The Colors Of A Optimistic World

Sorting the objects ... Red, Yellow, Green

There are many different ways to declutter. A proven technique is the sorting of objects according to different categories. Colours can be used very well for this. Red stands for "can definitely go away", yellow means "can maybe go away" and everything that ends up in the green category "may stay". With this method you take one room after the other, empty it completely and then start sorting out or categorizing it. From the potted plant to the last sock, you pick up all the items in your hand and decide which categories they belong in. All items in the Green category can be returned after cleaning up the cleared room. You will notice that one or the other piece of furniture has also had its day - get rid of it! If possible, the items in the red category should be disposed of on the same day, so that they do not sneak back in and still find a dusty place. All properties in the yellow category are allowed to stay for 30 days in a place such as the cellar or attic. After this time you can consciously go through these items again and decide whether they belong to the green or red category. Most items will be in the red category after 30 days!

Emotional and rational decision-making

When clearing out, you should proceed intuitively and decide from your gut whether you want to keep an item or not. A rational decision aid is whether you have used the item in the last 30 days or whether it is used once or twice a year (camping, diving, etc.). An emotional decision-making aid is whether one associates this object with beautiful memories of situations or dear people and thus contributes this object to daily happiness. All items that can be found in these two categories may remain natural. With all other items you can draw a courageous line and give them away, sell them or throw them away, depending on their condition.

Clearing out helper

Depending on the size of the apartment/house and the accumulated possessions, it can make sense to bring one or more helpers into the boat to clear out the trash. With a little good music and a few tasty cuts, clearing out can also be a lot of fun! However, you should choose your clearing out helpers well, because if you have chosen people with a passion for collecting, your project will be much more difficult. Who in your circle of friends and family has the ability to support your decisions, who stands behind your project and can be a good support for your clearing out action? It's not always the best friend!

Plan Clearing out

Planning a decluttering operation is very helpful. Especially when it's the first decluttering. Then knowing exactly how to carry out such a clearing out action effectively saves a lot of time and nerves. If you have a whole day or a whole weekend, you may be able to clean out your entire apartment on those days. This is of course less suitable for families with young children, as the family rhythm must of course continue so that there is no medium-sized chaos. You can also take one room a day. This takes a little more time, but you can clear it out without any time pressure. Start with the least used room and work your way up to the most used room. Experience has shown that this makes it much easier to clean out, because the rhythm of everyday life is less disturbed. With growing experience in clearing out, the most elaborate room can also be successfully cleared out. So how about the following order: storeroom, attic, garage, cellar, hallway, bathroom, bedroom, dining room, kitchen and then living room? Make a plan, set time limits and go for it!

Buy something, get rid of two things

This is a sure long-term solution to master material chaos, even without strict clearing out. You will ask yourself with each purchase which two things you would exchange for this item. Shopping is no longer just about material value, but also about ideal value. This makes impulsive buying decisions more difficult, since you have to think carefully before you buy a T-shirt which two other possessions from your inventory you would like to give away. So the value of your different possessions is questioned again and again and at the same time more and more things disappear from your possessions. So that's how you kill two birds with one stone!

Does it have to be a TV?

Some people actually have a television in every room. All of us don't have a single TV. That doesn't mean that we don't watch television at all, but that we watch what I really want to see on the laptop. So we are not dependent on following the apparently randomly arranged television program of the different stations, but can research quite purposefully to different topics and look at exactly what I need or really want to see. How about you? How often do you turn on the TV because you are really interested in the program and how much do you really need your TV? Try to get by without a TV for 30 days. You will soon see that you can think of many other beautiful activities with which you can definitely fill your time more sensibly.

