Читать книгу The Colors Of A Optimistic World - Logan J. Davisson - Страница 59

What happens to us when we implement minimalism in our lives? Less is more and this is exactly what minimalism is all about. We throw all the unnecessary stuff out of our lives to have more time and space for the really important things in life. The focus is on the things that offer us real added value - we become more productive, we intensify our relationships, we set ourselves goals and make our lives more inspiring. Our focus is moving away from the consumer society towards more joie de vivre. You decide for yourself what is useful and what is useless for you. So what do you want to fill your life with? It is important that you decide for yourself and not some advertising or social pressure. You pedal your way freely through the minimalist lifestyle, removing the outer shells to be close to you. You may not even know what you really want because of all your consumerism and you will find out on your minimalist journey. So the effect of minimalism is that you are closer to yourself, that you are more relaxed, that you are freer and that you are more self-determined. So you are going to deal with the question "What do I need for my happiness in life?" and you will learn a lot about yourself! By the way, you clear out your apartment or house, so you have much more space and by your changed attitude to consumption you also save a lot of money. After all, you were able to find out for yourself that it's usually not the objects that make you happy, but above all the moments with loved ones. By accumulating fewer possessions, it is easier for you to keep order, cleaning goes faster. This saves you a lot of time and stress. Also the thoughts around the new Smartphone and the alleged necessity to possess it are dropped, whereby it can be lived much more relaxed. Your neighbours always need the latest sports cars? Good for her, but you don't have to deal with these trivial decisions anymore. This gives you the opportunity to use your time and energy for really important decisions. For example, you can develop professionally, get more involved with the stock market, take care of your retirement plans, plan great parties and spend wonderful holidays with your loved ones. As you can see, this way of thinking allows you great flexibility in shaping your life and that is incredibly important. After all, only you yourself are responsible for your happiness in life and no one else. The creators of the new advertising for the new vacuum cleaner robot promise you heaven on earth, but as soon as the little electronic butler flits through your living room, you are no longer interesting for them. The attention to your true needs will increase steadily over time. So you will go through your life more attentively and consciously, perceive what really makes you happy and experience great gratitude for many incredibly small things in life. Finally you have your luck in your hand and are no longer dependent on external factors! That's an incredibly good feeling!

More serenity through minimalism

Through minimalism we experience more serenity in everyday life. How is that possible? For this we should first look at how serenity develops. Serenity arises when we feel safe and worry little. Our composure decreases, for example, when we accept the wishes and expectations of people other than ourselves. Just because Hinz and Kunz need the latest smartphone and sneakers from Nike doesn't mean that we also have these wishes or that we have to refer to these external wishes. Either we follow one trend after another because we accept other people's ideas or because we fear the rejection of those for whom this trend is really important. In both cases it is about the ideas and wishes of other people and not about our own. As soon as we try to "please others" or to bend ourselves for the recognition of others, we are no longer calm. Instead, we bow to social pressure. We cannot influence other people's opinions and so we are constantly on our guard, under constant pressure and under stress to meet external expectations. What happens as soon as we surrender to the minimalist lifestyle and find more of ourselves? We often realize that we are not following trends out of passion for the trend, but to impress other people and thus supposedly secure ourselves a place in an unstable social structure. As soon as it is more about how we imagine our four walls, how we would like to live and how we would like to use our lifetime, we move on a safe path: On our way. Here we are not exposed to the arbitrariness of other people, but work for the achievement of our own goals, wishes and ideas. At this moment, we no longer make our happiness in life dependent on the opinion of other people, but solely on our opinion. And exactly at this point serenity arises. The pressure to meet expectations as perfectly as possible disappears. We are moving more and more towards the state of our lives that we really want and this is a space where we set the standards for perfection. Suddenly it seems less important to find out when the new Smart TV will be launched and how to finance it. Rather, you're now asking yourself, "Hey, I'd like to spend another nice evening with all my friends, how do I do that?" At the moment when we no longer blame the material possessions for our happiness in life, but see them for what they are - material as a means to an end - we can focus on everything that does us good and lets us be. Minimalism suddenly gives us a lot more time to take care of it. After all, we don't have to spend ages in department stores to find the perfect leggings, we can choose more valuable activities!

More satisfaction through minimalism

Perhaps the chapter "More serenity through minimalism" has already shown you why minimalism makes us so much more satisfied. We are only satisfied when we satisfy our innermost needs. We like to satisfy these needs superficially with extensive shopping tours that give us short-term happiness or with material status symbols that represent our place in society. True satisfaction, however, looks quite different. When was the last time you spent an outdoor night under the stars? How satisfied are you when you can enjoy a richly laid breakfast table? How satisfied are you when you finally reach your personal goals and learn to play the piano again? This feeling of satisfaction is simply not comparable to the feeling of running the new Prada bag or copying the questionable style of "Instagram Models". Minimalism saves us time, saves us nerves, saves us a lot of unnecessary stress. Minimalism is about finding out what we really need in our lives and how we can make the most of our lifetime. So we must start to set our own standards and not apply the standards of other people to our lives. If we concentrate exclusively on the standards of other people, we rob ourselves of the opportunity to get to know ourselves and to develop further. Our personal development, however, is a great asset: satisfaction. In very few cases standstill brings true satisfaction. Development, however, is - because this is about the realization of our very individual goals! On the journey to a minimalist lifestyle we learn a lot about ourselves and also find out in which direction we want to develop. This step means that we are more mindful of ourselves. Mindfulness is an important means to feel satisfaction in life. Satisfaction is closely linked to gratitude. Gratitude and contentment always provide positive feelings in our lives. But it is not only by experiencing and achieving our individual goals that we become more satisfied, but also by lowering our expectations. For example, the expectations of our material possessions, which do not contribute significantly to our happiness in life. Maybe you've spent your evenings in front of the TV and started wondering if this should go on for the rest of your life. After all, you have noticed that these monotonous routines, the irrigation by a boring television program and the constant advertising don't contribute to satisfaction, but rather move further away from it. We then often try to fill the inner void with material possessions because this is an easy and quick way to stimulate our short-term reward system in the brain. In the long run, however, these measures will prevent us from achieving our true happiness in life. On the way to minimalism you will ask yourself more than once what you want, what your goal is, what your vision is and where you want to go. This is the optimal start into a life with more satisfaction, after all you pay more attention to yourself and observe yourself consciously!

