Minimalism - Living Life with Less - Part 4

The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less. From old good friend Socrates. I'm Curtis. My palau there is Joe, and we are dudes in progress. Hey, Joe.

What's going on, my pal?

I'm ready to talk for the fourth time about minimalism.

You think we've done the subject justice so far?

Yeah, I think we've done all right. I find our show is doing what I wanted it to do, which was the focus in on things I wanted to improve on. I catch myself thinking about these things all the time, doing the work and the studying and talking to you on Saturdays about it.

I I agree, Kurt. I think that the show is doing exactly what I had intended as well, which is to fix you.

Well, good luck with that. Hopefully got a long time.

That's funny. That's funny.

Well, yeah. We're going to finish up with number eleven. What is it? Eleven through 20 of your list?

Yeah, twelve through 21 is today's list. We'll do a quick review of the first eleven. If you remember last week, we kind of caught an audible in the middle of the show to finish up your part on Joshua Becker's book and decided to move the rest of the list twelve through 21 over today. And if you remember what that list is, it's the benefits of minimalism 21 benefits of owning less. This comes right from Joshua Becker's website. Becoming Minimalist.com. I'm a big fan of Joshua Becker, and I know you are, too, especially after reading his book, Kurt. And we've done one through eleven and we'll roll through twelve through 21. So you are absolutely right.

I like that audible you called making a little edit and change to our format where I think what we're going to continue to do is alternate being the host, kicking off the shows and leading the show. We're both accomplished podcast hosts of our own. And then I like how you may take a topic a little deeper on one week and I'll do the next week.

Yeah, just like us, the show is a work in progress. Right.

I like that idea. Then we spent some time over the last week. We said we were going to put together a 30 day challenge on minimalism, and I think it's pretty solid what we worked on. We've got the list together. You did a nice graphic, and I know we made another good decision where I think we're going to continue the conversation where remember we had this argument. I don't know if you want to call an argument difference of opinion. You lean more on the side of getting rid of stuff and I'm thinking more about the middle of the side of things that matter. And so I think our list is going to be more 1st 30 days and I could use a lot of getting rid of stuff, organizing and all those kinds of things, if you remember.

Right, I believe deeply in doing things that matter. Right. Yeah. I don't want everybody out there to think that Joe is just all about throwing crap away. But I do believe that when you declutter almost every part of your life, physically, mentally, digitally, even relationships, you make room for what's important. And sometimes you don't even know yet what's important to you until you get rid of the clutter and your values reveal themselves to you. So once you've done this, once you've gotten rid of the clutter, now we move into what's really important. Now, some people may have a solid grasp on their values, and the clutter doesn't clutter up their values. But many people, I would venture to guess a lot of people really don't know what's important to them deeply until they can clear out the things that they know aren't important, the clutter in their life. And it's not just stuff. There's lots of definition of clutter. So I think we're aligned.

Kurt okay.

Yeah, I know if you want to continue to fight, we'll fight, but I think we're aligned. I think we're aligned. My idea is, again, get rid of the clutter, and your true values will reveal themselves, if they haven't already.

I find fascinating, as we look into these quotes, some of the people we're using in our quotes are from ancient times. Mine was from Socrates and saying, the secret of happiness not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less. I don't know what Socrates was collecting back in ancient Greece, but it's kind of fascinating to me.

We've quoted Marcus Aurelius, too. Yeah, I think you quoted Marcus Rillius. I really invite you to if you've not already, read some of the writings of the Stoics, including Marcus Rillius the Meditations by Marcus Rius. If you've not read that book, there's a modern language version of it. So don't feel like you have to learn Greek or Roman or whatever the language was, latin or I don't know, but it's a really good read. And there's some other stuff by Ryan Holiday, I think his name is, writes on Stoicism.

Right.

And I really, really invite you to check that stuff out.

Fantastic. Well, I want to check out your list.

21 benefits of owning less.

I want to hear your 21 benefits of owning less. Joe I've been hanging on my seat. You know, my wife Margita and I, pretty much every Saturday we go visit her mom, who's in a nursing home. It's about a 45 minutes drive up and then 45 minutes back, I want you to know she is all caught up in the podcast, dudes. In progress.

I'm curious how many people had to drink last week by you mentioning your other podcast.

I didn't mention it all this time.

Well, yeah, maybe I opened up the.

Door there's still time.

Maybe I opened up the door for.

That well, you know, Joe, tomorrow night I'm recording my 500 episode.

Congratulations, man.

500 episodes. You have to know if you're wondering. So I'm getting a gang together for a little roundtable celebration where they ask me some of my favorite moments doing the podcast. Almost nine years and 500 episodes.

On what date will your 500th episode release?

Oh, boy.

Well, I just released sometime in March, right?

Well, yeah, I just released 498 and so two weeks from this past Monday, as we're recording here on Tuesday. So about two weeks.

Congratulations, pal. Yeah, and I'll say that a lot. Congratulations.

It's been fun. So if we want to go through.

This list of 21 benefits of owning less, let's roll through the first eleven that we covered the episode before last.

Tell me, tell me. I'm ready.