Cosmetics and body care

Most of us strive for some ideal of beauty, but in the fewest cases we have created this ideal of beauty ourselves, but simply adopted it from the media. Of course, this is not bad as long as we do not harm ourselves psychologically or physically. One of these beauty ideals in our society is to use a fragrant body lotion, to buy a whitening toothpaste or to colour your hair regularly. It also works without these artificial cosmetics. Body lotion, toothpaste, shampoo, deodorant and the like can be conjured up in just a few minutes using natural ingredients found in every kitchen. Instead of the chemically contaminated lotion there is then a high-quality olive oil on the skin. Body care can also be minimalist - and much healthier than the artificial alternatives! Rethinking one's own beauty standards can at best have a positive effect on one's own body image, mood and the stock of cosmetics in the bathroom.

The wardrobe

Many people are sensitive when it comes to wardrobes because there are unbelievably beautiful items of clothing hidden in them that one day could be put on again. The reality, however, is usually different: We hoard what the stuff (or the wardrobe) holds and usually only put on our favorite clothes. What does it sound like to you when we tell you that we only own clothes for a week? First of all, frighteningly little! However, we don't have to worry about what to wear on a single morning, because in the wardrobe there are only the favourite clothes in which we feel comfortable, look good and which can all be combined with each other. Enjoy the lightness of a wonderfully structured wardrobe! Anything that no longer fits, never will fit again and never has fitted, must be removed.

Investing the right way

It is worth investing in high quality things. Just for the simple reason that these items (mostly) break less quickly and you produce less garbage. In the long run you will save money - tip: buying high quality used things saves money! Minimalism also includes consciously deciding for or against the purchase of a product. To be careful, to choose carefully and not to buy the first product, gives the whole thing a whole new touch. Minimalism as it is lived is often about mindfulness. This should of course also be reflected in purchasing behaviour. So careful investing is a good way to live out minimalism to the full! This tip should be particularly heeded, because most people fail exactly here with the conversion!

Plastic minimalism

The awareness for an environmentally friendly lifestyle is getting bigger and bigger and therefore this is of course also a topic of minimalism. Environmental protection has many facets, one of which is the conscious use of plastics. You know that discarded plastic bags and plastic products are rarely recycled and most of them end up in our oceans. As a result, animals suffocate and the microplastic particles continue to spread. It is not easy to lead a plastic-free life, but a plastic-free life is definitely a worthwhile adventure. First ask yourself: Where do you use plastic in your everyday life and what environmentally friendly alternatives are there? The plastic bag when shopping can be replaced by a fabric bag, the plastic water bottle by a reusable bottle made of stainless steel and the tomatoes packed in plastic are certainly also available without plastic packaging! The possibilities here are manifold, so stay open for new ideas and enjoy every progress or improvement.

Food shopping - is it minimalistic?

Of course, minimalism also works wonderfully with food purchases. But that doesn't mean that you will have to eat only rice and dry bread for the next few years. Rather, it means that you consciously and carefully choose what ends up in your shopping cart. Shopping lists are very helpful here. You should think in advance about what you should eat during the week and what foods should be on the shopping list accordingly. This will save you time, money and reduce your waste production. Maybe Foodsharing and Meal Prep are not yet familiar terms for you - then it's time for a little research! With minimalist food handling, the aim is to throw away as little food as possible and at the same time leave as little plastic waste as possible behind. Many minimalists also focus on the environmentally friendly production of food. My tip: Plan your meals and stick to your shopping list!

Social Minimalism

Social minimalism is related to material socialism. After all, our consumer behaviour does not come about by chance, but is shaped above all by our social environment. Do you have friends and acquaintances for whom friendly words are less important than expensive gifts? Even blasphemies, constant problem-shooting and bad communication can rob you of your energy. Instead you should spend your time with people who give you energy, because these people take you further in your development (and hopefully you take them further in their development). They give you unconditional love, inspire you and the time you spend with these people is just beautiful. You don't have to end friendships (if they are friendships), but simply focus more on the people who enrich your life and contribute to your happiness - that's social minimalism.

What is your optimal order?

Chaos does not only arise because too many things accumulate in one place, but also when many things are not stored sensibly. For example, if half of your bank statements are on your desk and the other half is somewhere on the bookshelf, chaos is inevitable. A simple rule for more order is to keep the same things in the same place. So you will quickly notice when you store things double and triple. Another trick is to store things that you often use in such a way that they are ready to hand. Placing a waffle iron in front of your favourite pan is only clever to a limited extent. Only very few people think about what their optimal order might look like. Do you already have a system or do you urgently need one? There are no limits to your creativity.

