It was 2015 when I first became aware of the concept of minimalism, but i barely had an awareness of the extent one needs to go, to really reap the benefits of simplifying one’s environment.
Let me back up to the tipping point*… in 2015, when I lived in a 300 square foot apartment, lined with closets. I was taking on complicated and stress-filled consulting jobs. I was stressed to a ridiculous point, attempting to be perfectly ethical on all fronts… I was the poster child for anxiety, completely scattered between going to school for permaculture design, teaching bookkeeping at the same school where I was a student of horticulture, and serving as a computer-based accountant, where I rarely charged what my services were worth, yet didn’t stop, even if working for free, until all my clients’ issues were resolved.
Oh, and I had a part-time landscape maintenance business on the side, where I would sometimes take a two-hour bicycle ride to do a one-hour project, then end up spending all the money I’d earned on ‘snacks,’ which I would guiltily eat on the way back on the bus, arriving at home just to hit the couch in exhaustion…
And then there were my lists… I had ‘To Do’ lists that referred to other ‘To Do’ lists. Subsections broken down by areas of my life, based on one-year, five-year and lifelong goals…. I would pour over the lists and translate them into ‘To Do’ activities for days of the week. Just to find I barely had the time to take care to maintain my home, let alone working toward these long-term goals.
All the while, I was sinking further and further into debt, in spite of all my good faith efforts and workaholism. I would constantly redo my bookkeeping as I watched my debt grow. In retrospect, my lack of minimalism was largely displayed in my trips to the grocery store. I was constantly overbuying groceries, and, in defeat, not having time to eat them before they went bad, time and again throwing them in the compost bin.
I had stacks of bins, filled with books I never had time to read, and games I never had time or social connections to play. I had a closetful of fancy vacuums and air filters, designed to improve the air quality of my room, which seemed to have given my recently adopted dog an ongoing case of wheezing (which the vet suspected was asthma brought on by dust). I also had kitchen cupboards filled with gadgets and containers that promised to help me create nourishing eating habits, meals that would practically cook themselves.
To bring this all around to minimalism, or lack thereof, my only outlet was to buy creature comforts, and exotic ethical foods that were, repeatedly, too unpalatable to eat. I continued to lose weight and gain debt. My life was chaos as I raced from teaching to classes to clients, and I filled my closets with items that I thought would bring joy or help me get control over my housekeeping.
Oh, and yes, this is significant; I stumbled upon a documentary about tiny house living, which led to more clutter, as I took on a project to build a tiny house on a friend’s property… so I bought a trailer, and a tiny trailer, and lots of tools, and proceeded to learn how to use tools by attempting to build a teeny tiny ‘teardrop’ trailer. I had a sketchy plan that I would somehow build an 8×20 tiny house, while living in a 4×8 teardrop trailer 200 miles outside of town, where my work was. Needless to say, this added another leave of complexity, and stuff, to an already confusing, stress-filled life. I was ina constant state of, at least, low-level panic.
So the *tipping point,* which I previously mentioned, occurred when I came home one late evening to discover a note on my door, indicating the landlords wished me to vacate in one month. Although I had always paid my rent on time, they had suddenly decided to reoccupy the place. This forced me to face the unmanageability of my life, and a piercing fear of homelessness. I was beyond broke, and had no idea how I would find a place for my animals and all my stuff…
There were so many details that required a ‘home’ base, both physically and mentally. Not just all my possessions, and my dog and cat, but my plans, my grand plans, and my lists. So many lists, the list flow chart…
I felt betrayed by reality. The renters’ illusion. That the king’s ransom you pay each month lends you no security for the future, regardless of how many years you diligently paid your rent. At most, which I managed to negotiate, you get 3 months to figure out how to make a transition and avoid homelessness. and in this town, a walk to the grocery store will remind you of those who fell between the slats.
Trying hard and doing good are like a speck of dust in the face of your real vs deserved destiny. Or at least that was my feeling upon finding the eviction notice on my door that night. In between peculiar chest pains, which I chalked up to anxiety, I spent all night awake, grabbing onto an unrealistic plan to housesit in exotic parts of the country with my cat and dog.
Quite fortuitous, however, was the fact that I had a client who happened to have an unoccupied RPod travel trailer, and loving neighbors with hearts big enough to allow me to park that RPod in their front lawn, mere feet from the street where I could watch my dog watch the people pass by on the sidewalk. The transformer buzzed overhead, next to a street light, and that was my life for the next year, as I refused to let go of anything, and assured myself I only had 12 bins of personal items stacked along the back of their house, and everything else I deemed ‘essential,’ shoved in bins or storage cabinets, collecting mold out of site… Did these possessions ground me? I had minimized my square feet, but I had not minimized my possessions. This left me feeling that I was living in a hoarder’s closet. My footprint was smaller, but jam packed full of clutter.
