In a span of just a month, minimalism has tremendously improved the quality of my life. Allan is the primary witness of these changes that he even pointed out in one of our conversations that I’m starting to live like Tim Ferris (huge compliment, if you ask me). I became aware of Tim Ferris through Allan because he kept raving about how Ferris has learned so many new skills by reverse engineering and automating processes of these regular tasks to become productive in more value-adding aspects of his life. Minimalism, in a way, is one of the hacks that I feel can help a person become more productive. By removing all the distractions and clutter in your life, you are able to allocate most of your bandwidth on more important things.
For those of you who don’t know Allan, he’s ultra passionate about business growth and goal setting, and achieving these through transparency, accountability, effectiveness, and efficiency. Since he himself is an advocate of productivity and has seen how minimalism has positively changed my everyday life, he warmed up to the idea of decluttering his own stuff. The lowest-hanging fruit, according to him, would be his closet as it is the least organized aspect of his room.
And so yesterday, we started his journey to minimalism, starting off with his clothes. Days before our decluttering weekend, I asked him to start pondering on these things:
- his wardrobe’s theme/color scheme
- what events/occasions he sees himself attending within the year
Answering these were no-brainers. We have very similar tastes in clothing, so the answer to the first item will be white, gray, and black. As for the second point, we’ll pretty much be going to the same occasions as we’re each other’s +1s.
With these in mind, shortlisting his stuff was manageable. Here’s a pre- and post declutter photo of his closet:
Before decluttering, he had shirts and pants hung outside his closet, and the doors are so hard to close as it was literally overflowing with clothes that haven’t been used over the years. It may look like we just neatly folded his shirts, but for your perspective, we actually got rid of a bed-full of old clothes. Here’s a photo of the minimized pile, placed right beside his bed for size impression:
He’s super happy with the turnout of this decluttering process that he’s even considering shooting his video courses here instead of renting a studio which would cost him a few thousand bucks. Today, he said it was so easy to dress up and decide what clothes to wear as his closet is now easier to navigate; he doesn’t need to dig through the pile of clothes he hasn’t used for many years now. What was left are the pieces he sees himself wearing everyday and in the next 90 days.
This exercise, he said, has made his room more liveable that he wants to declutter the rest of his items. I’m actually excited to help him out again as I’ve started to find decluttering a very therapeutic exercise. We’ll both work on the next phases, and I’ll update my blog once we find the time again. 😎
🔥🔥🔥
FATIMA ESPINEDA 