Digital Clearing Out

Even on a laptop, smartphone and similar electronic devices, a lot of bits and pieces can accumulate. Cleaning up and sweeping out the corners is just as liberating as clearing out the wardrobe. Which apps and programs have you not used for ages? Get rid of it! Which photos and videos are older than one month? To the cloud or to an external hard drive with it! Which documents and notes are no longer needed? Get rid of it! We use our laptops and smartphones every day and yet we fail to keep them tidy, although this makes them much easier to use. How many email addresses do you have and how many unused accounts on different websites? Here, too, a lot will have accumulated, free yourself from it!

A little library?

Probably over the years you've accumulated a small pile of books. That's wonderful, because books are great! But have you ever thought about selling the books, which only serve as dust catchers, on the Internet? On corresponding portals for the sale of books a considerable sum can be collected. The books can also be given to the local library. There are many nice ways to better house the dusty treasures. In times of urban libraries and digital libraries, reading should not be too difficult either. You can invest the profit from the sale of the books in new literature! Maybe you have also subscribed to one or the other magazine - is this subscription still worthwhile or can you also read the newspaper comfortably in your local library? Do you know someone with whom you could share your subscription or is your subscription perhaps not so important to you? Here, too, the motto is: Be creative!

No more presents for you?

Can you imagine a birthday where your guests don't bring presents for you? For example, how about asking your guests not to bring gifts, but to raise money for a charity instead? Wouldn't that be a wonderful enrichment for your anniversary? Otherwise the money can also be used to organize an unforgettable party! Hopefully, you will spend your birthday with many loved ones, so that you will have a wonderful time even without gifts, of which you will have many great memories. Remember what is really important and put it into practice on your own birthday: Collect memories, not objects!

Insurances, contributions and Co

We Germans are careful and that's great! But maybe you have one or the other insurance that you really don't need anymore. What about contributions for associations and the like? Take a look at your regular financial commitments and sort them out vigorously. We are sure that half of these financial obligations do not enrich your life, but rather burden it. This is not "just" about the financial aspect, but also about making your finances more minimalist and above all more mindful.

Newsletter and Advertising

Advertising and newsletters are now available in two forms: Printed and digital. Of course, it is not a big act to put a newsletter into the waste paper or to move the advertising mail into the digital wastepaper basket. But look at the big picture: How much time do you spend each day sorting your physical and digital mail? Five minutes? That's not much, of course, but in a year that's around 1,825 minutes, more than 30 hours. That doesn't have to be, because in these 30 hours you can also sit in the sun with a cup of coffee or listen to an interesting podcast. What helps against the flood of advertising is a sign with "Please do not insert advertising" on the letterbox. With every advertising mail that lands in your digital mailbox, you click on "unsubscribe newsletter". Sure, it's interesting to know what's on offer. But this is only interesting until you start to define for yourself what is useful for you!

Chaos in your wallet?

Also in the purse accumulate well and gladly receipts, small cards, visiting cards, notes and the like. That doesn't have to be the case, because a well-assorted wallet makes life much easier. Do you really always have to have your credit card with you? Which loyalty cards do you actually use to collect points? If you're honest with yourself, it's amazingly little. Maybe you just go to the specific café to finally get the point card full or buy a specific fabric softener because you got a discount card through this consumer-driven reward system. Your wallet says a lot about you and your consumer behavior. Letting minimalism take over at this point can have a positive effect on the next purchase. A monthly check is also worthwhile here to sort out receipts and similar everyday collectibles.

