The Minimalist Way Read online

  I felt grateful that during my kids’ childhoods, we’d prioritized low-key neighborhood play over tightly-run, competitive activities; we’d chosen relaxed family outings in nature over weekends stacked with birthday parties, recitals, and commitments. I knew that our pace wasn’t for everyone, but I also knew that it was right for us, and that was all that mattered.

  If I could grab you by the shoulders right now and tell you one thing about modern family life, I’d tell you that your family’s life doesn’t have to look like anyone else’s. You don’t have to hustle; you don’t have to keep up. Every birthday party you throw doesn’t need to be a Pinterest-worthy event. Every afternoon doesn’t need to be booked with practices and productivity.

  You don’t have to compete against yourself or anyone else. You can do family life your way—and find immeasurable comfort and relief in knowing that your way is right for you.

  Reflection

  Look back at the value tree you made in chapter 2, focusing on your top three values for your “family” life domain. Write them here, and use them as a guide as you implement the strategies in this chapter.

  1. –––––––––––—

  2. –––––––––––—

  3. –––––––––––—

  Write or reflect on the following questions before moving on: How do you want to feel as a member of your family? How do you want your family to feel? What’s your vision for your family? What’s holding you back from feeling the way you want to and achieving your vision?

  Strategies for a Minimalist Family Life

  By now you understand that a minimalist life—a minimalist family life, in this case—doesn’t necessarily mean stripped to the bones; it simply means a life built on what matters most to you. Once you know your values for your family life, you can use the following strategies to start living out your vision.

  While some of the strategies in this chapter apply specifically to those who are raising children, many of them apply beautifully to any form of family life.

  Your Family’s Schedule

  “Hey! It’s been a while!” I said to a friend recently. “How are you guys doing?”

  “Oh, you know,” she answered. “We’re hanging on! Work has been crazy lately, and my mom sprained her wrist a couple weeks ago, so I’ve been trying to get over to see her more. The kids have three sports games this weekend at three different places. Plus, a birthday party for one of the kids’ classmates, and my husband and I have to go to a fundraiser Saturday night … But you know how it is!”

  The thing is … I didn’t really know how it was, at least not completely. Like any family, our family has seasons that are busier than others. We have times when soccer takes the better part our weekends or when my husband’s travel schedule leaves me juggling more than usual at home. But for the most part, we see those seasons through, and then we flow back to our family’s baseline: a pace that feels comfortable and balanced.

  We live in a culture where our worth seems to be measured by our busyness. And as parents, the message is that if you’re not offering your kids everything, you’re keeping them from future success. How will they become college athletes if they don’t start team play as preschoolers? How will they ever find what they’re passionate about if they don’t first try every club, sport, and opportunity out there?

  I think the problem here is our assumption that busy equals better. Deep down, what do you really want for your family? A jam-packed schedule, or time to make real memories together? And how about for your children? A prestigious scholarship or a life of meaningful work? An excellent three-point shot or the life lessons you can gain from practicing a skill? Straight A’s or the knowledge that their parents love them no matter what?

  Take a look at your calendar. In your journal, write down everything in your family’s schedule for the next two weeks. Then write down your top three values for your family life. Next, cross off every activity on the schedule that doesn’t directly align with one of these values. What does this tell you about how you’re spending your time as family? How are your activities and commitments contributing to your values? What do you need to let go of? Resolve to make some changes today.

  Meal Planning

  For some, slowly preparing a delicious meal is a form of mindfulness, a time when the world stills and all you can hear is the sizzling of minced garlic hitting hot oil. For others, cooking is a time to laugh and catch up with family members who tend to congregate in the kitchen. And for others still, food is simply something that needs to get on the table.

  Wherever you fall on this spectrum, all that matters is that you accept it and embrace it. Know your values, and do what fits. For example, if connection is one of your top three family values, maybe your mealtimes are a beautiful vehicle for that. But if feeding your family feels like a chore more than a gift, you can find a hundred other ways to work connection into your family’s routines.

  Because this is a book about simplifying, I’m going to assume that you could use some help getting food on the table in a way that doesn’t add unnecessary stress to your life. These three simple meal-planning strategies will help ensure that mealtimes support your values, whether by fostering connection or simply not adding to your stress. Try experimenting with any of these separate approaches.

  SIMPLE STRATEGY 1: THE MONTHLY PLAN

  At the end of each month, plan a meal for each of the upcoming thirty days. I find it helps to write the meals down on a calendar so you can easily stick to the plan. Evaluate which days of the week you’ll have more time than others, and schedule more elaborate cooking for those days—planning to serve the leftovers on a day when your family tends to be busy. For example, cook a big meal every Sunday, and then plan to use those leftovers every Tuesday, your busiest night of the week. At the beginning of each week, look at the next seven meals you have scheduled, and make a grocery list. Try to shop only once a week to save time and money.

