It was designer Mies van der Rohe who popularized the statement “less is more” and it perfectly describes our minimalist journey to date. As regular readers know, our transition to a more mobile lifestyle started with the willingness to part with our large library of books and has been sustained by what I call “the action of subtraction.”
As University of Virginia professor Leidy Klotz, author of Subtract: The Untapped Science of Less, writes, “Subtracting is an action. Less is an end state. Sometimes less results from subtraction; other times, less results from not doing anything…And it is only by subtraction that we can get to the much rarer and more rewarding type.”
And in our case it was the intentional move toward subtracting extraneous stuff from our lives that has enabled our “living large with less” lifestyle. “Shall we always study to obtain more of these things, and not sometimes to be content with less?” asked Henry David Thoreau. It is clearly a countercultural philosophy but one that opens up endless opportunities.
I for one was raised to consider lesser alternatives to life’s smorgasbord, as I grew up on a steady diet of store-brand groceries and eating out was relatively rare even if it was only fast food. To this day, water is my beverage of choice when dining out, which is still somewhat of a special event. Some may use the word frugal here but I actually prefer the term “thrifty.”
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, thrifty can mean “economical management, economy; sparing use or careful expenditure of means” but also “the fact or condition of thriving or prospering; prosperity, success.” In other words, being thrifty may actually equip one to thrive in life.
When it comes to simpler living I am reminded of a quote attributed to author Antoine de Saint Exupery: “Perfection is achieved not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.” Not everyone is prepared to limit one’s belongings in order to optimize one’s lifestyle but for brave souls minimalism holds tangible and intangible rewards.