mindset – Minimalist Moments

21st Feb 2021

Why I Consider Myself An Extreme Minimalist

It’s the second year of writing on this blog, and over that time, I’ve grown while my pile of belongings have shrunk.

I’ve written a lot about minimalism and the process of decluttering, but since then, my mindset has changed, what I want has changed, and what I thought I needed to be happy has been challenged time and again.

I am now what I consider to be an extreme minimalist.

Minimalism is all about only keeping the things that you love, that you find useful and that bring value into your life. Once the physical aspect has reached a certain point, it extends into other areas of your life such as relationships, career, and personal values.

Extreme minimalism is minimalism taken even further and isn’t something there is such a lot of out there on the internet. Many extreme minimalists have gone furniture-free to encourage more movement in their daily lives as well as introduce even more space to move around freely. They keep only what is essential for them and live as free as possible.

What is essential will differ depending on the individual, and that will always be the case no matter what kind of minimalist you are.

Some extreme minimalists I follow are Youheum on Heal Your Living, and Anja’s Artworld. While my lifestyle is different because I have a family and different hobbies, the extreme minimalist lifestyle very much appeals to me.

As I decluttered more and started asking myself big questions, I realised that I too, wanted more, by having even less.

Of course, because I have a family, there’s only so far I can go. I can’t go furniture free, for example, as I would have done, because my family loves having a sofa, table and chairs. And that’s fine by me. Extreme minimalism isn’t for everyone, and I’m focusing on what I can do personally to minimise my own stuff so I can maximise my life.

So far, I’ve got rid of about 80% of my stuff.

It’s strange to think I used to be an organised hoarder. The stuff I held onto caused drawers to break and arguments between me and fiance (now my husband). I didn’t know what I wanted out of life other than to collect and play as many videogames as possible and write fanfiction which I never published.

I was simply surviving day to day, and was struggling with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and Fibromyalgia.

Growing up, I had been taught that life is a constant struggle, that money is only for rich and/or crooked people, and that my dreams were unrealistic. For the longest time, I viewed successful people with suspicion and saw almost every opportunity as a con.

It has taken many years of working on my past, working on my mindset, changing the stories I told myself on a regular basis and becoming minimalist, to unlearn all of that.

My minimalist journey started a couple of years ago sometime after being confronted with my huge attic hoard by my mum.

Later, we moved into a house we would be sharing with my parents and for a time we had to live in the bedroom while a side extension was built onto the house so we would have our own living room and enough bedrooms for all of us.

Once complete, the living room was going to be very narrow and long, so I knew I had to be selective about my stuff. I wanted a fresh start, anyway. New furniture, new ornaments, new everything.

Over time, I got rid of bags upon bags of clutter. I must have been walking to the charity shops every other other day because everyone in my family started commenting on it and making jokes out of it. “You’ll have nothing left”, “Their shop will be just full of your stuff”.

Ironically, I did feel as if I had a shop full of stuff, yet none of it had brought me lasting joy.

The more I got rid of the more free I felt, and the more my decluttering muscles built. But I also started to feel guilt for the amount of stuff I had mindlessly accumulated. Some of the stuff wasn’t even all that old and was something I had convinced myself I needed but then realised I didn’t or got bored of quickly.

Some of it was gifts I had kept out of guilt and obligation.

More recently, we’ve had our second child who is now almost 5 months old, and the gaming room we’ve had will soon need to become her bedroom. As a result, we’ve been slowly getting rid of our large collection of games and merchandise (definitely some of the hardest stuff for me to part with).

Most of it, I realised, was just to show my identity as a gamer and as an interesting person. I used to want to be like my favourite Youtube game collectors and imagined one day showing it all off on camera.

I wanted my friends to come over and be wowed as they looked over my awe-inspiring collection.

Now I don’t want any of that.

Not only have I parted with a lot of my stuff, I’ve shed a lot of my ego and realised the things which are really important to me; writing, taking photos in nature, going on long walks.

I’m not saying I no longer enjoy playing videogames; that’s something I’ve enjoyed since I was 4, and can’t imagine a life without. What I’m saying is, I want more out of life, and extreme minimalism seems to be the way for me to make room for that.

I was tired of a layer of dust accumulating over everything. Fed up of dusting huge units of furniture. Exhausted with the decision fatigue when I didn’t know what game to pick. Bored of worrying about what might happen to my collection in any number of situations.

I consider myself an extreme minimalist because I am almost entirely free of decor and things that might otherwise overload my senses visually, and I’m considering sitting on the floor more and on fold-away furniture to encourage a more active lifestyle. So far, my long walks have been doing wonders for my stamina.

I’m already experiencing many of the benefits of extreme minimalism:

Less things to clean and maintain, more time to relax, be with my family, or learn something new.

Less visual clutter overloading my senses.

The more money saved by not buying random tchotkes, the more I have to support me in what matters.

Celebrations being focused on family and fun instead of stuff and storage (this is a work in progress as it involves others being on board).

More space to think and for my kids to play freely.
Space for my husband to set up his PC station for gaming and work, and still have plenty of entertainment area left.

Less worry about safety and getting angry at superfluous things getting broken by my kids.

Room for growth and potential.

Space for the big questions in life and for self discovery.

Space for silence and a cup of tea just thinking about…nothing.

I’m quite excited to continue my journey and wonder where I’ll be six months and even a year from now. Likely, I will be returning to posts like these as a fun way to check how far I’ve come.

Photo by Christopher Sardegna on Unsplash

16th Feb 2021

When Others Don’t Get It – How to Live The Life You Were Meant to Live

When you live a counter cultural lifestyle people will have something to say, usually by those closest to you.

As I’ve become more and more minimalist, one of the silliest comments said to me is ‘’you won’t be happy until you’re living in a cave and shitting in a hole in the ground’.

