This post is mainly focused on a tough question: what is the hardest part about maintaining a minimalist lifestyle?
Have you been looking to make a change in your life?
Simple living and becoming minimalist can help improve your life in a variety of ways!
However, there are some challenges to keeping up with this type of lifestyle.
Although this seems odd to say in comparison to someone who lives above their means with big spending, a minimalist lifestyle can be challenging for the opposite reason.
The hardest part about living a minimalist lifestyle is the fact that it’s so easy to buy more stuff and accumulate more junk!
In a society based on consumerism, the temptation is ever-present for acquiring more material possessions. Maintaining a strong mindset for simplicity is key to sticking to a simple life without excess.
And to clarify my friends, I don’t mean that we can’t have nice things with a minimalist lifestyle, we just want to avoid accumulating useless junk and wasting money and time chasing happiness with possessions.
In this post, we’ll cover some helpful minimalist lifestyle tips to ensure you understand the pitfalls of simple living.
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Minimalist Lifestyle Tips: What is The Hardest Part About Maintaining a Minimalist Lifestyle?
1. The Urge To Spend And Buy Things You Might Not Need
As we mentioned above, the urge to buy and spend will be your biggest temptation and greatest enemy!
Especially with Amazon! Admittedly I was one of the worst offenders haha. There was a time when I had packages arriving weekly and sometimes daily!
Just terrible for my finances! Now I’m still working to get rid of some of the junk that I simply don’t need or use.
Here are some ways you can limit your impulsive Amazon spending:
- Delete your Amazon app (trust me it helps)
- Save any Amazon purchases in your cart or save them for later
- Make lists for future purchases (this can help for the holiday season and organize what you need)
The main issue with shopping out of boredom and going to sites like Amazon to look at is the fact that we oftentimes end up spending way more than we should.
This also includes buying things we simply don’t need but really want.
If you’ve ever tracked your spending habits or just thought about some of your past purchases, you’d find that a lot of times we might use something for a week and never use it again!
Just terrible!
Not to mention the fact that when I started to save items for later instead of buying immediately, I realized that often times as time passed, I either changed the item or didn’t even buy it at all!!
Giant facepalm -___-
So just remember a few things to follow as a rule of thumb to combat impulse spending:
- Always save items for later when online shopping if you don’t absolutely need the item promptly
- Make sure to keep a mindset of simplicity and realize you don’t want to add more unnecessary things into your life
- Make sure that you buy things that will bring you value and that you need
- Invest in things that you will use daily if you decide to replace anything/upgrade
2. Adding More Clothes To Your Minimalist Wardrobe
Another one of the easiest ways to buy more than you need is universally for most people the item we need, but have too much of, CLOTHES
The temptation to buy more clothes is greater than ever with the rise of online shopping…
In addition here are some of the ways we can fall into the trap of buying more clothes:
- Clothes shopping on amazon when bored
- Shopping online to check “deals”
- Online clothes shopping to see what’s there or trending
Now don’t get me wrong, many needs arise in life, where we do have to go out and buy new clothes for a special occasion.
A few of these events include:
- Weddings
- Formal events
- Dances
- Vacation
- Special ceremony
- Graduation
- Job interview
You get the idea! There are many reasons we may spend money on new clothes.
However, if your spending is for clothes that aren’t for any of the reasons mentioned above, it may indicate you’re needlessly shopping and buying clothes for no reason.
If a minimalist lifestyle is one of your goals, buying extra clothes you don’t need will be one of your biggest obstacles.
For a minimalist wardrobe, buy clothes only when:
- Replacing old/unused/clothes that don’t fit
- Changing up your style and adding pieces that will match and you wear regularly
- You need clothes for special events
Maintaining a minimalist wardrobe may be one of the hardest tasks in your minimalist journey, but if you follow the rules above, you can succeed.
3. Maintaining Your Minimalist Mindset
Another one of the most challenging aspects of maintaining a minimalist lifestyle is maintaining your minimalist mindset.
Your minimalist mindset is what keeps your whole lifestyle together. When you don’t keep a firm conviction about why you love simple living, you can easily slip into a habit of accumulating.
You just need to remember, less is more!
Remember that simple living can help improve other aspects of your life:
- Helps you save money to save more and invest
- Helps you prioritize experiences over spending and material possessions
- Allows you to keep a cleaner living space
- Less cleaning and organizing
Just remember it’s easy to get carried away and buy things in waves and not realize that you might be spending too much and filling your space with junk all over again.
4. The Temptation To Upgrade Your Current Possessions
Finally, we may be often tempted to upgrade the current possessions that we already have. I’ve been guilty of this 100%.
But again the theme here is buying and investing in things that you don’t need. Some of the things that you might purchase or feel the need to upgrade include:
- A new car
- Decorations around the apartment or house
- Furniture
- Office/desk items
- New electronics
- New clothes (mentioned above)
Upgrading your possessions can seem enticing, but this will not only cost you more money but will potentially add more things than you need at a time by buying on impulse.
If you do decide to upgrade any items, make sure they will be something that you will use daily and make your life easier!
Final Thoughts On The Difficulties of Maintaining a Minimalist Lifestyle
Well, congrats if you’ve made it this far into the post, you rock!
I just wanted to say that simple living and minimalist living can be challenging to uphold, but you can do it if you know the challenges that stand in your way.
Let me know if there are any questions you might have had or anything I might have missed.
Comment below and let us know any questions or experiences you’ve had with simple living!