As a minimalist, I gave out 2 of my 3 chino trousers to my sister to take to Ghana and give them out to the workers on our farm—I have wore them for over a year and the colour has faded from machine wash.
So I bought 2 new ones to replace the 2 goning out. I will give the third one away too when I come around to buy another one.
I want to live an intentional life—and that means I need to bring things or persons into my life intentionally. The fact that I can afford 20 trousers does not mean I need 20 trousers. That is clutter.
In the last 4 years of my life, I have achieved more than I had achieved in the preceding 32 years.
Of course, the 32 years has built me up to this but making sure I only focus on what is really essential to me has given me a lot of time to spend with the people I care about and also has given me the financial ability to invest in real assets instead of chaff.
Clothes, shoes and many of the things that we work so hard, earn money and buy are not assets. The few needed are necessities and beyond that, the rest are pure junk.
You can see that the colour of the 2 trousers I have bought are the same—I just need a clean nice looking trousers out of necessity so I don’t care about different shades, different styles or types.
A few years ago, Afia Schwar posted me on Instagram and said I have just one white shirt as I am always wearing a white shirt—that I wash it, I wait for it to dry and wear it again. Her followers were laughing at me. That’s a poor and shallow person’s mindset, the disease of our generation and that is why many of our people are broke, unexposed and absolutely stupid, financially.
If you don’t take charge of your life, the advertising market will drive you crazy into debt and into having no assets, no freedom and no life of your own.
I see people paying 500 pounds a month for hire purchased cars in the U.K. and others paying same amount for mortgages where they are gathering equity and living in them.
I see people travelling the world and creating priceless experiences and many others working 24/7 to keep up with the Joneses by buying designer wears—vegetating at one corner of the world and will die in their ignorance clothed in designer wears.
I see people waking up at 4am to travel from Kasoa to work at Central Accra each day and at the end of the month, they use chunk of their monies to buy clothes, expensive phones, expensive weaves and many non-essential things to just lie to people that they have “arrived”. The circle then continues.
Life is indeed about making a choice but make sure you are making whatever choice intentionally and that it is bringing you value, freedom and lasting happiness.
For me, minimalism has taught me a lot including how to focus on what is essential in my life and how to gain control over my life from the matrix universe that is designed to keep us as slaves, always exhausted and desperate for more.
As a minimalist, I am learning to give away old items–instead of selling them or just throwing them away. Know that when you give away usable items, another person would find value in them.
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