Pretty extreme, right?

But, so what if that WAS the way I’d be happy? (I wouldn’t be, but still…what if?)

I also recently left Whatsapp and Facebook and some of the comments were ones of downright panic and exasperation.

“But how will you keep in contact with people? It’s kind of stupid in this climate!”

But I knew that the damage it was doing to my long-term mental health and the time it was sapping were far worse a cost, so I have stuck to my decision with no feelings of guilt.

As a result, I’ve felt 80% more present and see that I have more time than I ever realised, even if most of it is taken up by a screaming, teething 4-month-old at present.

The people who I’m close to can still message or call me or vice versa so it isn’t a problem.

You have to ignore the comments (which usually come from others’ own fears) and as my favourite writer , Anthony Moore, has quoted ‘Stay in your own lane’, for if you’re busy looking at others, you will crash.

On a similar note, Cait Flanders, author of Adventures in Opting Out’, quotes ‘Hike your own hike’. You don’t have to do what your friends are doing, or even what your family expects of you if where you’re going feels wrong to you.

In her latest book Cait also says ‘ People can only see as far for you as they can see for themselves’, which, in my own experiences, I’ve found to be true.

It’s like having a pair of glasses and then giving those glasses to a friend. Their vision is likely to be extremely blurry or the glasses won’t suit them at all.

I was told I was crazy for making a sudden decision to take a counselling course out of nowhere (I had a dream about it)- which turned out to be one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.

I was told I’d never make it out there in the world by one of the closest people to me – yet here I am.

I was told that many things in my life were ‘just a phase’ but because I simply stayed true to myself and my beliefs, I am much happier for it and those ‘phases’ were actually important life changes that are improving my life to this day.

You have to do what feels right for YOU. I understand if, like me, you have a family, there may be compromises you have to make along the way, but, ultimately, your life is yours to live, the decisions yours to make.

If you don’t live how you like now, the regrets later on will also be yours, and yours alone.

29th Dec 2020

Don’t Make New Years Resolutions…

It’s that time of year again. The time of year when we all post our goals and state that this year will be a ‘New Year New Me’.

I used to make lists of things I wanted to achieve in the new year, then I’d wait for my life to reset as if by magic on the final chime of Big Ben. But now I don’t make New Year’s Resolutions. It’s not that I don’t want to change anything in my life. It’s that whenever I want to change anything, I start right here, right now.

When you’re serious about your goals nothing kills them faster than waiting for that perfect time to make a start, especially on New Years. Once the celebrations fizzle out, often so do most people’s resolutions. And when you see others around you giving up, it’s even more of a perfect excuse to quit when things get challenging.

If there’s something you’ve been meaning to change in your life, remember this: There’s no need to wait for the New Year to ring in when every day is a new tomorrow.

So, don’t wait for the fireworks, start now. Your future self will thank you.

22nd Dec 2020

My Shopping Ban Plan 2021

2021 is almost upon us, and one of my goals (which I’m actually starting from now) is to get a real handle on my finances and let minimalism work its magic on my bank account.

I’m not going to lie; I have a real weakness for books, video games, cafe trips, alcohol, takeaways, and replacing my backpacks for newer ones that catch my eye. My worst financial sins by far are falling back on Paypal Credit or my Argos store card.

The allure of these credit services has allowed me, throughout 2020, to make some really silly financial decisions and questionable purchases that were far from mindful.

Admittedly, finances are something I’ve always struggled with despite becoming minimalist. It’s not that I’m incapable of making sound decisions with my money, but that I’ve been living reactively rather than intentionally.

I have no problem getting rid of my old stuff once I buy something new. The problem is that I buy new when I don’t need to.

A couple of months ago I went back to decluttering the attic. Only this time I tackled some of the stuff that was harder for me to let go of: my old game consoles.

I will talk about that process in another article, but what’s important to mention now is that I sold them and made quite a substantial amount of cash. It’s been my second time doing so. The first time I blew the money I made, but this time something was different.

The SNES and a bunch of other things I sold meant a lot to me. They were a huge part of my childhood and my identity as a gamer. This time, I wanted the money I made from them to mean something. After all, I’ve minimised so much that there’s not much left to sell so I saw it as my last chance to use it for good.

For the first time in my life I used that money with real intention and didn’t buy anything frivolous. In fact, I was loath to spend it at all. That’s when I decided I wanted a big change and have made quite an extreme plan in the form of a 365 day shopping ban.

Cait Flanders did it in ‘A Year of Less’ and the methods she took to turn her life around have always stuck in the back of mind, especially after reading her second book ‘Adventures in Opting Out’. Cait couldn’t be living the lifestyle she is living now, travelling the world and growing as a person if she hadn’t first taken serious stock of her negative habits, negative self beliefs, and chaotic spending.

I hit 34 at the start of this month and it’s terrifying to realise I’m middle-aged (or almost middle-aged depending on how you look at it) and am only just waking up to the fact that I need to be in control of my finances if I ever want the future I’m working towards to materialise.

So, I’ve sat down and drafted my shopping ban. It’s not as extreme as Cait’s was because we have different interests, but it’s a start. I also found myself including a ban on ways to spend my time. Here’s my draft with a few notes:

SHOPPING BAN 2021

Allowed (essentials)

Gluten-free food (I’m gluten intolerant)

Fruit

Herbal and decaf tea

Alcohol (from budget) would ideally like to quit -set low budget

Cafe trip (from budget)

Books (but only if my backlog is empty)

Baby food/nappies/clothes/toys

Kids clothes/treats

Easter eggs for Eiden (my son)

Birthday gifts and cards

Netflix

Xbox Ultimate (I adore video games too much to deprive myself)

Phone contract

Driving lessons (very important to be able to get to future counselling courses)

Counselling course level 3 (very important for my future career)

Once a month takeaway

Magazines that bring value to me e.g Mind Cafe and Writer’s Forum.