Stay minimalist

For many people, it is much more difficult to remain minimalist than to carry out a major clearing out operation. But why is that? Because every day our habits urge us to buy, buy, buy. So to stay minimalist in the long run, you have to change your habits. This works best when you set yourself ten big goals - based on the inspiration in this chapter, for example - and then set one of those goals as your weekly task. So you are constantly busy with the topic of minimalism and its implementation and you will get many more ideas. So always make sure that you pursue new goals, challenge yourself and constantly develop yourself further! A weekly, monthly and annual check-up helps: What have I planned and what have I achieved? In order to clearly define your goals, you should write them down. This brings structure to your project and you always have your written thoughts at hand.

Maintaining minimalism

We are only too happy to slip back into our beloved habits. You have already learned how to prevent this. Changes in our habits are also accompanied by changes in our mindset. Accordingly, regular smaller clearing out actions can help you adjust your domestic status quo to your minimalist mental status quo. The more often you question yourself and your behaviour in this way, the more profound the changes will be. You will see that in one year you will think quite differently about the necessity of the second pair of sneakers. Stay open for these developments and regularly give yourself the chance to deal with your living environment. When cleaning up, sometimes not only material entanglements but also mental entanglements dissolve and you notice "Hey, I only go to Pilates because XY does that too. I'd like swimming much better!" - be curious!

Drink tap water

Water in plastic bottles is usually not only expensive, but also unhealthy. Finally, with every plastic bottle of water you drink, you also drink tiny plastic particles that come loose from the bottle and swim around in your delicious water. Sure, now you could reach for water in glass bottles, but carrying that isn't necessarily comfortable either. So why not choose the simplest solution: Drink tap water. If you live in an area with not quite as pure tap water, a water filter is of course a good idea. If you have been drinking cola and co. so far, you can do your health a big favour and switch to water. When it comes to drinking, make it as easy as possible!

Search for challenges and practice mindfulness

Letting mindfulness return to everyday life is part of the minimalist lifestyle. How will you feel lucky at breakfast when you're distracted by radio and smartphone? To eat breakfast consciously, to really enjoy a cup of coffee or tea and to participate in breakfast with all your senses - that's luck. In this way you can make your entire everyday life more conscious and mindful and consequently more minimalist! We all live in the belief that multitasking will get us ahead. We are strongly in favour of singletasking gaining the upper hand. Once we focus on just one thing, we can perceive ourselves much better in this situation. So the daily cooking, the daily walk, the daily washing up and the daily sunshine can become a reason for a good mood!

Effects of minimalism: More serenity, satisfaction, success and happiness

What happens to us when we implement minimalism in our lives? Less is more and this is exactly what minimalism is all about. We throw all the unnecessary stuff out of our lives to have more time and space for the really important things in life. The focus is on the things that offer us real added value - we become more productive, we intensify our relationships, we set ourselves goals and make our lives more inspiring. Our focus is moving away from the consumer society towards more joie de vivre. You decide for yourself what is useful and what is useless for you. So what do you want to fill your life with? It is important that you decide for yourself and not some advertising or social pressure. You pedal your way freely through the minimalist lifestyle, removing the outer shells to be close to you. You may not even know what you really want because of all your consumerism and you will find out on your minimalist journey. So the effect of minimalism is that you are closer to yourself, that you are more relaxed, that you are freer and that you are more self-determined. So you are going to deal with the question "What do I need for my happiness in life?" and you will learn a lot about yourself! By the way, you clear out your apartment or house, so you have much more space and by your changed attitude to consumption you also save a lot of money. After all, you were able to find out for yourself that it's usually not the objects that make you happy, but above all the moments with loved ones. By accumulating fewer possessions, it is easier for you to keep order, cleaning goes faster. This saves you a lot of time and stress. Also the thoughts around the new Smartphone and the alleged necessity to possess it are dropped, whereby it can be lived much more relaxed. Your neighbours always need the latest sports cars? Good for her, but you don't have to deal with these trivial decisions anymore. This gives you the opportunity to use your time and energy for really important decisions. For example, you can develop professionally, get more involved with the stock market, take care of your retirement plans, plan great parties and spend wonderful holidays with your loved ones. As you can see, this way of thinking allows you great flexibility in shaping your life and that is incredibly important. After all, only you yourself are responsible for your happiness in life and no one else. The creators of the new advertising for the new vacuum cleaner robot promise you heaven on earth, but as soon as the little electronic butler flits through your living room, you are no longer interesting for them. The attention to your true needs will increase steadily over time. So you will go through your life more attentively and consciously, perceive what really makes you happy and experience great gratitude for many incredibly small things in life. Finally you have your luck in your hand and are no longer dependent on external factors! That's an incredibly good feeling!