Number one spend less. Number two, less stress. Number three, easier to clean. Number four, more freedom. Number five, good for the environment. Number six, be more productive. Number seven, example for my kids. Number eight, support other causes. Number nine, own higher quality things. Number ten, less work for someone else. And number eleven be happier. I tell you, that list by itself is a pretty awesome list.

It sure is.

And as I look through this list, I might have started this list from 21 up instead of one down through 21, but I didn't. So we're going to continue with number twelve. Do work you love.

You know I love that one. I'm a big fan.

Yeah. If you think about it, when you clear everything out of your life, including at work, you can easily see what you value most, what you enjoy most, where your skills are. Sometimes we're so caught up in the minutiae that we can't see where our passion lies. We can't see where we are truly valuable. Maybe we keep our job, right? We're not talking about quitting your job, but we're talking about doing more of the work you love. And if you're able to clear the way. What I mean by clear the way is understand what you value most in your work and where you excel the most in your work and where your true passion lies. By clearing away the clutter, you will do more of the work that you truly love.

I've been passionate about this since I was in high school. I can remember going to the guidance office in the library and reading up on this kind of thing. What was it I was going to do with my work? I was obsessed with going to college and trying to find something that it's hard to do when you're in high school, but that continued even through college. And even after I got out of work and I was working somewhere, I thought I had an analytical ability. Seems I did since I finally started doing that. But yeah, it's a lot of self reflection, too, and really thinking about those things that you're doing. And I did a lot of things. I tried some things that it was quite obvious I didn't like them. I tried sales. I remember getting out of college and going to interviews. Got down to the last second. The guy said, I don't think you're cut off for sales. That was kind of hard to hear, but he was right.

Also, when you own less stuff, you have less to take care of. You have less to worry about. Fewer bills, fewer obligations, fewer things to worry about. And when you have fewer things to worry about, your time is freed up to do the work you love. Maybe the work you love makes half the money that you make now, right? Yeah.

Well, I've always encouraged my kids, too, to pursue, find some way to enjoy the work that you do.

Because if you have less stuff, fewer bills, fewer obligations, fewer things to take care of, fewer things to worry about, you can pursue a job that you love. And for now, it may make half the money. I remember listening to an episode of The Minimalists. Joshua Fields Millburn quit his $200,000 a year job, laid himself off, and went to a job where he made 90% less for the sake of simplifying his life.

Yeah. What was the result of that, looking back?

Well, the result of that, he's very successful now. I mean, he doesn't reveal any of his income stuff, but he was able to build a life that he wanted, build a job that he wanted. He does a lot of things. He does The Minimalists, of course, and he does that podcast, and he's an author, but he also teaches people how to write. He teaches people how to be good authors, and he does probably some personal coaching and things like that, just doing whatever he wants to do, whatever he loves to do. But he had to make that radical decision. That's a lot of time spent on number twelve.

All right.

Do work you love. Do work you love. But that's important. That's important. That's a passion of mine, too. Number 13, freedom from the comparison game. And I can't remember who this quote is, and if I don't get it exactly right, forgive me, but it's basically this. We work so hard to spend money. We don't have to buy things we don't want to impress people we don't like.

Yeah, that was Will Rogers.

You had that quote, will Rogers.

That was my quote from last weekend.

Will Rogers. Good memory. Was it last week or the week before?

Something like that. Yeah.

So in the past, let's just put it down.

This is free yourself from the comparison game.

Freedom from the comparison game. This is what minimalism will bring you. That's freedom from the comparison game. When you think about it, like, I have a very minimal wardrobe. All of my clothes can fit into all of my clothes do fit into closet space that is about 36 inches wide. Every single lick of clothes that I have, that in the top one, one drawer of of a dresser drawers. One the top drawer of a dresser drawers, the standard dresser drawers. That's where my underwear and socks and a couple of hats and things like that go. Everything else and a couple of pair of shorts. Everything else goes. Everything else fits into a closet. People pretty much know how I'm going to show up, how I'm going to be dressed when I show up.

Yeah, they've seen the whole and it's appropriate.

What's that?

They've seen the whole wardrobe.

They've seen it. Right. Right. Joshua Becker wears the same thing. He has the same outfit that he wears every single day. Now, he may throw a jacket on for a special occasion, or may throw a pair of dress shoes on for a special occasion, but for the most part, he wears the same thing every single day, and I love that. And when you free yourself through minimalism from the comparison game, you don't worry about that. You don't worry about having the latest fashion. You worry about comfort and function and appropriate attire for the moment.

I think I've never had that social pressure, even when I was a kid, that wasn't part of my culture growing up. It's not been even in the working world, even the business world where I worked, business casual has become the norm. We're even wearing jeans at work now. I'm all for it. I was never much of a dress up person anyway. I've never been into fashion or clothes, and I'm fine except for my t shirts. I do get quite the fancy t shirts, but other than that, that's where.

Well, you can't see it, but Kurt has a Led Zeppelin t shirt on right now.

I've been collecting a lot of the stores. Target has these old rock, rock and roll bands, so I like the old classic rock bands and picking those up. I think the comparisons are more the difficult part is, hey, you're trying to do a podcast, and people want to be like the big guys, and that's a tough trap to get into. Just try to compare yourself to people who are famous, and you don't have to do that.