Banned

More books when I have others to read

More videogames when I have others to complete

Cafe trips when budget is used up

Alcohol once budget is used up

Takeaways once budget used up (once a month)

New backpacks

New laptop bags

New technology

Clothing (unless others have worn out or can’t be mended)

Paypal Credit (very important ban)

Store card use (very important ban)

Banned use of my time

Any form of social media and email over my daily allowance of half an hour

Checking the news more than once a day

Allowed use of my time

Intentional use of Youtube or Netflix

Gaming

Important use of my time

Anything parenting

Walking

Blogging

Writing

Photography

Udemy Courses

Reading

Seeing friends (dependent on the pandemic situation)

This list could be amended as I go through the year, or if I think of anything new, but it’s important to me that I stick to it, and now I’m holding myself accountable by sharing it on this blog.

I’ll be updating my progress on here at least once a month because I believe that holding myself accountable in public is key to being successful.

If you’re doing a shopping ban or have done one in the past, feel free to drop me an email or a comment – I’d love to hear your story.

19th Dec 2020

Have a Merrier Christmas With Less

It’s almost Christmas, and although it’s different to previous years, what isn’t so different is the mad panic to buy, buy, buy, either to show love to friends and family, or out of sheer obligation.

But as I’ve turned minimalist over the past couple of years, dramatically reducing my possessions and experiencing endless self-growth, I’ve come to realise that stuff isn’t the key to love or happiness. In fact, an excess causes untold stress, financial hardship, damage to relationships, and to the Earth.

As a child, I’d physically always had everything I wanted, never going without the latest console, latest games, or best toys. The walls of my bedroom were lined with toy boxes, but even back then, I was never satisfied. There was always a new toy I wanted, a new book, or a new video game.

From my teens to my early 30s, I was what you’d call an organised hoarder. I had so much stuff that it was breaking my bedroom drawers, had filled up several storage boxes under my bed and on top of my wardrobe, stuffed every cupboard and lined every shelf. But no matter how much I had, I wanted more, more, more.

No matter how many games, consoles, books and trinkets I had, it wasn’t enough. I often dreamed of owning a bigger house, certain that if I only had more space to keep everything and entertain my friends, I’d finally be happy.

It didn’t matter whether I’d just acquired an entire wishlist of stuff for Christmas, either, come January I’d hit the sales to fill the hole inside me. You see, I didn’t realise at the time that one of the sources of my unhappiness was the sheer amount of stuff in my life. Greed and excess.

Another reason was low self-esteem which was further exacerbated from going down the path people expected of me rather than what I really wanted. Stuff was acting as a bandage for the trauma in my past, and as a smokescreen for decisions I had made that I wasn’t truly happy with.

I hated myself with a passion, but as long as I didn’t face it and kept the smokescreen going, I convinced myself I’d be fine.

Except I wasn’t. I was as far from fine as one could get. All of this hoarding and consuming caused countless arguments between me and my fiance, Leighton (now my husband), and I was forever in overdraft with my bank due to spending splurges. I was also a hot mess inside.

Then, one day, my mum had a declutter of the attic at her house. A huge amount of the stuff, she said, was mine, and she was bringing it to me to sort through.

When she arrived, I was stunned. It took her several trips back and forth between my house and the car to bring the bags and boxes. Years of my childhood and school life bulged at the seams and was dumped on the living room floor for me to sort.

At first, I wanted to put it all in our attic, but Leighton stopped me. “No way!”, he said, “That attic is rammed as it is with your crap and we aren’t having any more. Either you sort this or it goes in the trash!” So, with that, I was forced to confront some of my hoard, and the past I had been clinging onto.

And 75% of it was trash.

This experience didn’t instantly turn me into a minimalist, but unbeknownst to me, it was the first step.

Fast forward to the present day and I can tell you with a hundred percent certainty that freeing yourself from the burden of your excess physical possessions is one of the most freeing things you can do.

The second most freeing thing you can do is to free yourself from the desire to own more, and the pressure to buy more for others ‘just because it’s the norm’.

Free yourself from the expectations of marketers and focus on being grateful for everything you already have, especially the people and experiences in your life. Advertisers would have you believe that to ‘give her the best Christmas ever’ you should buy their latest scent or designer handbag. That to be a true friend you should buy any number of random seasonal gifts.

Not true.

Instead of buying your friend yet another pair of socks and a novelty gadget from the gift aisle, why not connect with them and get them something that aligns with who they are and what they want for the future? Maybe they want nothing at all, in which case you should believe them. After all, most people are already drowning in a sea of clutter and years of unwanted gifts.

Why not spend time with them or donate to a charity of their liking instead?

Not only will this be lighter on your wallet and your stress levels, but will help people (or animals) in need, and give you both a far longer lasting glow than any physical possession can.

According to Nationaldebtadvice.org.uk, over 16.9 million people borrow money to pay for Christmas gifts, and one in twenty will skip paying a bill over Christmas because they can’t pay it.

That’s madness.

We’re falling prey to marketing and trying to buy love and connection – things which cannot ever be bought. And when you think about it, would your loved ones want you to go into debt for them? Would you want your loved ones to go into debt for you?

Furthermore, an eye-watering amount of unwanted gifts end up in the trash or in charity shops, 60,000 tonnes of which simply gets sent to landfill.

When there are so many people in need, this is a troubling figure; not to mention the damage done to our planet.