More serenity through minimalism

Through minimalism we experience more serenity in everyday life. How is that possible? For this we should first look at how serenity develops. Serenity arises when we feel safe and worry little. Our composure decreases, for example, when we accept the wishes and expectations of people other than ourselves. Just because Hinz and Kunz need the latest smartphone and sneakers from Nike doesn't mean that we also have these wishes or that we have to refer to these external wishes. Either we follow one trend after another because we accept other people's ideas or because we fear the rejection of those for whom this trend is really important. In both cases it is about the ideas and wishes of other people and not about our own. As soon as we try to "please others" or to bend ourselves for the recognition of others, we are no longer calm. Instead, we bow to social pressure. We cannot influence other people's opinions and so we are constantly on our guard, under constant pressure and under stress to meet external expectations. What happens as soon as we surrender to the minimalist lifestyle and find more of ourselves? We often realize that we are not following trends out of passion for the trend, but to impress other people and thus supposedly secure ourselves a place in an unstable social structure. As soon as it is more about how we imagine our four walls, how we would like to live and how we would like to use our lifetime, we move on a safe path: On our way. Here we are not exposed to the arbitrariness of other people, but work for the achievement of our own goals, wishes and ideas. At this moment, we no longer make our happiness in life dependent on the opinion of other people, but solely on our opinion. And exactly at this point serenity arises. The pressure to meet expectations as perfectly as possible disappears. We are moving more and more towards the state of our lives that we really want and this is a space where we set the standards for perfection. Suddenly it seems less important to find out when the new Smart TV will be launched and how to finance it. Rather, you're now asking yourself, "Hey, I'd like to spend another nice evening with all my friends, how do I do that?" At the moment when we no longer blame the material possessions for our happiness in life, but see them for what they are - material as a means to an end - we can focus on everything that does us good and lets us be. Minimalism suddenly gives us a lot more time to take care of it. After all, we don't have to spend ages in department stores to find the perfect leggings, we can choose more valuable activities!

More satisfaction through minimalism

Perhaps the chapter "More serenity through minimalism" has already shown you why minimalism makes us so much more satisfied. We are only satisfied when we satisfy our innermost needs. We like to satisfy these needs superficially with extensive shopping tours that give us short-term happiness or with material status symbols that represent our place in society. True satisfaction, however, looks quite different. When was the last time you spent an outdoor night under the stars? How satisfied are you when you can enjoy a richly laid breakfast table? How satisfied are you when you finally reach your personal goals and learn to play the piano again? This feeling of satisfaction is simply not comparable to the feeling of running the new Prada bag or copying the questionable style of "Instagram Models". Minimalism saves us time, saves us nerves, saves us a lot of unnecessary stress. Minimalism is about finding out what we really need in our lives and how we can make the most of our lifetime. So we must start to set our own standards and not apply the standards of other people to our lives. If we concentrate exclusively on the standards of other people, we rob ourselves of the opportunity to get to know ourselves and to develop further. Our personal development, however, is a great asset: satisfaction. In very few cases standstill brings true satisfaction. Development, however, is - because this is about the realization of our very individual goals! On the journey to a minimalist lifestyle we learn a lot about ourselves and also find out in which direction we want to develop. This step means that we are more mindful of ourselves. Mindfulness is an important means to feel satisfaction in life. Satisfaction is closely linked to gratitude. Gratitude and contentment always provide positive feelings in our lives. But it is not only by experiencing and achieving our individual goals that we become more satisfied, but also by lowering our expectations. For example, the expectations of our material possessions