I was scattered in mind, food, environment, plans…
Fast forward a year later when I got a call from my friend who owned the RPod, who suddenly needed it back (because of an issue no fault of her own), and so my eviction became eminent. This put me in overdrive, and during the next couple months, I began to build a very tiny shed, where I had to downgrade even further. Fortunately, water damage destroyed one of my 18gallon bins, but the sentimental stuff remained undisturbed…
During the next three years, I proceeded to build a tiny 10 x 12 workshop for my dogs and me, while staying with my friends so gracious to let me live with them, and I dragged all my possessions from the RPod to the backyard, where I would spend much of my time.
I could go through the details of my gradual downgrade, but really it was a repeat of the same scenario… I would evaluate whether or not I needed or wanted possession after possession. My first go-thru involved getting rid of things I thought I would need if there were a zombie apocalypse. I conveniently decided that should such a thing occur, a full tank of gas, reliable transportation and willingness to hunt squirrels is really your only hope to survive. Also, a box of tools to rebuild once you’ve made your escape. I took so many trips to Goodwill! I became familiar with the emotional pain of letting it go. But then I would say a mantra that its new home would get more use. And as I drove away, I would feel my spirit lighten, as I felt a bit more light footed.
My next wave of declutter was way more challenging. The sentimental stuff! After two years of gradually letting go of material items, my space looked quite minimal. There was nothing left but four heavy boxes of journals and letters. Boxes that had not been opened in 20 years, except for when I was jamming more items into them… But I finally became aware that the emotional weight of those boxes was dragging me down, and it was time to tackle them. I actually wrote a blog on that process alone, titled ‘Goodbye Journals!’ It took a couple weeks and was quite gut wrenching. I grieved much as I let go of mementos of relationships that had ended years, sometimes decades ago. I shredded many journals where I was spinning my wheels for months on some same struggle. I did also scan many letters and meaningful journal entries, but in the spirit of paring down, letting go. I have to admit a wrench was thrown into the works when I thought I lost the flash drive everything had gotten scanned onto, but thankfully I did eventually find it. It is dubious, though, whether this flashdrive is something I actually ever will benefit from returning to, though.
This final step of letting go of those weighty sentimental boxes… this is, I believe where I am preparing myself for new spiritual growth.
I did not realize that the belief that those boxes held meaning was taking up much more space than the boxes themselves. As crazy as it seems to realize, I was subconsciously believing I would pick up where I left off with all these broken and ended relationships. Or that I would take the path I wrote about in my journal a decade ago, a path that has long since been covered in weeds, and is no longer a path at all. Yes, there were meaningful struggles I’d written about, and caring letters I’d received, but those moments have long since passed. Reading of these moments would not revive them, and by delving into them, I was faking into a sort of fiction; moments that had died long ago…
But how very sad a time to let them all go! It has taken me years of knowing I should but not wanting to. These ghosts have been such good friends to me during alone times! Even though I dared not get into these boxes, just having them kept the illusion alive.
One particular scoundrel of a boyfriend, who I will always dearly love, and with whom I had much adventure, had a particularly strange hold on me. I was not even conscious of a suspended memory that I incidentally have passed by several times a week for the past few years. It is on the way to a dog park just outside of town. A Motel 6, and the room where we stayed just above a pool. All tucked out of view from the road, where I’ve given it only peripheral thought through the years…
But a couple weeks ago, I decided that when I passed by, I’d drive around to where we had stayed, where I remembered lounging by the pool. Memories came awash as I got slower to the motel. I remembered how he’d been the first person to encourage my creativity, and how he knew me better than anyone. I couldn’t remember for sure why we’d broken up, having earlier found a batch of cards he’d given me during our time together, with touching sketches and sentiments. And reminders of how he wasn’t giving up hope in our potential.
Once I got to the motel and rounded the corner, I saw that pool. It was much smaller than I remembered! There were teenagers huddled together in one corner, sharing a cigarette, and even though it was the middle of the summer, the pool was covered by a huge canvas, leaves collecting in the middle. I then remembered how hungover I was that day, and how I had wanted him to join me, yet I was too angry and restless to sit still and enjoy the sunny day, let alone get in the pool. What was I angry about? Who knows?! It was a very long time ago.
Tales from the Little Shed 