I shocked myself last Christmas when I found there was nothing I wanted my family to buy me. I had minimised so much and had been practising gratitude whenever I could, so I felt grateful for what I already had. I also didn’t want to add potential clutter back into my home, undoing years of decluttering and emotional work. Instead, my husband gifted me money to put towards the counselling course I had applied for.

Rather than short-lived pleasures from receiving physical gifts, I invested in myself. As it turns out, taking that course was one of the best decisions I ever made.

Since then I’ve also bought a photography course because I love taking nature photos and want them to be the best they can be. Without minimalism, I’d never have discovered any of these passions or invested in them because I’d be too busy organising my stuff and looking for more. I’d be too broke.

It wasn’t easy to reach this mindset, especially as I was used to always receiving piles of presents and spending beyond my means for everyone else. Most likely, it won’t be easy for you either, but I can assure you it will all be worth it.

If you’re new to this I suggest starting off with small steps and changes, which will gradually snowball into huge life transformations if you let them.

With that, I wish all of you, my amazing readers, a Merry and stress-free Christmas. You deserve it.

6th Jul 20206th Jul 2020

The Weight of Stuff

I realise it’s been a really long time since I posted on this blog. I can’t deny I feel guilty about that because I was going to post an article on being extraordinary. While I do have the article, I couldn’t bring myself to post it because in the current climate, it just doesn’t feel right, and I’ve been sorting out elements of my own life, and thinking about my future, as well as battling pregnancy fatigue.

I’m now 28 weeks pregnant, and what I have been focused on is minimising and simplifying my life more than ever before.

This post is a little catch up for this blog about my minimalist journey since the lockdown started, and to share my thoughts about where I am now.

One way I’ve been thinking about my stuff is the sheer weight of it in my life, both physically and metaphorically.

I often read about people on decluttering journeys who load their cars with bags upon bags of clutter they’re casting off from their lives, and how many trips it takes to the charity shop.

Since I can’t drive, whenever I donate anything and as I decide to let go of even more stuff, I walk to town with the weight of those bags. As I walk and the bags weigh me down and cut into my hands, I can’t help but think about the sheer weight of my life.

All that heaviness. The stagnant energy that clings to it. The burden of guilt and old memories.

I welcome the relief once the weight is gone, and it often feels as if my arms are floating. Better than that, is the feeling of lightness in my home. There’s more space for energy to flow, space for potential in the future. Not potential new stuff, but opportunities and beliefs that serve me.

The more I cast off, the less weighed down by the past I feel, and the more hope for the future. It’s true that less really is more.

Speaking of the future, since I get so much joy from decluttering and love to help others with it, I had a sudden profound idea to look into becoming a professional declutterer – something which wouldn’t have occurred to me had I still been weighed down by stuff.

Clutter really is something that always lurks at the back of your mind, taking up space and valuable energy. Like a computer with an error message warning you its storage is getting too full, the brain is pretty much the same, and lightening your physical load will massively lighten your mental load.

Being 28 weeks pregnant has made the effects of minimising even more apparent. At a time when I find myself needing more rest than ever, I’ve been able to do just that because there’s no mess, surfaces are clear, and it’s quick and easy to vacuum and dust (our new dishwasher has simplified things even more – especially because my parents live with us).

I’m not having to worry about having enough space for the upcoming new addition to our family, because there’s now more than enough space to accommodate.

In fact, having a new baby on the way is making me think of the stuff in my life even more. For example, my husband and I have been massively attached to our gaming room. It’s the place we go to chill out and play videogames, display our games, and even use as a workspace.

But ultimately, we decided we could give up that luxury so that our second child has a room of their own (more essential because it is a girl and she’s going to be 6 years younger than my son who’s growing up way too fast).

With that in mind I started minimising the gaming room quite early on, and while it started off hard, it’s now got to the point where I no longer feel attached and could happily pass it on , safe in the knowledge that most of it hasn’t been played in years, is realistically never going to get played again, and that most games are now available digitally.

I also realise that I don’t need to have a Youtube worthy gaming display to prove that I love gaming. The way I do that is by actually playing them and letting them bring me hours of joy and excitement.

Sitting on a shelf, they do nothing but take up space, look pretty, and add decision fatigue. The digital streaming services available now on all platforms have helped teach me that. And if I don’t play them while they’re available, I was never going to get around to doing so in the first place.

Another hard thing I’ve done in the past few days is put my wedding dress and accessories up for sale. Initially, I felt sad, but when I brought the huge storage case down from the humid attic, I saw the space that had been created, and reminded myself that it would be far better bringing that same joy to somebody else than it sitting in less-than-ideal storage conditions, taking up valuable space.

Some people are curious why the whole journey has been a process which has taken a couple of years.

Before I was a minimalist, I was what you’d call an organised hoarder. At first glance, I lived in a tidy environment, but it was bursting at the seams and I was forever organising and wishing for a bigger house so I could store more. Window ledges, cubby holes, shelves, cupboards, drawers and storage spaces were rammed with relics of my past, and things I thought I needed, and it was causing heated arguments between me and my husband (who was my fiance at the time).

I also reacted to every whim for something new, be it a new phone, a new bag, a new journal, or another games console. These whims came all the time because deep down, I wasn’t happy and the satisfaction never lasted longer than a few days at most.

That hoarding and the constant buying was a result of years of deeply ingrained beliefs and trauma, and it’s taken a few years to get to where I am now with the mindset and beliefs I now have. Another factor is the seasons of life we all go through.

What’s useful in one season of life may no longer serve in the future, so the minimalist journey never really ends. There will always be times where life needs a mindful reevaluation of where you’re going and what may no longer be serving you, although once you’ve done the main bulk of decluttering, it should never be as stressful or as time-consuming again, provided you stay mindful and vigilant of what comes into your life and why.