Well, our culture begs us to own more. Our culture begs us to buy the latest, greatest, newest thing. And we stuff our closets because of sunk cost bias or some kind of fake value that we put on things or guilt. We stuff our closets for the things that we bought last year. That is just as functional. But we went at the latest and greatest because we saw the Joneses across the street with the latest and greatest. I think more people are trapped by the comparison game than they care to admit. I find myself doing it, man. I look at a car and like, wow, that's a nice car. I'd kind of like to get a Tesla, you know?

Right.

That's a really nice car. And I think more people, like I said, than they care to admit get caught up in this comparison trap. And minimalism, once you make that mind shift that you're living with, less minimalism will help free yourself from that comparison. Game number 14, time for things that matter most. And these all overlap, right? These all dovetail into each other. I believe. And you will hear me say this a lot. You've probably heard me say this a lot, kurt, I know you've heard me say this a lot. And I know that people who listen to my other podcast, Simplejoe at the Simplejoe.com, hear me say this every show, memories are better than stuff.

I'll drink to that.

Memories are better than stuff. Take time for things that matter most. You can never get your time back. And if you spend your time worrying about collecting, buying, organizing, cleaning stuff, you are using the most valuable resource you have, and that's your time. The less time you spend on stuff in every area, the more time you can spend with the people who love you and the people who you love doing things that you love. And this is near and dear to my heart. We only have a limit of time on this Earth, and we don't know when it's going to end. You know, as we talk right now, President Jimmy Carter is very sick. He's lived to be 98 years old. Now, he may live another year, I don't know. He's in hospice now, so probably not. So he's sick. I don't know from what, but this is not a political statement. Jimmy Carter may or may not have been a great president, but for my money, he's the best former president we've ever had. Meaning he's a good man that has done good things, that has been a good contributor to society.

Yeah, I know. He was committed to Habitat for Humanity.

He made a decision when he left the presidency to go back to live his simple life in Plains, Georgia. And he did important stuff, right? He did lots of important things. But he kept his life simple so he could have time to do the things that matter most to him. He went back home to Plains, Georgia, lived a simple life, continued to teach Sunday school and Sundays, and made sure that he had time by simplifying his life and keeping his life simple to do the things that matter most. And that's what minimalism will do for you now.

Good example.

Wow. Is Jimmy Carter a professed minimalist? I don't know. Probably not. But he's an example of making a decision to simplify your life so you can do the things that matter most.

I know you went to Disney World because I saw him there.

I actually saw him there.

Are here to tell you that story? No, I'll make it quick, but one of our first trips to Disney World back in early 2000s, sitting at the Animal Kingdom, The Lion King show. It's a big in the round kind of theater, kind of a Broadway production. And I see these guys with dark glasses come in. We were in the third row, and they had this section, all VIP ready for VIP to show up, which happens often at Disney World. And I noticed Roslyn Carter, his wife, walk in and Amy Carter and her husband, and there he was, Jimmy Carter with the Secret Service sat right in front of me.

Right in front of you? Really?

Right, Mac? In front of me, yeah.

And where were you?

We were at Animal Kingdom at the Lion King show, which was like a Broadway they still do the show. My little touch of fame.

Was there an opportunity to say hello?

No, not really. It's kind of weird when you see.

Celebrities give them a hug.

Especially when they have Secret Service with the dark glasses.

I don't know how big Jimmy Carter was, but you're a solid six foot, too.

I was sitting down.

He might have been afraid of you.

I'm a threat.

Watch that guy. Well, that's a cool story. I dig it, man. I dig it. Outstanding. So that's number 14. Time for things that matter most. Number 15, it's visually appealing. Now, this is subjective, right? This is a matter of opinion. But when I go into somebody's home and it is just cluttered, just full of stuff, I'm not comfortable. Now, a lot of it has to do with the company that I'm keeping, right? But generally, it's not as comfortable, it's not as appealing. And I'm speaking for myself, okay? When I go into a room where things are put together and there's not a lot of stuff, I feel like I can breathe. Again, this is subjective. This is a matter of opinion. But that's how I feel.

I'm laughing because I feel this was a Seinfeld episode where Jerry meets this really gorgeous woman and I think she takes him back to her apartment. It's a complete disaster.

Well, Jerry, the character on the show is very tight.

Exactly. The whole theme, a lot of the themes of the show were these nuances that all the characters had, and his was cleanliness. He's kind of a freak when it.

Comes to germs and organization and tidiness. Right.

So that was a great I think that was a Seinfeld episode, if I remember right.

So I don't know about you, Kurt, but again, when I go into an environment and it's cluttered and full of.

Stuff, I just feel yeah, I understand that.

And, like, I'm suffocating it makes me.

Think, you know, I remember watching a video, one of my speaking of rock and roll heroes, John Lennon, and he's in his big mansion doing the song Imagine and Yoko's there, he's got a baby grand piano that's all white, and there's not a thing else in the room. And talk about a guy that's awesome who could have plenty of stuff. That always had an impact on me. I thought that was quite interesting.

