Having actually picked up and moved across the world for a few years (to Singapore from 2008–2009), I’ve lived the “which of this stuff do we really need?” process.
We sold / gave away a lot, sold the house, put the rest in storage, and headed off with the first realization which is actually “we don’t need much.”
We’d sold a 3,500sf house and moved across the world to a 1,700sf condo and it felt huge.
The second realization was coming back a few years later and getting things out of storage. For most of the things, we realized that we felt no attachment. “Why did we bother to pay to store this?”
I don’t think it’s necessary to move across the world, or more severely, to practice poverty as a condition (as Seneca did) to stop and think about the absurdity of most stuff. Your article is a great reminder of that. Thanks!