Next time I post, I’d like to share with you all, our experience of having a brand new minimalist kitchen, and how it has changed our lives for the better. I feel it is a perfect example of the negative effects clutter can have on an entire family, and the unbelievable change in energy when clutter is dealt with.

11th Apr 2020

Re-evaluating Minimalism

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been thinking about minimalism and the role it plays in my life, even more so since being locked down at home.

But there are some other situations in my life which have cropped up and forced me to rethink the role of stuff in my life, and possibly moving onto a new stage of minimalism.

In my upcoming post, I want to share these thoughts and realisations with you, because it shows how we can fall into a rut and why it’s so important to re-evaluate your life every once in a while.

Photo by Jess @ Harper Sunday on Unsplash

16th Mar 202016th Mar 2020

Starve Your Inner Critic and Claim Back Your Power

Almost everybody has an inner critic, that snide, sniggering, scoffing voice at the back of your head that says you aren’t good enough, pretty enough, smart enough, strong enough, or deserving enough.

And let’s face it -with all the ways we have to compare ourselves to everyone around us nowadays, as well as intense marketing designed to reinforce beliefs that you’re lacking in some way unless you buy their product, is it any wonder that those internal insults become ever louder?

“I’ll never be able to live like him/her”

“My writing’s crap compared to this”

“I’m not smart enough to go for the job I want”

“I’ll never be disciplined enough to achieve that because I’m a loser”

“I can’t”

“I’m not”

“I’ll never be…”

“I’m (insert insult here)”

Even the most successful and confident people out there struggle with that quiet, doubtful voice most of the time. The difference is, they’ve learned how to control it, and even use it as motivation.

You’ve probably read and heard that a thousand times, and thought, ‘Well good for them for being born with that ability’.

But it’s not an inborn ability that people either have or they don’t. It’s all about training and rewiring your brain to think and react differently. That takes time and inner work. A lot of it.

Granted, some people might find it a little easier than others, depending on their past, their circumstances, the people they hang around with, and their mental health.

My inner critic, which I refer to as my inner gremlin, used to be like a raging tsumani. All- consuming, all-powerful, endlessly destructive. And hungry for more.

It never used to be like that. When I was a small child, I had boundless confidence and curiosity. I’d sit and write on my typewriter on the living room floor, or write a story in my notebook and race to show anyone who would read it.

Like most young children, I truly believed I could be anything I wanted; an archaeologist, a TV presenter, a weather reporter, a famous author.

What happened?

Circumstances growing up, plus being bullied throughout my whole school life, fed the inner gremlin that had started to emerge once all the other children started forming cliques and showing off their own unique personalities.

I wasn’t like everyone else. I was inappropriate, loud, wore baggy, unfashionable clothes because everything else irritated me, and didn’t understand social jokes or cues. I wasn’t interested in the things others were interested in, or in talking about relationships.

It wasn’t until early adulthood I got diagnosed as being somewhere on the autistic spectrum.

Anyway, the older I got and the more insults were thrown at me, the more I believed them. The more I saw the other people around me, the more inadequate I felt. I didn’t need to be told I was ugly and worthless by other kids because my own inner bully had grown vicious and gigantic by that point.

I’d tell myself I was vile and worthless. All the while, my inner gremlin fed and grew.

Eventually, I stopped showing off my writing outside of school. I went through periods of self-harming, and my self-esteem was as low as it could get.

As a young adult, I still had my dreams from childhood – my main one to be an author – but I had serious issues with my identity and with extremely defensive and angry behaviour in my relationships.

Where did all this come from? My inner gremlin which had been gorging itself quite happily over the years on all of my negative thoughts and beliefs.

Strangely enough, my first step into altering those terrible beliefs started when my mum came to my house one day with bags and bags of my old junk and clutter from childhood, which she had cleared from the attic.

I was a hoarder, you see. But at the time I didn’t realise because I kept everything crammed out of sight or neatly lined up.

Confronted with years of my own mess, I realised I had a serious issue with letting go of the past. In many ways, I was still living in it.

I may have been an adult with a child and renting a home, but inside I was still that angry child pining for acceptance.

That day, I let go of so much stuff, and when I did, I physically felt like this huge spiritual weight had been lifted from my shoulders. Years of attachments, sad memories, and old work finally where it belonged – in the trash.

Image by Лечение наркомании from Pixabay

Something got sparked in me that day that triggered years of self growth, and opened the gate to minimalism.

Because I was forced to question why I had been holding onto all that stuff, I started to ask myself deeper things, like where my beliefs came from, and why I felt the way I did.

I started reading every self-help book I could get my hands on that appealed to the specific issues I had identified. Books about overcoming trauma, writing, confidence, self-improvement, and later on, minimalism.

I didn’t just read these books once. I read them over and over, completing all the exercises inside them until I knew them off by heart and looking inside myself until it started to feel natural.

It’s safe to say that those books, alongside the action I took, went a significant way in helping me to change who I had become, and started me on a path of acceptance and becoming my true self.

For those of you who are interested, I will list some of those books at the end of this post, but keep in mind, your needs and what works for you might well be different, and that’s OK.

Fast forward to the present and I’ve made this blog, started training to become a counsellor, taken some Udemy courses, written part of a book, and made a new friend (who is also a writer). I’ve also become brave enough to enter a couple of writing competitions.

How did I silence my inner gremlin? I didn’t. Instead, I got strong enough to fight back and to co-exist with it in a healthy way. It’s nowhere near as big or as consuming as it was, and it certainly doesn’t stop me from writing or going for my dreams.

It’s highly unlikely you will completely silence your inner critic because for the most part, its job is to try to protect us from pain and humiliation. That’s why so many of us remain stuck in jobs we hate, lives that are going nowhere, and relationships that don’t serve us.