That is awesome. So that's number 15, visually appealing. Number 16. Not tied to the past. Release the past to create a better tomorrow. How many things do we hold onto that we're just holding on to because it sparks some kind of memory and we don't want to let go of whatever that thing represents. If we get rid of that, then we're getting rid of a part of our past. Right. And that can lock us up in the past. When we're holding on to these things, we're not able to move on. I'm trying to get rid of this is an interesting part, and I'll bring this up right now. Part of our 30 day minimalism challenge is something that I call a death party or getting ready to die party. I forget how I have it listed there, but it's basically where you invite your family over to take the stuff that they want right now. To take the stuff that they want right now, not wait until you're dead. It gives you an opportunity to realize, what do they want? What do they don't want? It gives you an opportunity to talk about those things. It gives you an opportunity to be in that moment and also will reveal they probably don't want most of your crap. Right? All that stuff that you think you're going to leave for them, those closets and garages full of junk. Bet you they don't want it. Bet you're just being a burden when you do go, my kids are going.

To take my vinyl collection. I don't want them to have it just yet.

But minimalism releases us from the burdens of the past. We can move forward now. I like moving forward. I like buying things. I do. But one of the rules that I try to set up for myself is if I buy this, what am I removing? If I buy this shirt, what one or two shirts am I going to remove? Because maybe I do want to freshen up, award my wardrobe. Maybe I do see something, a cool gadget that I want. Okay, we have the liberty and the freedom to do that. But what am I going to release in order to bring that into my life?

Yeah, that's good practice, because I don't.

Want to be tied to the past. I don't want to be tied to this collection of memories. I like memories. Memories are better than stuff, right? I say that a lot. I said it before. So memories are important, but the stuff is not. Release yourself from the past. Allow yourself to move forward by getting rid of it. Don't tie yourself to the past. And the minimalism helps you do that. Number 17, that's number 16. Not tied to the past. Number 17 less less places for your Heart invest your heart into meaningful things, and this kind of goes back to what you do and where you spend your time. But it's also where do you invest your emotions if you tie emotional value to things instead of people and relationships and contribution, if you tie your emotions to things, you don't have room to release your emotions to the things that are really important. So this whole idea of less places for your heart, the fewer places that you pour your emotions into mean that the things that if you have fewer things that you're pouring your emotions into means that those things get more attention. It might be your kids. It might be your grandkids. It might be a special cause that's important to you. It might be whatever. It could be planning a family vacation. But the fewer things that you pour your emotions into, if you're pouring your emotions into stuff and taking care of stuff and thinking about your stuff, where you're going to store it, where you're going to keep it, what are you going to do with it, your emotions are a limited resource. And where are your emotions better spent? In the few things that matter or in worrying and taking care of all of this stuff? I'm pausing in case you want to comment between each one.

I don't know when the pause is going to come.

It'll come after each one.

Yeah. Again, I'm going back to owning the camper or the fishing boat or the car. I know people are really into antique cars, but they could be spending a lot of time. That could be a social thing too. So I guess sometimes it can be a fine line.

So that was number 17, less places for your heart. Number 18 more opportunity for rest. Just take time for a deep breath, and if you're spending all of your time in your stuff, it's difficult to rest. You ever go to a hotel room? I know you have. And when you go into the hotel room, it's clean and tidy and everything's in its place, and there's not a bunch of stuff around you, and you just feel like, boy, that feels good.

Yeah. I don't have to take care of any of it, right?

There's nothing for you to take care of. There's nothing for you to fix. Dust fix. Now imagine some of that feeling every single day of your life where things are just put together, you have fewer things. Everything has its place. There's a place for everything. I'm not talking about just organizing. I'm talking about having fewer things to worry about, to allow opportunity for rest. Because when you spend all of your time and energy in stuff, with stuff, about stuff, getting stuff, taking care of stuff, there's no real time to take a deep breath and take the opportunity to rest.

Yeah. Our culture, again, does not lend itself to rest. It seems to be you need to be go and go, go, go all the time. And I think realizing that it's not a healthy way to live without taking a break.

Yeah. Again, we're not only talking about minimizing stuff, we're also talking about minimizing our time, minimizing our obligation choices, being choosy and where we spend fill in the blank. What we spend fill in the blank so it gives you more opportunity to rest. That's number 18. Number 19. And we have two more to go. Number 19. Find things easier. Holy smoke. This is near and dear to me, man.

Hopefully after this 30 day challenge, I will be able to find things easier. That's a great goal to shoot for after we get through Cluttering decluttering.

I can't tell you how many conversations that I've had with my wife. What did you do with my about where is this?

Where's the flashlight?

It's in this drawer. And I go to that drawer and it's not there. The drawer can barely open now. God bless my wife. I love her. I love her. I love her. But we have a difference. We value minimalism in a different way. And that's something to talk about, too. When it comes to minimalism, you can't force somebody else down this road. You can serve as an example and take control of the space and the things that you're in control of, but you can't force people down this road. Heck, you can barely force yourself down this road.

I'm anxious about our list because of some of these. I'm probably going to have to have a conversation with my wife.

Well, on that list. On that list, Kurt, you can just do what you can control, right?

