for something other than getting money
back, but being in a position to do that might
require you to minimize other areas of your
life so that you can create the kind
of wealth that you want to share with the world. So that's why we prioritize
some of the branding things. Yeah. The one thing I want to add
here is like, none of us are millionaires. Like my sister,
she's like, oh, you must be a multimillionaire now. You got your
documentary on Netflix, and I'm like, oh, honey. Like it just doesn't
work that way. So I just want to throw
the caveat out there, like none of us
are millionaires. Sitting on a big stack
of money or anything. But I'm an entrepreneur. And I want all of my
students to be millionaires. And I would never apologize for
them or for myself if I was. It's a good thing. We can't demonize wealth
if we want the people who have it to distribute it. Because for me to demonize
wealth is for me to say, hey, I'm going to
give you this, hey, poor person I'm going to give
you this piece of poison. No no, wealth is
a beautiful thing. We can do evil things
with it, but it's a tool just like anything else. So we shouldn't
apologize for wealth. We should do good with it. Well, I will say I am quite
impressed that you guys are-- even if it's a relatively
small operation to be running at all in 100%
DTC revenue is no small feat. So hats off to that. That's very aspirational. This will have an ad on
it, because if there's one thing I love, it's the
brands that support this show. And keep it free for
all of you guys at home. So we have time for one
last quick question. Oh, have you ever
gotten rid of something and then later regretted it,
slash, tried to get it back? Oh, this is a good one. So we hold on to a lot of
things in our lives because of these three really
dangerous words. In fact, I would say are the
three most dangerous words in the English language. Just in case. We accumulate entire junk
drawers, closets, basements, cabinets, bedrooms, spare
bedrooms, garages, attics, et cetera, et
cetera, full of what? Just in case items. A few years ago we put
out a free rulebook which you can download. It's called The
Minimalist Rule Book it's on our website,
TheMinimalists.com. It's 16 rules for living
with less, and one of those is the just in case rule. Ryan and I, we
figured this out early on when we were doing
our first book tour. And we showed up, we
were The Minimalists, but we had an entire
trunk full of stuff. Well, why did we
pack so much stuff for a little small
little book tour? Well, we packed a lot
of just in case items. And what we realized
is, oh, wait a minute. I don't need any of
these just in case items. I pack them so I felt some sort
of sense of emotional security. But they weren't
actually serving me. In fact they were clutter. Why were they clutter? Because they were
getting in the way. So the just in case rule says,
if I'm holding on to something just in case, I can let go of
it because I can replace it for less than $20, in less than
20 minutes, from wherever I am. We also call it the 2020 rule. Now at first that sounds like
an incredible rule of privilege. I don't want to go around
spending $20 every single day on replacing my
just in case items. Well, guess what? In the last 10 years we've had
to use that rule five times, because you never end up
actually having to replace these just in case items. So there are few things. There was a pair of
scissors I got rid of. A pair of toenail clippers. A pair of shorts. There were a couple of
things, that, oh, yes, that actually did
add value to my life. But what I've spent
hundreds bucks or so replacing
some of those just in case items over a decade,
but that rule, as well as the 15 other rules in the
minimalist rule book, they gave me permission to let
go of tens of thousands of just in case items that were
actually getting in the way. You know what stands out for
me, man, is cardboard boxes. Like, I'll get something
delivered and it's nice. It's this nice little box. And I know I'm old, because I'm
like, oh, that's a nice box. I should hold on to
that, just in case I have to ship something. And I'm like, no, no, I'm
going to get rid of it. It's not that big of a deal. And then I've done
this a couple of times where a couple of weeks later
I'm sending my mom something or whatever. And I'm like, oh,
I should've hung on to that little cardboard box! But yeah, I mean that's what's
nice about the just in case rule. $20, and less
than 20 minutes, and you can usually
replace any of those items. Stuff you've given
up that you regret. So as one of my old
professors used to say, I have regrets but no doubts. So when I moved, I
remember back in school, like people used
to give me books. Like my professors,
