Member-only story
The Origins Of Our Minimalist Christmas
It really hit me the Christmas my six-year-old child spent time ripping off wrapping paper mindlessly, lobbing the present down and moving on to the next one. He hardly looked at what had revealed itself from beneath the paper, before moving on, automaton-like, to the next gift.
Literally two weeks later, I decided that was it. I was becoming a minimalist, getting my sh** together and taking my kid for the ride.
Christmas had become a mess. I was allowing the notion that more presents equaled more love to meddle with my mind. It wasn’t happening again.
Sometime in early January, I started getting rid of my possessions. I wasn’t a hoarder, and I am a very tidy person- but I seemed to have so much, mostly pointless stuff, lurking within my house.
I worked my butt off and it took all year to get to a place where I finally felt ‘minimalist enough’.
Christmas Again
By which time it was Christmas again.
But a wonderful thing had happened by the time Christmas came round the following year. Throughout the months I spent clearing my house, and my life from extraneous crap, my (now seven-year-old) child had jumped on-board. In fact, not only jumped on board, but had overtaken me.