  A monthly plan takes about one hour at the beginning of the month to create, followed by about 15 minutes each week to write out a grocery list for the upcoming seven days. But this strategy saves considerable time and angst later in the month. And if you save your meal calendars for a time, you’ll have dozens of meal ideas to pull from going forward.

  SIMPLE STRATEGY 2: THE WEEKLY REPEATER

  Using four note cards (one for each week of the month), write down seven different meals on each card—your menu for one week. On the reverse side of each note card, write the grocery list for that week’s meals. At the beginning of each week, grab a card on your way to the grocery store, and both your meals and your shopping list are ready to go. This strategy means you’ll repeat meals every 28 days—or until you create a new notecard to add into the mix. (I’ve gone as far as laminating my notecards and keeping them in my purse!)

  SIMPLE STRATEGY 3: THEMED DAYS OF THE WEEK

  This strategy is a win for parents and kids alike, because everyone knows what to expect each day (and because alliteration is fun!). You can choose any theme and any structure that work for you, but here’s the general idea:

  Meatless Monday

  Taco Tuesday

  Wild-Card Wednesday

  Crock Pot Thursday

  Pizza Friday

  Breakfast-for-Dinner Saturday

  Soup & Sandwiches Sunday

  Now that you’ve taken a few minutes to think about how you want to feed your family, take a moment to think about what you want to feed your family. Flip back to your top three values for your “health & spirituality” life domain and consider where your eating habits are supporting your values and vision for the health of yourself and your family—and where you could make small changes to better support your vision.

  Getting Support as a Parent: Don’t Do This Alone

  For those of you currently raising families, I don’t believe you’re meant to do parenting alone. That said, it can also be difficult to build a supportive network duri
ng a stage of life when we’re most strapped for time and energy.

  But think about it this way: How would it feel to trust that your children could play in your neighborhood with other watchful, protective eyes on them? How would it feel to know that help—from a ride for your child when you’re in a bind to a gallon of milk dropped off at your home when you can’t wrap your mind around taking the new baby to the grocery store—was only a text or a phone call away? More important still, what would it feel like to know that in your lowest moments as a parent, you could show up on a friend’s doorstep, no questions asked?

  If you want to cultivate a family life based on your values and live at a pace that doesn’t feel frenzied, you have to be willing to invest in your village and to allow them to invest in you. Ask a friend or a family member to alter your daughter’s dance uniform or bring your son home from band camp. Ask for help, and offer it in return, because a network you can rely on will make such a difference in the kind of family life you can build.

  Household Chores

  No one wants to spend hours upon hours every week just trying to stay on top of the house. And I’d argue that most minimalists are unwilling to, because they know what matters most to them and want to use their gifts for a purpose much larger than laundry and yard work. Luckily, any of us can take on a minimalist approach to our responsibilities at home, starting with these three strategies.

  1. OWN LESS—AND SEE HOW YOUR SYSTEMS CHANGE

  A father of two recently told me that he and his wife had done a significant edit of their belongings half a year before.

  “I expected to feel lighter,” he said. “Less weighed down by our stuff. What I didn’t see coming was how much time it would free up—and not just time shuffling our things around and taking care of them, but also time doing laundry, meal cleanup, yard maintenance, and more. Chores that I hadn’t previously associated with our stuff.”

  Living with less means you have less to sort through; your systems become more efficient. Instead of digging through your utensil drawer looking for a certain spatula, you pull it right out, because you only own one. Instead of spending 10 minutes clearing the living room floor before you vacuum, you pick up a couple of things and plug in the vacuum. Instead of re-washing loads of laundry because you went so long without folding it that you can no longer tell what’s clean and what’s dirty, you have to fold your laundry promptly or you won’t have anything to wear. Multiply those small actions by the dozens of times you do them in a week, and your time savings become significant.

  2. DETERMINE WHAT LEVEL OF “CLEAN” FITS WITH YOUR FAMILY VALUES

  It may sound counterintuitive, especially in a book about minimalism, but I think one of the best things any of us can do to increase our contentment at home is to simply decide what level of mess we can tolerate.

  Re-read your top three values for your family life and think about how the cleanliness of your home impacts your ability to live those values. For example, if your values are presence, love, and humor, you could ask yourself questions like these: How does the state of my house impact my ability to be present and give love to my family? What expectations could I release in order to better live my values at home? For example, could I accept a certain level of messiness if it means nagging my family less? Could I approach the cleanliness of our home (or lack thereof!) with more humor?

  I firmly believe—and any minimalist I’ve ever met will attest—that cleaning is astoundingly easier when you’re living with less. But even within those parameters, it helps to get realistic about how the state of your house affects your ability to practice your values and live your vision. You may find that some chores are simply better left for another day.

  3. SPREAD THE RESPONSIBILITY OUT

  I sometimes think of myself as the center pole of a tent. I can work hard to hold the tent up and spread the fabric outward, but there’s no way around it: I can’t do it alone. When other poles join in, meeting me in the center and spreading out from there, we can cover much more ground. My influence on my family—and my impact on the world—is infinitely stronger when I welcome help from others.