I'm going to try to like, there's a coffee pot that is burnt out. It's a percolator that literally caught on fire at the base when I was making coffee. And for some reason it's on the counter downstairs. I'm going to have that conversation with my wife. I'm going to find out why we still have this sitting on the counter.

Right? Because the cord is still good.

We placed the top like three times. Like the little glass piece of the percolator, we broke that like three times. So I'm thinking she's clinging on to this because she thinks maybe some one day we'll have a percolator and she's going to want the top. But best I got right now when we have that conversation, I'll find out for sure.

It's interesting that the value that we put on things, she's listening to podcasts.

Every week so I can't hide from this percolator conversation.

Called her out. You've called her out, man. So that's number 19. Find things easier. And I think that that kind of speaks for itself. It's so frustrated.

Yeah.

Find I know the easier it is.

To get it organized like my tools.

But it absolutely drives me crazy to try to find things that you.

Know you have it.

That I know I have.

Where in the world did you put it?

But where did I put it? And if I had less stuff, first of all, I would know whether I have it or not, right? If I don't have it and I really need it, number one, can I borrow it from somebody? Number two, is it something that I can go by pretty quickly? Is it something that I really need? Can I get by with another solution other than going to buy it?

But Joe, I'm convinced there's a flashlight thief and a pocket knife thief in my house when I ever catch that bugger, find out why he's stealing my things.

So a few years back, I had eye surgery, and as a result of that eye surgery, I needed reading glasses.

I know where this is going.

I'm telling you, I have purchased I've reached the point where I just buy them at the dollar store now, because I can't tell you how many times I've purchased reading glasses.

That is not something you have minimalized.

And what happens is well, I have and I have there's a little story behind this. I have minimized these. What happens is I can find none of them. I can find none of them. I know I've bought 20 in the past month, but I can't find the darn one. And then all of a sudden they start appearing, and now I have this basket of 30 reading glasses, right? So what I did is I found a couple pair of reading glasses that I spent some money on, and I said, these are going to be my reading glasses. And I've done a decent job taking care of them, but still I find myself. Where are these things?

I don't know where they go.

Joe so you have your flashlight thief and I have my reading glasses thief.

Do you remember that comedian Stephen Wright?

Yeah. Very dry.

Very dry.

Hilarious. Yeah.

He made this joke. He said he lost his slippers. So he called information. He said, hey, do you know where my slippers are? She says, yeah, they're behind the couch. Thank you.

Stephen Wright did another one. He said, Last night somebody broke into my house and replaced every single thing with an exact replica.

Yes, that's right. You have the strangest humor.

Absolutely. That was funny. That was funny. So that's number 19. Find things easier. Number 20 live in a smaller space. If I had it my way in my life and I was the only one responsible for me, I am the only one responsible for me. But if I was the only person I'm responsible for and I don't have to consider the feelings or the emotions or the needs of anybody else, I would probably live in a box. Would you do just a very tiny house? I would. I would.

500 sqft on wheels, maybe. I'm kind of fascinated by that tiny house movement.

Yeah, I know that I can definitely live in a smaller place, even smaller than I have now. And we downsized when our kids grew up and moved out, even smaller than we have now. Because it's just less to take care of, less to worry about, less to think about. The home. A house is the costly for most people is the costliest investment somebody will ever make. And if you spend all of your money time cleaning, time maintaining money and time maintaining money and time cleaning, worrying about, ensuring all of that stuff, that big old house, where could that time, energy and money be better spent?

Yeah, outside. If you don't have a big house.

It could be spent outside. It could be spent with calls that you care about. It could be spent traveling, it could be spent on selfish endeavors. It doesn't necessarily have to be the great world changing calls. It can be spent on things that are important to you. Like I said, traveling, doing things that you find fulfilling, whatever that might be. But instead, here we are living in this big old house. Generally, I've talked about culturally in these big old houses with $4,000 a month payments. Where could that time, energy and where could those that time, energy and resources be better spent? So by minimizing you get to live in a smaller place and less to take care of in a smaller investment. And finally, number 21, display what you value most, communicate what is most important to you. I'm not talking about living a completely sterile life where there is nothing, no beauty around you when I'm talking about minimalism, but I am talking about what you surround yourself with are the things that matter most to you. The beauty that you surround yourself with, the things that you put on the wall, the pictures that you display, whatever it might be. You minimize everything else and only display those things that matter to you most. And when somebody walks into your home, they know exactly what's important to you. They know exactly what you value. I have one picture on a wall and that's a picture of my grandkids. Now my other kids might say, hey, who are we? Chopped liver? And they'll get pictures too. But that's the first one that I hung and a picture of my wife, my wife and I, our wedding picture actually is what I have hung up as well. But people could go into your home and know exactly what you value most. You can display what you value most by minimizing.

Well, I've not minimized in my office, so I'm going to stay away from that. It certainly looks like a hoarder here. I've got shelves that I've built. I get a lot of listeners who send me things. I've got my album collections, I've got pictures, I got Kevin Curtis Allen on my wall and Glenn Kessler.