More success through minimalism

How does minimalism help us to be more successful? By making our time management more effective and increasing our productivity. We can minimize or eliminate facets of our lives that prevent us from succeeding and thus unleash our full potential. This starts with a simpler everyday life, goes through a tidy workplace and does not stop at finding out one's own real goals. Over time, you will become more and more minimalistic in your everyday life. The need to go through clothing catalogues or search online for the latest trends no longer exists. Instead, you have plenty of time, space and energy to focus on your professional questions and challenges. Maybe it's time to change jobs, do further training or become self-employed - do what makes you happy. You can see that minimalism does not go hand in hand with the renunciation of professional success, but rather opens the doors to more success. The simpler and clearer your everyday structures become, the sharper your focus becomes for the really important things in life and of course this includes the path to success. In addition to this mental change, there is also a spatial change if you dare to clear out your workplace. It's much easier to work productively and effectively when you don't have to search for a working pen for 20 minutes and the drawers are just overflowing with chaos. The spatial minimalism also contributes considerably to your being able to concentrate fully on your success. With minimalism we also find out a lot about ourselves. Once we have discarded our consumption habits and realize what brings us true happiness in life, we can work towards it. You may find that professional development is a facet of your life's happiness. You will be amazed with how much creativity and motivation you will now dare to realize your professional dreams! The decision to go an unconventional way will affect all areas of your life. So it won't stay with the rigid 9-to-5 concept for long, but your professional limits will also be blown up. The result is that you are open to new things, to unconventional and exciting things and are no longer afraid of challenges. Minimalism will also be evident in professional life itself. If you've interpreted evening calls from your boss as a sign of your importance, it could soon look quite different, because time with your family has become more important to you. Of course, this does not mean that your professional success will fall by the wayside, but rather that you will make it more effective and productive by setting healthy limits, ensuring a balanced lifestyle and being able to concentrate intensively on your projects. Of course, success does not stop with the job, but can also be related to private projects. Your goal is to make your diet healthier? Here, too, a clear mind and a clear environment will help you to achieve your goals enormously. Minimalism therefore helps us to be successful on a spatial and spiritual level!

More happiness through minimalism

Minimalism has two sides that influence each other: The conscious renunciation of unnecessary ballast in any form and the careful exploration of one's own happiness in life. This formula can create a lot of moments of happiness in everyday life! Let's take for example the theme Select outfit in the morning. With a minimalist lifestyle this problem does not arise at all, because ideally all garments fit together, all garments are the favorite garments and thus this decision is considerably simplified. The less actually simple and unimportant decisions we can leave out in everyday life, the more liberated our everyday life appears to us - and it is. This, for example, is one way in which minimalism can make us happy. As we clear out, we quickly realize how little belongings we need to be happy in everyday life. We finally become aware of the importance of a few objects and we give them great value because of their importance and not because of their actual material value. This is how we shape our daily lives so that we are surrounded by our favourite treasures, which are of great importance to us. What does this mean for our emotional world? That we feel true, genuine gratitude because we become much more aware of our environment and are more mindful of our material goods. In this conscious and attentive attitude we regularly feel deep gratitude. Gratitude is the basis of happiness. But minimalism is not only about clearing out, but also about setting new priorities. So the time with our dearest ones can become our highest priority and in the beautiful hours with these dear people lies a great treasure buried: Happiness. But how do these feelings of happiness actually develop? Our feelings come from our thoughts. If we have negative thoughts, we will feel this in our negative emotions. You think you can't influence your thoughts and emotions? Yes, you can! However, this requires a little practice. Every situation in life can be interpreted and evaluated in many different ways. Through this interpretation and evaluation our thoughts arise. Usually these are unconscious and subconscious processes. By concentrating more on what makes us happy on our minimalist path, we also learn to attach more or less importance to situations and to integrate the beautiful situations into our everyday life. This is the optimal way of shaping our lifetime - we fill our lives with happy moments. So minimalism and our happiness are connected. We learn to consciously separate ourselves from negative influences, to make our material and spiritual life more minimalistic and thus to create more space for the things and people that really make us happy. The freedom and self-determination that go hand in hand with minimalism give our lives a whole new dynamic and enable us to perceive and strengthen unknown facets of life. What happiness means to you in detail is of course up to you and a very individual matter. To determine these subtleties for yourself becomes definitely easier through the lived minimalism.