they would often publishing companies would
basically send them books, right? And the hope was the professor
would read that book, like it, and then use it
for their class, which would mean every semester 200 to
300 students are buying copies of that book. So they always had these
books, like, right? And I would go into office
hours, ask questions a lot, and a lot of them, they like
me, and they give me books. And so man, like I
was a broke dude, but I just I was
wealthy in books. I had so many books you couldn't
move around in my apartment, because people would give
them to me like that. And when I had to move, when
I moved because I chose, I wanted to follow a
dream, and I just-- I couldn't afford to move
all those books with me. And I had to let them go. And I cried. I cried when I had to
let those books go. And even to this day
when I think about them I think, oh, my babies. Like I miss those books. But this is what I
want to say about that. Because I do have regret,
but I have no doubt. And when I say that I
never gave those books up because I felt like it
was immoral, or wrong, or nonminimalistic to have them. I gave them up because I wanted
to create space for something better. I wanted to move
across the country. And I wanted to pursue a dream. And in order to do that, I
had to let those books go. And so even though when I
think about those books, I feel a little sad,
when I look at what I learned by going after
what made me come alive, I say to myself, oh,
I have no doubts. I miss those books, it
brings a tear to my eye. But thank God I took a
chance on my possibilities. And I bet on myself and
I went after the things that I wanted to
do with my life. And I got the answers
that I needed. And I think if you
live life that way, you don't give it
up because somebody made you feel like you had to,
but you only give something up if it's holding you back from
going after who you truly are, and what makes you come alive. You do that, even if you do have
regrets, you won't have doubts. OK, so no one was like
tossing out like a locket that their grandmother kept
with her through the war, and then we're like, no, I
probably should have kept that. That's the thing about
sentimental items. When my mom died, this was my
first foray into minimalism, I started with her stuff. I had to let go. And I realized when I
got down-- she had just retired on Social
Security, and she found out she had stage four lung cancer,
and a few months after that she was gone. And when I went down to
the little assisted living place that she was
living in at the time, I had to deal with
all her stuff. She had a one bedroom
apartment filled with 65 years worth of accumulations. A lot of sentimental
items, right? But of course if
everything is sentimental, nothing is sentimental. And so yeah, I let go
of a lot of her things. Well, how did I do that? I realized that the memories
aren't in the things. The memories are inside us. Just like with TK, the
knowledge isn't inside the book. There's a lot of information
in those books, right? But the book itself
isn't where the thoughts, the memories, the knowledge is. And the same thing
is true with any of our material possessions. Yeah, I took pictures
of some of mom's stuff before I got rid of
it, so I'd have access to those memory triggers. Those memories are
still inside me. But then I held on to
a few of her things. And by having fewer
things, I actually got much more value from
those sentimental items, because they weren't watered
down by tens of thousands of useless trinkets that I was
just holding on to in a storage locker somewhere. Yeah, I definitely need to
downsize some sentimental things, for sure. This is a wake up call. Well, listen. It has been such a pleasure. I admit I was a bit intimidated
to manage a conversation with three people,
but you're all like, you guys have a
real rhythm going. Like you are very
balanced in giving the answers between the three of
you, and you may not know this, but about 90 plus
percent of our audience is women, and so
is all our staff, and most of the guests,
so you guys being three at once has also really
radically altered the gender ratio of our
guests in one fell swoop. So that's fun as well. But I really enjoyed
this conversation. I feel like I got
a lot out of it. I think our audience
will as well. If people want to learn
more about you guys, where's the best
place for them to go? TheMinimalists.com. You can find
everything right there. The brand is strong and simple. Well, thank you all three
so, so much for being here, and thank you guys all
at home for tuning in, and I will see you next
week on an all new episode of The Financial Confessions. Bye. [MUSIC PLAYING]