As I look through this list, I would probably say number four is what I value most, and number four is more freedom. The sense of freedom that comes from minimalism is just refreshing to me. It helps me breathe. I no longer feel tied to stuff, material possessions, be it in my home or in my car or at work or whatever it might be. I no longer feel tied to these things. And I have almost a renewed sense of freedom, of independence, of autonomy, to know that I'm not burdened with things in my life. And that, to me, is freeing. So there's our list, the 21 benefits of owning less great stuff to think.

On and even to practice, Joe, as we get into our 30 day challenge. So we've done four weeks of talking about minimalism, and now for pretty much the month of March, we've got a good list and you've got it in a nice PDF. We'll put it out there on our website. I think if we got to get our email list going, we can have this available to email to people when they sign up for email list, these kinds of challenges. And you've got it started off on a Saturday. First thing, find ten easy things that donate or discard. I like that one. I think your thought here. Day one, you can start any day, but if you start this on a Saturday, you can start at the middle of the month and start checking these off as you go and build some momentum. I think that's what you were going for there.

Yeah. So let's talk about this list and day one as this is releasing. This is March 3 as we're releasing this final episode on minimalism, our fourth installment on minimalism. And we are releasing a dudes in progress 30 day minimalism challenge. The worksheet that I put together does start on a Saturday for day one, because Saturdays are an easy day to start. Most anything that you need some freedom to start, right? That you need some breathing room, some time to think about it. Saturdays are a good day to start those things. So I started this on Saturday. So day one is Saturday, and I don't think we're going to go through the whole list, but Saturday, this would be tomorrow for you as we're releasing. This is simply this. Find ten easy things to donate or discard. Ten easy things to donate a discard. And there's no rules, there's no regulations here, there's no real guidelines. Whatever those ten things are, those are yours. Just find ten easy things to donate or discard. You may find big things, significant things that you're ready to donate or discard, and that's great. But whatever those things are, ten easy things that you can easily get rid of, easily donate, that you have low emotional attachment to, that are easy for you to discard. And that starts tomorrow, day one for us.

I think each week I'd like to look at the past week and comment on each one that we worked well, not for each one, but some that were meaningful for us. I'm looking forward to get my garage cleared out in Saturday. Ten easy things that donate or discard. I could I could probably do 50 things.

But listen, if you get momentum, God bless you for it, right? If you get momentum, God bless you for it. I don't know. Kurt, are we settled on how we're going to actually release this? Do we want to, like, right here in real time, let the sausage be made and you and I kind of decide how we're going to release this? Release this dudes in progress. 30 day minimalism challenge. Because this is not Friday, March 3 for us. This is actually the 21 February for us. So let's think about how we're going to release this. I have a couple of ideas and let me know what you think, Kurt. We could post each day in the Facebook group. As that day arrives, we can make the PDF available and people can follow along. I even thought about maybe doing just a little daily podcast, a five minute podcast every day that we talk about. Okay, how did you do yesterday? How did you do on finding ten things to donate or discard? Did you complete that task? Well, here's today's, something like that.

I definitely want to do the Facebook posting so that people can follow along. They know what the item is for that day. That's quite a commitment to do a podcast every day, even as small as five to ten minutes.

Well, there would be no music. There would be none of that stuff. There'd be no introduction. This would just be simply me or you saying, hey, this is Joe checking in with you. How did yesterday go? And your dudes in progress. 30 day minimalism challenge.

Yeah, you could explain what you did and what the next one is for next day.

Very quickly. Very quickly. I wonder if that would be a.

Value that'd be fun to try that and see what kind of response we get.

And we'd put it right in this feed.

Okay.

Right in this feed. So each Friday we would still release a show, but it would be a checkup. Let's think about that. So if you are listening to a little daily check in podcast of the 30 Day Minimalism Challenge, you'll know that we did it, right? If not, you'll know, we did decide it not to do it not to do it. But I think definitely we will make the PDF available. We'll put each day, along with a link to the PDF available on our Facebook page if we're able to at the time to release that as an email giveaway. If you sign up for our mailing list, you get this as a free giveaway. There'll be many ways to do it. Just go to dudesinprogress.com and in today's show notes will be what we've decided to do.

I'm really excited to do this. I like these 30 day challenge. I like having something that I'm doing every day towards something I want to be focused on. And for 30 days, it's going to be minimalism as we progress through the podcast. Other things I hate when a week goes by and there's things that I've been wanting to do and I don't do them. And I think you can really accomplish a lot just by doing 30 minutes a day on something.

And these are things that most of these things won't take more than a few minutes. They won't take more than absolutely than a few minutes. Now, some of them may take a little longer, but some of them are.

You'Ll still find them challenging, though, joe, I did this course. It's a 21 day course on change One Thing adventure, to be focused and to do the Little workbook challenge, which was 410 minutes, something like that. Let's say it was ten minutes. Why is that still challenging to commit to that? I find that fascinating. So this will be fun.

If you have the PDF in front of you as you're listening to this, understand that each thing on here will be explained in the Facebook post. At minimum, if we decide to do a daily podcast, then it'll be explained in that daily podcast as well. Some of them require a little bit of an explanation. A little bit of an explanation. I'll give you an example. Create a dated junk drawer box. That's day three. Create a dated junk drawer box that requires an explanation. And on day three, if you're in the Facebook group or that we do this on a podcast, we'll explain that what that what created a dated junk drawer box means. If you think about it, you could probably figure it out since that's one.

