Going Small

I am a minimalist but I still have a small bit of fashionista in me. The fashionista in me likes to change handbags for different seasons. So today I moved into my fall handbag. It’s black. It’s sleek. It’s sexy. And it’s small.

Now, I don’t want to give the impression that I moved into a wristlet. It is a full size handbag. It’s just half the size of the one I had been carrying.

I hadn’t been carrying it because it was too small for me to fit all my stuff. But I faced a choice: let this tres chic handbag go to waste or stop carrying so much crap. I took a hard look at what I really need on a daily basis and pared down to just the essentials. Nothing more.

We have been trained to believe that bigger is better. We want bigger homes, cars, and closets. We want bigger phone screens. And apparently, some of us want bigger handbags. Of course, bigger comes with a bigger price tag. There may be other costs as well, like higher costs for heating, cooling, and gas.

Bigger also causes another problem. Bigger usually means fore stuff. I don’t understand. It is a universal law that if I get a larger handbag I will somehow fill it with stuff. An even larger handbag will cause me carry even more stuff. If I started wheeling around a suitcase behind me I am sure that within a week it would be full.

So instead of constantly going bigger to accommodate more stuff, why not go small? Why not consciously choose less space and make conscious decisions about the things that go in that space? Having less space forces you to think carefully about what stays and what goes. You can’t just add it to the rest. You have to choose.

So what did that mean for me? I had to commit to one pack of gum and one box of mints. I had to choose what medication I wanted to carry. It meant that I had to commit to one lipstick look (one liner, one lipstick, and one gloss). It meant that I needed to sort through the miscellaneous papers and receipts and business cards and decide what was important to keep.

Perhaps the biggest change is that I can’t carry my iPad with me everywhere I go. My new handbag simply will not accommodate it. This forced me to think carefully about whether I need my iPad with me everywhere. I’ve decided that I don’t.

I am constantly seeing stories of people wanting bigger homes and bigger cars. Of course, sometimes a larger space is legitimately needed. We have kids and get married and start businesses. But too often more space is not truly needed. More space is desired to hold all our crap.

I think it is time to challenge this notion. It is time to reject the idea of constantly going bigger. I think it’s time to go small.

It can be a challenge to make do with less. You will have to be creative and you may have to go without some things. The reward is less clutter and perhaps lower cost.

Are you ready to go small? Perhaps you could carry a smaller wallet, handbag, or backpack. Could you stay in your current house if it had less stuff? How about getting by on a smaller budget? How can you make do with less?