  The other poles holding up your tent may be your parents, your partner, your children, your housecleaner, your neighbor, your babysitter, your friend—or any combination of the above. See them for what they’re doing, and invite them further into your circle by asking for help when you need it.

  If you’re a parent, here are a few ideas, as well as my family’s simple system, for getting kids more involved in running the household.

  •I once heard someone say that if your kid is old enough to operate a handheld device, he’s old enough to help with chores. It’s amazing what even young kids can do, from sorting laundry to cleaning windows to putting away the silverware after you run the dishwasher.

  •In our family, starting around age 3 or 4, we give our kids what we call “daily jobs,” which include making their beds, putting away their shoes, and clearing their plates from the table, among a few other small responsibilities. Additionally, we assign each kid at least one bigger job (more as they get older) for the year, such as helping with laundry, taking out the trash, wiping down the table after meals, or unloading the dishwasher. Assigning a job for an entire year takes the guesswork out of chores and prevents any arguing over who’s doing what. (A big sanity saver in my book!)

  •As long as the kids have been consistently doing their “daily jobs,” we also offer about a dozen “money chores,” which they can choose to do anytime throughout the week to earn a bit of money.

  In my experience, the trickiest part of sharing household responsibility with our kids—or really, with anyone—is deciding what to accept. An 8-year-old is not going to clean the counter exactly the way you would. (Your spouse, for that matter, isn’t going to either!) But more often than not, done is better than perfect, especially when it means you can devote more of your time and energy to the things that really matter.

  Your Family’s Toy Collection

  If you’ve raised young children, you know what a stumbling block toys can be. No one has the physical and emotional bandwidth to create a meaningful life when they’re spending most of their time cleaning up toys.

  During my early years as a mom, day after day ended the exact same way: me, exhausted and longing to climb into bed … but instead walking around our apartment, gathering the random toys our kids had pulled out, played with for two seconds, and left in the middle of the floor. For way too long I accepted this as part of my life, one of the responsibilities that came with raising small children. But eventually, it dawned on me that if I didn’t want to finish all of my days collecting Tonka trucks and toy telephones, maybe I didn’t have to. This is the approach that worked for me.

  1. WATCH WHAT YOUR CHILDREN ACTUALLY PLAY WITH

  I started watching our toddler-aged boys more carefully, paying close attention to the toys that captured their interest for more than a few minutes. I also took note of the toys that they dragged around the house and almost immediately discarded.

  Then one night while they slept, I snuck into their room and boxed up any toys that didn’t meet my new criteria. (You know you’re a parent when you’re decluttering with a flashlight in hand!) Our boys woke up to an apartment containing a third of their toys and a mom wondering how soon they’d notice what was missing.

  The truth? They barely noticed. If anything, they acted like the few toys I’d left out were new. I compare this to the decision fatigue I experience when standing in front of an overstuffed closet. When you have too many options, it somehow feels like you have none. After our toy cleanse, our kids no longer needed to sift through the toy clutter that had previously been crowding their minds.

  For your first toy cleanse, I suggest temporarily holding onto any toys you wonder if your child will miss. That way you have the option to bring a beloved toy back out if your kid keeps asking about it. But after a predetermined amount of time (about two to four weeks), pass the
unneeded toys on so they don’t become a permanent fixture in your basement or storage room.

  After our family’s first toy cleanse, I realized that the only toys I’d left out were our building and imaginative sets—the ones our kids could come back to over and over again and engage differently with every time. Wooden blocks, a marble run, LEGO bricks … These are the kinds of toys that have provided hours and hours of value to our family.

  2. ROTATE THE TOY SETS YOU KEEP

  I started keeping our toy sets in the top of our boys’ closet, leaving one set at a time on the floor of their bedroom. Whenever they were ready for a new set, I’d tell them we could switch it out as soon as they picked up their current set. In a matter of days, I went from cleaning up armfuls of toys every night to cleaning up barely any toys—ever. I found that owning a handful of toy sets was really all we needed, and rotating them regularly made them feel almost new each time we pulled them out.

  3. SWAP TOYS OUT AS THEY GROW (BUT BE SURE NOT TO KEEP THE OLD ONES!)

  We’ve since added a daughter to our family and watched our three children grow and change in so many ways. We may have swapped out our classic alphabet blocks for a well-loved LEGO collection, and our family of toy ponies for a set of Shopkins, but it’s still the same kind of toys that really capture their attention, spark their creativity, and keep their parents feeling sane, all at the same time.

  Parent after parent has shared with me how much better their family functions with fewer toys. Their kids fight with each other less, they get more creative with the toys they do have, and perhaps best of all, they know where everything goes and can clean up after themselves without getting lost and overwhelmed. If toy freedom appeals to you, try experimenting with a less-is-more approach.