Of yours, you'll be explaining that one.

Yes, absolutely.

Let's move on to we got our win for the week and our quote for the week and our resource for the week. What was your win for the week, Joe?

So yesterday, as we're recording this, this is Tuesday the 21st, and maybe that's where we're pulling back the curtain and we're releasing the magic. But yesterday was President's Day, and I took the day off yesterday and I cleaned my office and prepared to give stuff away. Either discard it or give stuff away. I did some prep work for that. I even shred it. A handful of things that needed to be shredded. I put in folders, a few things that needed to be put in folders. I threw a lot of stuff away. I just didn't need to keep that. I thought I would keep, put some bills in a system, in a process and threw a bunch of stuff away, a few garbage bags of things away from paperwork to just some stuff that I felt was cluttering my office. So I took the day off yesterday, and I cleaned my office and prepared to give stuff away. And boy, did it feel good when I was done. I love coming into a nice, clean, slick desk with everything kind of in its place, and I understand what my task is at hand because it's right there in front of me.

So you think the podcast and all our talk about minimalism was a motivating factor?

Absolutely. Because when we're putting it out there, we feel responsible to walk the talk, right?

Absolutely. Yeah. It gets in your subconscious mind. You think about it, it pops in your head. You're like, oh, we were talking about this. I'm raring to go on this 30 day minimals challenge. I'm thinking of things all the time, that this is going to be part of my challenge. Like that. This will be fun.

All right, how about you? What's your winter?

I went for the week. Well, we've been talking about secret to happiness, being relationships. Speaking of things that we were talking about in the podcast that have gotten into my head a little bit, and unfortunately, a good friend of mine, someone that Joe knows, released or spoke about in our Facebook and the Facebook groups, how he lost his dad. And I was profoundly saddened all day yesterday thinking about this, because I care about my friend, and that's one of the most horrible, tragic things that can happen is the loss of a family member. And I find this Joe to be very awkward. I am lost for words, and I'm not really an emotional person. I don't feel like I have this quality of comforting with people, which is I shouldn't say that because it finally got to me. I had a lot of things going on yesterday. I was busy. I recorded two podcasts or had conversations even after work, but I'm laying in bed about 930 after all that work. I don't know what motivated me, but I texted my friend, not knowing what kind of state he's in. It's a turmoil. It's a big turmoil when the death of a family member. And he responded right back to me. And we had a nice little quick chat, but decided to get on the phone today. We picked a time from this morning, and we talked for, like, an hour, and it was fantastic. And I felt so glad that I did reach out to him, although I was a little anxious in doing that. I know that he appreciated it. And then we connected on some practical matters and things that we could do for his family, and I feel so much better about that right now, but I'm glad I did that, and it was important. So speaking of things that matter, relationships, especially comforting a friend in a tough.

Time, to me, what makes that a real win for the week? A real win is whether you call it God, whether you call it the universe, whether you call it whatever, something prompted you. The universe, God, the Holy Spirit, whatever your thing is, prompted you, and you took action on it.

You felt a locked up about all day.

You felt a need to do this. And that action that you took was a small action that led to a big conversation that led, I would venture to guess, that led to not only deepening a relationship with a very good friend, but led to helping his healing process. And that's important. Dude, that's awesome.

Thanks.

That's awesome.

All right. And now the quote of the week. Joe?

Well, we kind of have a list here in front of us. We just talked about our 30 30 day challenge. Before we go into the quote, Kurt, let's talk about our resource. Do you have a resource to share this week?

Well, while I was looking in for the quotes on minimalism, I saw a guy come up a couple of times. I thought he was somebody else, and I kind of Googled his name and he runs a blog. He's got a business all about this. And you've reminded me that he's been doing this for a long time. ZenHabits Net. I started reading a couple of his blog posts because I got his quote for this week. Leo Babuada. How do you say it?

Babata.

Babata.

Babata.

Leo Babata.

Yeah, he's like he's one of these he's one of like the Gram Pooh boss of minimalism.

Well, like you were saying about the minimalist, two guys reading some of his stuff. I mean, it's very Zen and habits. I thought you would like that too. But I don't know if he's a Buddhist or whatever, but he seems to be like a regular guy. Then you don't have to be a Buddhist to try to live some of these philosophies. But ZenHabits net. I think it's a resource. I'm going to dig into his work as a blogger.

Awesome. I've read a little bit of his stuff. Good stuff. You'll recognize a lot of it, but yeah, he does his thing. No doubt.

What's your resource?

No doubt. Mine's a little different. And when I think about things that help me simplify my life, one tool that has really helped me simplify my life is Lastpass Password Manager.

I love this one. And we did this separately. I don't think we talked about this, and we both are using this tool.

So Lastpass Password Manager has helped me simplify my life in an unbelievable way by helping me, number one, create uncrackable passwords. Right?

Yeah. Nasty passwords. Long and all kinds of characters.

Right? By helping me create uncrackable passwords. I mean, I think the statistics say the kind of passwords that they create when the combination of numbers and characters.

