Be more with less

As a kid, I spent plenty of time with my granddad. Being an avid traveler himself, he would tell me stories of his travels to various countries and encouraged me to see the world. His stories fascinated me and I couldn’t wait to make my first trip.

Travel happened soon — when I was five, my dad got a job as a Professor in Libya, Northern Africa, and off we went to Libya. Between then and now I have traveled to 30 cities and relocated to a minimum of 10 — of which some were re-location to countries.

I often reflect back to see what traveling and relocating to different countries has taught me?

Apart from the beautiful experience of seeing new places, experiencing new cultures, and meeting new people, I think, it has taught me to let go of things that do not matter.

Let me explain.

Often when planning a move, especially to a different country, I realized that apart from the paperwork for visa, job, home, banking, etc. that took a lot of time, packing stuff and moving took a huge amount of time and contributed to a lot of stress. I wondered what it would be like to just move around with a suitcase full of belongings and not have to worry about anything else.

So I decided, let me just own stuff that can fit into two suitcases — that includes my clothes, shoes, bags, documents, books, technology. It wasn’t an easy process — getting rid of things that I had held on to for memory, the just-in-case items, the what-ifs. It was a slow process, but once I managed that, I experienced FREEDOM. I remember the old days when I’d spend an entire weekend organizing junk, but now it’s easy to remain organized since I don’t own much to organize in the first place. Instead, I’ve discovered that it’s much easier to get rid of something than it is to clean or organize it.

This inspired me to take it further. Eventually, during my research, I came across this term called ‘minimalism’ which defined what I was trying to do. And I was delighted to find that so many other people have embraced minimalism — single people, people with families & kids & houses, even Silicon Valley billionaires.

Minimalism is a lifestyle that helps people question what things add value to their lives. By clearing the clutter from life’s path, we can all make room for the most important aspects of life: health, relationships, passion, growth, and contribution.

This has slowly developed into a lifestyle choice and I try to think twice or thrice before getting any new stuff into life, so there is room for stuff that matters.