At its least destructive, it tells you to stay where you are, in comfortable waters, with everyone else. It halts and destroys dreams.

At its most destructive, it becomes like mine did. A seething mass of hate, doubt, and negativity.

The trick is to not feed it, and to gain power over it by fighting the inner demons that allow those beliefs to cement in your heart and mind.

Let me give an example of the occasional things my gremlin will rasp, and the things I now say back. Perhaps some of it will resonate with you.

Gremlin:

You’re dreaming if you think you’ve got a chance.

Just look at this article – no readers. You’re rubbish, may as well give up now.

You lead a rubbish uneventful life, people don’t care what you have to say.

What qualifies you, of all people, to think you can help others?

Oh shut up, everyone started from zero.

But I’m doing something I love. Which is more than what you can do.

You’re just my inner critic, what do you know about writing and having fun? Nothing!

Inner Gremlin, you’d never get anywhere with an attitude like that. You suck. You’re mediocrity itself.

I can do what I want with my life, unlike you who can only criticise.

I am qualified to help people because I desire to, have been through things which could be valuable to others, and am training. You don’t know a thing about helping – just critisising.

I dare get my words out there regardless, and that’s awesome and more than most people will continue to do.

And you know what? Time after time of practising inner dialogue like that has turned the balance of power.

I’ve taken its energy source, cut off its supply, and shrank it down by doing the thing it hates the most – taking action.

Try it today. Argue back with your inner gremlin. Do it time and time again until it becomes nothing more than a minor annoyance.

Wage a war and confront your inner demons. Cut off its food supply.

Don’t let your inner gremlin decide your future.

Oh, and here are the books I said I would link, but before I do that I would also like to give a mention to Anthony Moore on Medium whose stories and articles help keep me going even through the tough times.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=hal+elrod+the+miracle+morning&crid=3TAZWMGYMNDYI&sprefix=Hal+elrods+miracle+morni%2Caps%2C191&ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_24

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=jen+sincero+you+are+a+badass&crid=2G0L4RFV1KW8Z&sprefix=jen+sin%2Caps%2C159&ref=nb_sb_ss_i_4_7

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=100+ways+to+improve+your+writing&crid=1EM0UFD51SZBB&sprefix=100+ways+to+%2Caps%2C160&ref=nb_sb_ss_i_2_12

22nd Jan 2020

The Helping Hand of Failure – Why I Recover Faster

I’m not perfect.

Nobody’s perfect.

Yet there’s this expectation in society that if you don’t have a high-profile job and don’t own the latest and greatest stuff, you’re no good.

Marketers constantly try to convince you you’re lacking in life if you don’t own the latest phone, celebrity endorsed cologne, or the sexiest sofa.

You’re not a good parent

You’re not a good runner

You’re not beautiful enough

Not smart enough

Not cool enough

Not happy with your life

But that’s OK because if you buy today, you can rest assured that you’ll be the envy of your friends, and you’ll be so much more interesting.

We rarely realise it, but after a while, those messages add up into an essay about how much we lack, and life starts to feel intensely unsatisfying. Depressing, even.

While embracing minimalism definitely made me see that happiness doesn’t come from a delivery van, it certainly hasn’t made me immune to slipping up and making bad decisions.

On this blog, I talk about achieving goals a lot and simplifying your life so that you can discover what’s really important to you. I even share my successes so that you can hopefully start to realise the potential in you.

But what I don’t talk about often enough are my failures along the way. The times where I take five steps up the ladder but fall down ten.

Let’s face it, even though we need failure to grow, it’s embarrassing to talk about and even scarier to experience.

First off, here’s a little bit about me so that you get a little bit of context: I’m generally happy and cheerful (sometimes to an annoying degree according to my husband), I have several obsessions including writing, reading, gaming, minimalism, and self-growth.

Come into my living room, and you will see that everything is a calming white and pastel green with loads of empty space. I’ve got my future planned out, an incredible family, and quality friends.

But it wasn’t always like that, and sometimes I fall into the same quicksand I had escaped before, slowly sinking back into old habits and ways of thinking.

I used to be a hoarder. Not the kind of hoarder you see on those TV shows, but an organised hoarder. I was in serious denial about how much I owned. It caused arguments with my fiance, and allowed me to carry on hiding behind my stuff.

You can read the story here, but basically, I was keeping it all because I was deeply unhappy, didn’t believe in myself, and identified strongly with my past.

It took my mum bringing it all down to my house and my husband threatening to bin the lot, for me to finally confront the lonely memories and dusty old beliefs that kept me clinging on.

Now, I am living and loving a minimalist lifestyle but although I’m reaping all the benefits, I’m not totally free of my old coping mechanisms.

You see, minimalism will make your life a hell of a lot calmer and easier, and it will help you to discover yourself, but it won’t solve every problem for you. Especially those that are nestled deep inside.

It also won’t cure bad habits because they won’t go straight in the trash with your physical clutter. Rather, they get recycled into new, useful habits.

Sometimes, when things get me down like an argument, symptoms of chronic illness, or even writer’s block, I will find myself clicking over to Amazon and Ebay. Other times, I just feel stale in myself, like a mouldy piece of bread.

Suddenly, the bag I bought just months before has a fault and I need a new one. I need a new game despite having a mile long list of unplayed titles. I could really do with that lovely looking lunch box as it will ensure my food doesn’t leak in my backpack (despite never having that issue).

Of course, those are all elaborate stories I weave in my mind which will lead to me buying the product of interest.

As I click ‘buy’ I feel the anticipation of the item’s arrival and start getting rid of things that are relatively new. The dopamine rushes through me, even though I know deep down that two clicks and a parcel won’t bring me satisfaction.

But my brain doesn’t care about that fact because of the temporary feelings of elation.

