Can you be a minimalist if you live in a big house?

But first, what is minimalism?

Minimalism has been historically used in reference to music and art.

More recently, it has gained popularity as a way of living with less…less material possessions, less commitments, less of the things that cause us stress.

It’s a movement of removing things from our lives that are distracting us from the things that we truly enjoy.

It can help us to prioritize the things that will bring the most enjoyment to our lives, and who doesn’t need a little bit of that?

But the one thing that it isn’t about is the number of things that you own.

Sure, there are people out there who only have 100 things, or those who live in tiny homes, and their stories are certainly interesting, but there are so many stories of people who choose to live with less.

And the definition of living with less is different for everyone.

Minimalism is not a competition, nor is it a one size fits all lifestyle approach.

I’m here to say that you can be a minimalist, even of you live in a big house!

I first became aware of lifestyle minimalism about three years ago when I felt like I was drowning in stuff.

I was constantly picking up after my kids, only to have to turn around and do it again. The realization that we had too much stuff and that there was a movement where it was acceptable to own less became my salvation.

When we became homeowners we had fewer possessions, although I will admit to having a lot of clothes and books.

But having lived in small apartments up to that point helped to contain the number of items that we could comfortably have.

Having moved around a lot during college and for four years post graduation, we were tired of moving all of our stuff. I wanted to move into our forever home so that we wouldn’t ever have to move again.

At the time when we bought our house, there was just the three of us. But we knew that we wanted at least one more kid. And since we wouldn’t be living close to family, we needed a guest room.

So that put us at 4 bedrooms that we “needed”. When we did buy our first home, with the four bedrooms, which is where we still live, there was a lot of empty space.

Having been a big consumer for much of my adult life, my first impulse was to fill all the empty places in the house.

I remember when we came to view the house for the first time. The previous owners had decorated it so nicely, or at least I thought so at the time.

Every corner had something in it. It was all so pretty. And I wanted to replicate what they had done so badly.

So we starting buying things that we thought we needed like trinkets for the fireplace, lots of pillows and blankets, a big sofa. There were glasses…so many different types of glasses…large and small drinking glasses, red wine glasses, white wine glasses (I don’t even like white wine), martini glasses.

You get the picture.

We had what felt like a million towels and multiple bedsheet sets for each bed.

And we acquired SO. MANY. TOYS. I think because we had so much more room we wanted to give our, then, only child all the things we felt we couldn’t when we had less space.

And then we had another kid and got even more stuff.

Looking back, it was all so ridiculous.

I remember a day when my oldest was playing in the toy room with a friend and they thought it would be fun to pile all the toys, games and books in the middle of the room. And they had removed every single game piece from the boxes.

That was a very bad day.

And that wasn’t even the turning point.

But it should have been.

Sometimes I look back at the person I used to be and I just want to shake my head.

As a newish mom who had just moved to a new place and had decided to stay at home for a little while, I basically left my old identity behind and I was trying to form some new sense of identity.

I had no idea what I liked in terms of decorations (or a lack thereof as it turns out). Or how I would look at all this space one day and wish that we had made a different decision.

But I am a firm believer that things happen for a reason.

We live in a wonderful neighborhood that feels like a family, which is especially important with no family around for support. And our kids are lucky enough to go to a wonderful public school where “empathy” and “kindness” are cornerstone words.

Getting from there to where I am today was the result of reading about other people who are living with less that I used as inspiration.

Particularly Joshua Fields Millburn and Ryan Nicodemus of The Minimalists, Joshua Becker of Becoming Minimalist and Courtney Carver of Be More With Less. I know I’ve mentioned them before but their writings were pivotal at the beginning of my learning to live with less.

One of my absolute favorite writers is Erin Boyle from Reading My Tea Leaves. She lives in a tiny apartment in New York with her husband and three small children. I really admire her dedication to living minimally in a small apartment with her family. I’m sure that it comes with it’s own set of problems but its very easy to romanticize it, especially the ease of cleaning it.

These people, and many others over the years, have helped me to realize that there were so many different kinds of minimalism.

It is not a one size fits all lifestyle.

For me, there are 4 of us. We live in a house with 4 bedrooms and 3.5 baths, a dog and 2 cats. And we have 2 designated storage areas in our house.

But we have a lot less stuff than the typical family (and our storage areas are pretty much empty). It does hold our Christmas tree and decorations and the ‘ school stuff that we’ve decided to keep. We also put off season shoes down there.

Given all that, I still classify myself as a minimalist.

I have tried to remove all of the belongings and commitments from our lives that are distractions.

But it’s definitely an ongoing process. I constantly find more things to remove.

And as I get older and my priorities shift and my knowledge grows, there will be more areas where I reduce. Whether it’ll be more possessions, distractions, food waste, the chemicals in our house, who knows?

Minimalism frees up a lot of time for me to think about where I can make an impact in my little corner of this big world.

And I will forever be grateful for discovering it, no matter what size my house is.

So if you’re sitting there in your big house and reading this, know that this lifestyle of less is for you too.

It doesn’t mean that you have to downsize into a smaller place.

It doesn’t mean that you have to get rid of everything you own.

Just the things that don’t matter.

If you need a little nudge to get started, check out this post about getting rid of stuff and this one about decluttering books.

Embracing a life of has been the most freeing things I’ve ever done.

I have had zero regrets, except that I regret not having discovered it sooner.

So, what does minimalism look like for you? Or what would it look like like if you chose to live with less?

Until next time,

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