They make no sense at all.

Well, of course they make no sense, but numbers and characters and lower case and upper case and all the combination, it would take millions of years for the fastest computer that we have to crack. Right? The cool thing is they don't store these passwords. It's all encrypted and encoded. And the passwords themselves, they don't know. They don't have access to I don't know half my passwords, my true passwords, to be quite honest with you. I have one master password that I have made it extremely difficult, extremely difficult to guess, but I know it. And that's the only password I have to worry about, is that single password. And if I know that password, I have access to all my other passwords. And like I said, they're not stored in such a way where they can be retrieved by anybody other than me.

Yeah, I love this tool. This is one of those areas of frustration, all these things to keep things locked up. They're so locked up, I can't even get into my own things. An ID and a password when it's I have so many interests in so many places. I go on websites. It's really cool. The Chrome browser especially recognizes you're putting in an ID and password, and it pulls it straight from Lastpass. Or if you're on your mobile device. Same thing. I know the iPhone, for instance, has their own kind of password thing, but I use Lastpass for my home computer and also for the mobile device, and it is so beautiful. I think it's like my daughter was the one that turned me on to it for a family price of, like, $30 a year.

It's cheap, something like that. When you think about the value that you get out of it, it's cheap.

It's a beautiful thing that you don't have to worry. Like you said, keep really sophisticated passwords. One click. Although I did notice in WordPress it hides the number I got to put in there. My podcast WordPress site. Sometimes a little Lastpass character gets in the way of me seeing what I got to type in there. But anyways, other than that, it is a beautiful thing. Good choice, Joe.

It's a great resource, and it really helps me. And this isn't one of those things that you kind of shimmy in there to the subject. This has helped me tremendously in minimizing my life and living. Don't have to worry because I don't have to think about it. It's all right there.

Awesome. Let's finish up with our quote for the week.

Joe, mine comes from Jim Rohn, and Jim Rohn is a personal trainer. Not a physical personal trainer, but a personal development trainer from way back in the day. He's he's considered, like, I would say, the great uncle of personal development. You know, you think about you think about Tony Robbins. You think about Tony Robbins, you think about many of these motivational speakers. They all, at some point or another, were students of Jim Rohn, and he has some great books, some great philosophies. You think about Napoleon Hill and some of those guys that are like the grandfathers of personal development. That's why I called Jim Rohn kind of the great uncle. He kind of came after those guys, but had an incredible impact in a different way, in a more modern way. And I love his stuff. Jim Rohn is really somebody to dig deep in the archives for and check out his work. And I love this quote by him. Success is nothing more than a few simple disciplines practiced every day. Not a lot of disciplines. Not every once in a while. A few disciplines. A few simple disciplines practiced every day. If we can figure out how to just practice a few simple disciplines every day, success is inevitable.

I like that. That reminds me. I think I learned this going to basketball camps. I was really into basketball, improving my skills. One of the coaches what was the saying when we were kids? Practice makes practice makes perfect. But he would say, practice makes permanent. The other thing was, you got to practice the right things. That's what practice makes permanent. If you practice to shoot the basketball the wrong way, you're going to have a permanently horrible jump shot. But if you practice it the right way, like you said, every single day, then you will move closer to perfection.

And what I love about this is in this one little sentence, volumes are spoken. A few simple disciplines practiced every day. What that sentence tells me, I hear more in that sentence, what it doesn't say than what it does say. Even so many times we try to just load ourselves up with all this stuff to do, all these things to do, thinking it's going to make our life better when we need nothing more than a few simple disciplines practiced every day. How about your quote?

So I got my quote, but you made me think of this quote from Bruce Lee I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once. I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times.

Why don't we just leave it right there, man? You saved that your other quote for next week. That was a lot easier.

All right.

That is right there.

I was a big fan of Bruce Lee as a kid. Hadn't his post.

That's a good way to wrap this up.

I agree with you, Joe. So where can you find Dudes in progress?

You can go to dudesinprogress.com. Dudesinprogress.com. You can check out our Facebook or links to our Facebook. Are there links to how you can support the show? Links to all the shows are there all kinds of stuff. If you want to read back and look at our quotes for the week or our resources, they're all right there in today's show notes. Our wins for the week all right there at Dudes Inprogress.com. And I invite you to go to Dudes Inprogress.com if you will support the show. If you support the show, we're building all the resources, all the extra resources for the supporters of Dudes in Progress. For example, you're going to be able to hear postshow conversations between Kurt and me we'll eventually have in their small mini courses. We might even put in their archived podcast. When we get to archived podcasts, there'll be all kinds of bonuses and things like that over in the over in our patreon support group, I guess you would say. But all that can be found in Dudes at Dudes in Progress.com. Dudes in progress.com.

And don't forget to get into the Facebook group. We'll be posting our 30 day minimalist challenge. I like your idea. Maybe we should do some podcasts every day.

Some extra podcasts just for supporters. That would be very cool. Kurt. As we wrap up this show, remember, progress is better than perfection. Keep moving forward.

I agree, Joe. And next time we will try to do better.

Talk to you later.

See you, Joe.