Days later, the package comes, and as the packaging goes in the bin, so does my excitement. I realise I didn’t really need it, that I could have saved the money, invested in more skills, or gone on a day trip.

‘Call yourself a minimalist? Ha! You’re a phoney, you’re weak’, my brain chatters.

Just to be clear, I don’t have a shopping addiction, because these slips ups don’t happen very often. But the shame is no less intense, and the bad decisions can lead to me making other bad choices such as eating a luxurious helping of Nutella on toast when I know I’m gluten intolerant, or having a second glass of wine even though I know I’ve had enough.

However, unlike in the past, I find that I can get back up from the fall much faster than before. The injury doesn’t go as deep.

I know that I’m not a phony because I strongly believe in what I practise and what I say. As sickening as it sometimes feels, I acknowledge my mistakes, and that makes me self-aware.

Experiencing failure makes you feel like masking the feelings that come with it, and all the mean things the gremlin in your brain might be hissing at you.

But here’s the thing: the more failures you have, the more wise and resilient you become. You grow. You learn. You start to become aware of why you made those bad choices.

I’ve discovered that, generally, when I’m craving something new and making up stories of validation, it’s not the stuff I’m craving but experiences.

It’s not a new outfit I’m after, but love and acceptance.

I don’t want to own new stuff, I want to see new places, learn new skills, walk a new path, blossom into who I know I can be.

However, even though I’ve taken action and forged a new path for myself, the path is long, sometimes a forest gets in the way, and you know how excruciating it can be when what you want is just a little bit further, and a little bit further.

But what we often forget is to enjoy that journey. We can get so focused on hacking through that forest that we don’t see the beauty, or notice the undergrowth teeming with life.

The trick is, to not lurk in that beautiful forest for too long, and if you fall, get right back up.

Remember who you are and what you stand for, and walk hand-in-hand with failure no matter how scary, because it is your best teacher, and your greatest friend.

9th Jan 2020

New Year Still Me

Why New Years Resolutions Don’t Work And How You Can Master Yourself PERMANENTLY

I know it’s a little on the late side since January has well and truly kicked off, but Happy New Year to you all!

And how are those New Year resolutions going? Still going strong, or starting to feel the burn? Perhaps you’ve already given up.

If the latter sounds like you then worry not ,because today I want to talk about why New Year New Me doesn’t work, and why you can still win big this year while being yourself.

For many, New Years is like starting a fresh new notebook or journal. You know the feeling: crisp fresh pages that you’re definitely going to keep neat and fill all the pages this time. But ten weeks later, it’s full of scribbles and you’re already looking at new ones.

That’s what New Yew Year’s resolutions can be like and this is why so many people are what I call one month wonders.

It’s the same every year; the clock strikes midnight and everyone cheers, pops the champagne and vows to be a better person.

‘From this moment on, I’m cutting sugar and losing weight!’

‘I’m going to find a new job’,

‘I’m going to be more organised’,

‘I’m going to stop smoking’’

‘I’m going to start going to the gym’,

‘I’m going to be a better parent/partner’,

‘I’m going to get a nicer partner’

Half a week goes by. Then one. You’re on fire! You’re totally going to smash your goals. You can already feel yourself becoming the person you’re meant to be, that you’ve always dreamed of.

Then week two comes and you start to feel the burn. It’s hard. Really hard. And you’ve already skipped a few days at the gym, and are falling behind schedule.

Life is hard, so you go out and treat yourself to the biggest, creamiest slice of cake you can find, accompanied by the sweetest, most luxurious hot chocolate. Bliss.

‘Oh well, failed already,’ you think. But no matter, everyone else has as well. I’ll try again once the warmer weather comes.’

Thus, the pattern continues year after year. The resolutions remain the same, and the list is a little longer than before. Why isn’t anything changing? You try, but life just keeps getting in the way.

That’s because New Year New Me doesn’t work like that.

Despite what marketing would have you believe, you’re still you, and growth takes place over a long period of time. Change must come from within if you want to see a significant difference in your reality.

A new you isn’t something that comes about like a change in the weather. It’s like planting a tree, maintaining it, and watching it grow. It takes time and dedication. And you must be willing to fail and learn from it as a part of the process.

Society and social media would have you believe that you must be perfect, and that you can be perfect if only you’d buy this health drink, and this notebook. But the opposite is true.

Without failure you cannot win.

This may feel shocking and a little uncomfortable to take on, but failure is a great thing. Not only do you learn what works and what doesn’t, it means you’re taking action, which is more than most people do.

There isn’t a single successful person who has got where they have or where they did without consistent failure.

Take Thomas Edison, for example. He didn’t see failure as his enemy, despite a thousand failed attempts at creating the lightbulb.When a reporter asked how it felt to have failed that many times, he replied, “I didn’t fail 1,000 times. The light bulb was an invention with 1,000 steps.”

The reason so many people fail and don’t get back up is because they lack grit, don’t have a powerful enough reason for change to take place, and see failure as a terrible, unacceptable thing.

Also, getting fired up just because everyone else is doing it.

Everyone else is going to the gym and going on diets. Everyone else has a plan. Everyone else is going to be better and you’re going to be left in the dark.

But if you’re one of those people who say ‘Right, it’s New Year, I’m going to be more assertive and look after myself more’, you’re not serious enough.

That’s right. You’re not truly ready to commit.

Know why?

Because people who wait until the New Year to make changes always wait for the planets to align before they start. They wait until everyone else is doing the same thing, then burn out at around the same time.

If you’re dead serious about becoming a new you and winning throughout the year, the best time to start is always NOW.

You’ve probably read that on a hundred other posts and in dozens of books. You might even be sick of seeing it. That’s because it’s true.

