What's in my Suitcase? (Minimalist)

hi everyone and welcome back to my channel if it's your first time here my name is Emily and I am a traveling entrepreneur and filmmaker and today I'm going to tell you all about the time the Islander at the suitcase for almost one year [Music] so if you know the story already as soon as I graduated from university I moved to Italy to build the life that I loved I spent a couple of years in Italy and about a year ago I decided that it was time for me to move on and spread my wings and do a lot of things including me the country so at the end of last year I packed up my bags for the last few years I've tried to adopt a more minimal lifestyle but once again I purged my items and I decided to give the digital nomad lifestyle a try now digital nomad doesn't didn't stick but what did stick all throughout the year pretty much up until now was living out of a bag no I can already see the comments so before I get into the video I did not live out of a single suitcase what I did do was lived out of a variety of different bags but what was constant throughout most of the year up until now was that I was living out of the bags that I had with me so I thought it would be fun to show you how I did it and how you could do it and make it work - at the beginning of the year that was when I first set out to do this experiment I guess like I said I spent a lot of time purging things I sorted out the things as well that I wanted to leave at my parents house while I was out traveling and I ended up with this setup which I was pretty happy with and it was one big suitcase one little baby suitcase and a shoulder bag I actually took another advice with me so the exact setup would change but this was the kind of smallest package that I can pack everything down into I think pretty soon after leaving my parents house I realized that this was going to be a little bit problematic my first stop was Portugal my parents actually lived in France so I've been flying from France to Portugal it was a small airport there was a flights at the same time to London and the person who checked in my bag assumed from my British accent that I was going to London so my big saccas did not come to portugal with me so that was kind of the first thing that said maybe you want to think about having even fewer things the other thing that made me think maybe you don't want to be lugging around two suitcases all the time was when I moved into my flat and Lisbon I remember like lugging these suitcases up his little alleyways I lived in an alleyway I did I lived in it's been windy quarter and a taxi can couldn't get through so I was like walking and lugging my stuff up this hill cause Lisbon's on the hill and I was so letting it sweating pretty please for the things I bought with me I don't think I really felt like I was missing anything actually that's a lie I was missing slippers so I bought two but the other ones too far away to reach maybe let me just break down what I actually bought with me I've organized the things that I brought with me to five categories that's how it starts out in 2018 so first of all I went ahead and I packed my clothes I just bought a couple of pairs of jeans and I bought one nice dress always good to have a dress and just lots of Laius things that you can layer up a really useful as you can see I wanted to be able to get as many looks as possible from the jeans with as few items as possible but that I could layer up few jumpers few cardigans were always a good idea and I bought a couple of jackets so I could change up the look even more like I said it's all about layering big fluffy scarfs and keep you nice and warm in winter weather and I even bought a couple of fancier things - pajamas obviously and I bought two swimsuits well how did I do that my workout you didn't really see the light of day much until about me but I still bought that my sneakers plats and boots for toiletries I bought a couple of reusable travel bottles and then my sponge bag as I like to call it with a variety of makeup not too much hairbrush you know the essentials on the topic of toiletries if you are led to menstruates as I am then I got myself a little menstrual cup for this year of traveling because I didn't want to always have to carry around tampons in my bag they've got to fall out and just get lost amongst my stuff and it's just healthy for the environment and super convenient then if you are working while you're on the move but then you want to bring your work Stephanie that's cameras camera accessories loads of notebooks and I even decided to bring all my documents with me wouldn't recommend that now onto the bags I actually bought a variety of bags because depending on where I'd be going during the day or night then I wouldn't really want to bring suitcases out with me travel towel passport train pass sunglasses suitcase weigh a teddy bear phone box and just random wires it's really there was some random stuff in there towards the end and that's about it so like I said during my time in this band the only things I really bought were the pair of slippers which I decided in the end actually we're going to replace my flat pair of shoes I bought a little book as well I bought a Portuguese book it's the Portuguese version of the little prince because that's a tradition I buy that book in every language that I learn and so I've got one in French and Italian a nerve but Portuguese one so I think that the lesson I learnt there is when you are staying somewhere for like a month at a time it's really fine having two suitcases it's a really nice balance to be honest but when it comes to lugging them around when it comes to moving time it's not super fun this brings us to the month of February where I left Portugal and once again it was time to move and I came back to my native UK for a month like this is like every meant to be traveling actually I haven't been back to the UK in a year between living in Italy and then my parents live in France it was time for me to go back to the UK and do some admony things it was when I was there because I was staying in my parents flat that they have in the UK I thought ok it's time to kind of purge again really work out how I'm gonna make this little setup a little bit more sustainable for the times when I'm moving around so this is where I actually ditched the big suitcase just a little side note as well this big suitcase this big red one isn't actually the actual one I took with me the actual one I took with me broke and my mum accidentally stole it after I left in the UK so we did a little swap sees it was the same size as this so so there's a ditch the suitcase of ditched a few things with it like I said I left the flat shoes behind to have my wonderful slippers now I left behind a couple of books one thing that I ended up with during January was a load of random if you have like a phony box with me I had like random SIM cards because I've been swapping sim cards between Italy and Portugal a couple of items of clothes definitely not enough to fill the suitcase but enough that I could downgrade again so this brings me to Emily and her bags 2.0 this set up was definitely a lot less efficient than the other set up it was more efficient because I could carry this stuff around a bit more easily it wasn't as heavy but it was just learned around and bags if I'm honest but I think it work I do remember though that when I was moving from the UK at the end of February to my next destination there were snow flurries all around Northern Europe and I remember just trying to drag my little suitcase through London