TRANSCRIPT
Someone recently sent me a message on the internet asking if I would make a video on living a minimalistic lifestyle. I thought it was a pretty good idea because I don’t think I’ve ever really spoken much about it, and it’s been a very important part of my life for the past several years to have that very minimalistic lifestyle.
It’s actually been 5 years since I’ve really had a home of my own. I’ve been a wanderer, a traveler, a nomad. I’ve been living all over the world. I haven’t had a lease on an apartment. Sometimes, yeah, I live in a place for a while and I pay some rent for a month here and there, but a lot of times I’m living with friends, I’m on the road, and camping. It could be lots of different things, uh, staying with different people.
One big part of that that’s allowed me to do it is I have very little stuff. I don’t have a lot of belongings. In one way that’s difficult, but in another way, my God, it’s so freeing. When I gave up my apartment 5 years ago, I was renting an apartment in Manhattan. I didn’t even have a lot of stuff then, but when I chose to go on the road, I realized how much stuff I had because I had to get rid of a lot of stuff.
What was interesting is it was very hard to get rid of stuff, but at the same time, it was like I didn’t really miss it. So what do I own now to be able to travel and live the way that I live? I have a backpack, I have an extra little suitcase, I have a guitar, I have some clothes, I have a couple of pairs of pants, I have a pair of shorts, I have a bathing suit, I have some socks, I have some underwear, I have a bunch of t-shirts, I have this pullover, I have a jacket, I have a pair of gloves, um, I have some extra guitar strings, I have a harmonica, I have this camera, I have my computer, I’ve got some microphones for my camera, I’ve got extra tapes that I use, and I’ve got, okay, I’ve got toiletries and toothpaste and shampoo and stuff like that. But past that, I really don’t own almost anything.
It’s a little strange because I think it’s just not common. What I found though is that it allows me to have a very mobile lifestyle. I do rent a storage unit in New York, and so I’ll keep stuff there when I’m off and away from New York and traveling, but I don’t have much in it. Mostly, actually, it’s just full of DVDs for my movies because I sell my movies still, even though that business is going down now that my movies are free on YouTube.
But there’s something about it that’s just like, it’s so easy. It’s like I can put all my clothes in one backpack, I can grab my guitar, and I can go somewhere. It’s like, wow, the life that I had in my home is basically not that different when I’m living somewhere totally different.
I think, why is it that people have so much stuff? And why did I have so much stuff? I didn’t even have that much compared to most people that I know. It’s like I had a lot of books, but I got rid of basically all of them, and it’s like I’m not the worst for wear. I read them, you know, they’re done, I don’t need them.
I think a lot of people hold on to stuff as a clear external way to define their existence. It’s sort of like when they have a lot of stuff around them and they have a lot of possessions, I think they realize more consciously that they’re alive. Or maybe it’s not even conscious; it’s just they get a sense that this is their nest. There’s like, there’s walls around them, there’s their belongings and their possessions. Without all that stuff, I think a lot of people would be scared, and they would have to look within, and they would have to connect with their inner self to really know themselves. For a lot of people, that’s terrifying.
It’s a lot easier to have tons of junk around themselves and have stuff everywhere than to really look within. Because I think also when people have a lot of stuff, it’s a mirror for all the unresolved stuff that’s inside of them. All their unresolved childhood feelings, all their unresolved needs and their longing and their hopes and their dreams and their pain and their sadness and their history of abuse, it’s like it all gets in there and it’s buried down with all sorts of feelings. And then boom, they manifest all sorts of stuff around themselves.
I think for me, the more that I’ve cleared my inner self, the more my outer world doesn’t need as much. I really find that I don’t long for that much stuff. I was like, I don’t really need more clothes. I mean, I’ve been living for the last basically year and a half on one pair of sneakers. I’ve also found that the more mature I’ve gotten, the less I feel I need to show off to other people.
I remember as a teenager how painful it was when I’d go shopping for clothes and shopping for shoes because I always wanted to have the right thing to look the right part, to be the right role, so friends would like me, so girls would like me, so I would be respected. It was like sort of torture, and I had to buy more and buy more to have different things, and I had to change my clothes all the time. Now it’s sort of like, no, once I got myself on the inside, I didn’t need so much noise around me. I didn’t need to have so much camouflage. I could just sort of be myself and have a much simpler life.
Now, could my life be even more simple? Could it be more minimalistic? I think it could. I mean, it would be hard. It’s like if I wanted to make videos like this, I need a camera, and if I want to play guitar, I do need a guitar. But I’ve also realized I can live without it. It’s like, you know, in a lot of my travels, I’ll bring very little stuff, just bring a little backpack, and I can’t even fill it with clothes because I need room for food and water.
But I think also, like, I think getting rid of stuff can open the door to look within, but I also think looking within can open the door to get rid of stuff. So basically, these things can work in tandem and be very useful. For me, it’s been a much calmer life.
Also, another thing is it’s a lot cheaper to not have a lot of stuff. I’m amazed at how much people spend on crap. It’s like, I think there’s a lot of people, if they didn’t spend on so much crap and do so much, they’d actually probably wouldn’t have to work so much. They could probably travel a lot more, they could have a lot more fun, they could be a lot more free.
I also know, like, I see people when they travel because I fly a lot for my work and for my interest, and I see like how many bags of stuff people bring. I’d be like, I just have one little backpack, and people who are going for half the time I’m going are bringing four times as much stuff. It’s sort of like, what do they really need all that for?
I think it’s like they might be like children; they need a big security blanket, something to hold on to to make them feel safe. Because without that, they’re like, who am I? I think people get, you know, they can feel a little bare, they can feel a little naked without a lot of stuff.
So, uh, I don’t know. Well, to the person who asked me to do a minimalistic video, um, I hope this was useful.