It doesn’t matter if it’s New Year or the end of summer, if you’re twenty-five or seventy. If you really want things to change, you’ll put in the time and dedication from the moment you decide what you want.

As author and entrepreneur Jim Rohn said ‘If you really want to do something, you’ll find a way. If you don’t, you’ll find an excuse’.

I used to be a master of excuses and spinning stories as to why I couldn’t or shouldn’t. It meant I could sound and feel temporarily awesome without putting in the work.

If I was meant to be successful, success would come to me. Maybe I’d even win big on the lottery.

I grew up with everyone around me telling me that life is hard, that money is hard to come by, that I should be grateful for what I have and not do anything stupid, aka, go outside my comfort zone and look for another way in life.

I was told that people who have money or who were successful had either cheated the system or won big.

And I believed it all.

As a result, I looked in awe at successful people and thought they were born that way. If someone was in a higher position that me at work I looked at them almost like celebrities. I put them on a pedestal and looked at them starry-eyed whilst seeing myself as important as pond scum.

When I discovered and started following minimalism, everything changed for me because getting rid of my hoard forced me to confront the reasons I was clinging on.

I’ve also read tonnes of amazing self-help books and done every exercise in them, applying them best I can every day of my life.

That doesn’t mean that I never slip up because I do, plenty of times. But it’s important to keep going. Remember what I said about failure?

Over time my confidence has sky-rocketed, I’ve completed the first course towards a new career as a counsellor, and I started this blog. I also entered my first writing competition despite being so terrified that my heart was pounding before I hit publish.

My mindset has completely altered from what it once was and my old beliefs have long gone out with the trash.

But it took a lot of hard work and perseverance. I had to carve out time for personal reflection and self-growth exercises, to toss out my past in bin liners and boxes, and it had to be more important than sitting with a game controller in hand, daydreaming about a new me.

Change didn’t happen overnight. It took a long time, and I’ll never have completely reached my full potential because growth never stops.

In the words of entrepreneur and motivational speaker, Hal Elrod, ‘You are where you are because of who you were, but where you go depends entirely on who you choose to be.”

To be successful you have to make the choice to carry on long after everyone around you has quit.

It’s easy to enter the New Year saying ‘Hell yeah, watch out world, here comes the new me!’and dive in brimming with motivation, especially while everyone else is doing the same thing.

It’s why it’s always so hard to find a parking spot at gyms in January, why book shops start selling all the motivational self-help books, and why health food and fitness equipment adverts can suddenly be found everywhere.

But simply buying an exercise bike and going at it when you feel like it isn’t going to make you fit.

Buying a nicer laptop or a shiny new notebook isn’t going to make you a well-known author.

Ditching one bad relationship isn’t going to stop you from attracting more of the same if you still harbour subconscious negative beliefs about your self-worth.

Vowing to be better with money isn’t going to make you any richer.

What will get you results is riding that bike regularly, churning out words daily, altering your inner beliefs so that you will no longer put up with mediocre circumstances. Not giving up when you fail, no matter how many times.

What you do must become so routine that it feels the new norm, including the way you think about yourself.

Grit and habit aside, you must also be very specific. If you’re vague and say things like ‘I will be better with money’, you’ll be scratching your head come March and blowing cobwebs out of your wallet.

You need a detailed plan which includes specifics. For example ‘I will not go under £200 in my bank account every month. I will do this by eating out only once a month, and making lunches at home four days a week’.

You must become like the Terminator. Your why must be so strong that it can’t be reasoned with or bargained with, and you must be relentless even when everyone else is back to screwing around.

Let me give you an example of this from my own experience.

When I first decided I was going to change my path and become a counsellor, I encountered a lot of resistance from others; mainly because it had come to me in a dream and it felt so right and I felt so excited that I started excitedly ranting to my husband about it.

Then I jumped out of bed and started looking up courses and thinking of ways to pay for it, even though I was completely broke.

Not surprisingly, my family thought I had lost my mind.

But I felt so intensely that this was the path I was meant to follow, that I didn’t stop. I went on the search for days, researching the career, talking to people, and searching for courses even when it seemed there were none in my area.

I didn’t care how long it took me or if I had to travel for miles on train. My husband was about tearing his hair out at this point trying to talk and shout sense into me (before he started supporting me when he saw just how deadly serious I was).

Long story short, a course appeared in my area as if by magic and in a very short time I applied for and was accepted onto it. In true Law of Attraction style, I ended up with the exact amount of money needed to pay for it and have now completed my course and applied for the next one.

Without a doubt, it was one of the best decisions I have ever made and I didn’t care what anyone else said to me, what the universe threw at me, or what my current situation was.

That’s how dedicated you need to be if you want to change your life.

Yes you’ll have challenges thrown your way. The universe loves to do that.

Many people see them as impossible hurdles and a sure sign that they aren’t meant to succeed.

Don’t believe it for a moment! See these things for what they really are – a test to see how serious you are. Find a way to barrage through the obstacle and you’ll get to where you want in no time.

This brings me to my final point of staying focused.

Whatever you do, don’t compare yourself to others and look at what they’re doing unless it’s for educational or inspirational purposes.

It’s not a competition and you won’t be lying in the same grave as them when you’re gone.

You’re living YOUR life, crafting YOUR own reality. You can only do this by following YOUR own path in life.

If you’re constantly looking over at someone else’s path, you’re going to bump into trees, get lost and not even see the massive pile of gold you passed ten miles back.

You’ll also probably start noticing how many more weeds are on your path than theirs, not realising they had to hack their way through a jungle at the start.

So stop dreaming and start living, TODAY!

With that, I leave you with one more quote I love by Jim Rohn:
“If you don’t design your own life plan, chances are you’ll fall into someone else’s plan. And guess what they have planned for you? Not much.”