try to people be shoulder bags on me memories but I did make it to my next destination which was Brussels my original plan was to stay in Brussels for a month and then continue traveling but this is where you know I was changed a little bit April of May is where I started to buy a couple of things and I mean really a couple of tiny things I bought a couple of bits of camera equipment because I was working as I was traveling and video was becoming a much heavier part of my business so we needed to upgrade some gear so I got this little light the audio recorder and this little also focusing thing they seem small that this stuff adds up if you're considering living more of a minimalist lifestyle I really not interested in living this few things as possible but little positions like that do add up for you other than out of suitcase it's also worth noting that I'm really glad I took the different bag combos with me because I was still from Brussels traveling pretty much every month so like I went to Amsterdam at the end of March April I went to Portugal again for a little bit may I headed off to France and each time I could kind of pack up the things that I needed so I wasn't always taking every single bag when I was in Brussels I was staying at my boyfriend's studio apartments and this was another reason firstly that's another reason I didn't wanna leave secondly that's another reason why I really had to keep the number of things I had down to a minimum so even though I did have kind of a base at this point I was still living out of my bags because it was a studio apartment if you don't know a studio apartment is basically an apartment that is one room it's really only meant for one person at least this one definitely was definitely wasn't meant for two people and it was a struggle I can tell you having said that I didn't make the decision that I don't want to leave Brussels and I was slowly coming to terms with the fact that I was probably gonna move there but in any case by the time it got to make it was getting hot outside and my kind of jumpers and jeans and boots weren't really cutting anymore so this was when I went back to France to my parents house tonight I picked up a few summer clothes but still literally just what would fit into the little suitcase that I brought with me alongside for like toiletry bag that obviously had to take with me I definitely started to get sick of some of my clothes towards the end of the summer and even towards the end of the winter I was so sick of being the same thing all the time but having said that I had fewer decisions to make I had to do laundry more often I can see why it definitely works in the long term for some people I don't ever want to go back to owning just loads of clothes that I can't even sort through and see all of the things that I own but in late August I was going on holiday and I did decide that like I needed another pair of shoes because I didn't really have any like day-to-day sneakers just a couple of extra t-shirts by this point all of the clothes were getting quite old this is also the time that not only am I going on holiday but I'm officially moving to Brussels and we're moving into a new flat so I was like you know what purge time again and I did I got rid of all some of the things that I had here with me which just made it be easier to move I had a little bit more than for inter just that tiny suitcase I had with me remember I don't have my big suitcase with me anymore when we were packing up the stuff I packed up my stuff very easily and that brings us to the month of October so like I said all through this time I've just been living out of bags yes I got a couple of things yes very few things away once we're in the new apartment which is Maria you know we decided that it was time but I maybe bought some of my stuff back into my life there are definitely some things that makes my life a bit easier like the lights so I'm filming this video with that I wanted here with me this was when I got on the phone with my mom and I asked if she could send over my suitcase that I had left at my parents house actually left two suitcases but by the time I'd looked at the stuff that was in there on skype I was ready to throw away half of it and once again I purged because you just don't need as much stuff as you think you do especially when you've been away from it for a year you're like I don't even remember that existed so I definitely don't need it in my life and so with that I I got the rest of my stuff behind my mum sent over all of the bags and then I was back in the UK at the end of October and I picked up a couple of bits extra and here we are I'm no longer living out of a suitcase what I think about it all this stuff I've got here now I probably could fit into I'd say four big suitcases apart from some of the oddly shaped stuff like there's lights maybe but honestly just one of the things that I learned from the year and I just continuously learned through my travels and living abroad in different places is that I don't need as many things as I think I do having said that sometimes I go a little too far the other way they get rid of something I'm like to use like that made my life easier it's not about just owning as few things as possible it's just about being intentional with what you do own and being honest about what you do and don't use would I do it again maybe if the situation was right definitely learns a lot about some of the things that I took with me like my excessive hard drives would I recommend it to somebody else absolutely why not obviously that's a generalized question I think it just depends on whether you're the type of person that would enjoy it like why not try it for a month for a couple of months just see what you actually use on a day-to-day basis I think it's a fun exercise fun might be stretching it but it's a really interesting exercise and I think that the long-term benefits definitely outweigh the the short-term inconveniences and if you're not going travelling like I do this is something you can do in your own home put the stuff you don't think that you need in the attic or under your bed and just see where you are at the end of the month or two months of what you really used what you didn't use if you definitely think of a few ways of making it easier on myself but hindsight is 2020 so I think I'm gonna leave the video there for today I hope that you enjoyed seeing how I lived out of a suitcase for a year maybe you picked up some tips on how you can do the same thing what do you think that you would really miss if you had to live out of a suitcase for a year let me know in the comments think another thing I kind of missed is just having a base that's actually mine now I can start to put things up this is very temporary but I want to make it look nice and are any of you planning on living out of a suitcase or even a backpack or something for a year let me know what pretty things you'll find in do you movements so if you did enjoy this please do subscribe I make videos every other week all about living abroad being a traveler being an entrepreneur okay guys I'll see you next week in my next video bye

Channel: Emily Stoker

Views: 4,287

Rating: 4.7966104 out of 5

Keywords: living out of a suitcase, minimalist living out of a suitcase, living in a suitcase, minimalist, what's in my suitcase, how to live out a suitcase, living abroad, living out of a suitcase tips, digital nomad, travel vlog, traveling entrepreneur, declutter, downsize, live out of a suitcase

Id: Y-QO3RL5yxw

Length: 14min 20sec (860 seconds)

Published: Sun Nov 25 2018