ENVIRONMENT AND MINIMALISM
Environment goes very much hand in hand with Minimalism!
Minimalism is living with minimum requirements. This concept is not new,
neither is it unused. There are individuals on this planet who believe in
living life, using minimum possible things and live it well!
Flying high becomes difficult, if we are loaded with unwanted
things or in other words, garbage! Many a times, we accumulate things, thoughts
which are not important for life! We tend to lose our freedom, protecting and
preserving things, which we think are ours! This snatches our real happiness!
If we really wonder what our minimum requirements are, we realize that we are
possessing much more than what we need!
As Socrates rightly said, “The secret of happiness is not
found in seeking more but in developing the capacity to enjoy less”. It’s our
attitude of collecting things, may be wanted or unwanted, thinking that it may
be needed sooner or later, that leads us to accumulating trash, in a way,
making our “Home Sweet Home” a place of storage! If we get too much involved in
non-living things and think of them, spend time for them, spend energy in
preserving them, we may lose our time, which we may have otherwise spent for
our happiness! We see so many examples regarding this, which will immediately
appeal to all of us. We acquire so many clothes, shoes, accessories, which we
then rarely use or rather their turn comes after a long time. And moreover, we
tend to preserve the older things too, increasing the loads on our wardrobes,
shoe racks and cupboards. We build huge houses, few rooms in which are always
closed or maintained for those, who rarely turn up! We have three four sets of
things like TVs, pen drives, laptops, other gadgets, which we do not use at
all. We have more vehicles in the house, than the number of residents. When we
spend time to keep the house neat and tidy, we have trouble keeping these
things in order. Sometimes, they may clutter the house. Their maintenance
becomes costly, as we are paying the maids for cleanliness, paying for electricity
bills, petrol, diesel or whatever is required! We are definitely adding a load in
the environment! Whenever we get an urge to buy something, we should think
twice, thrice, four times, before buying, as to whether it is required or not!
A
thing which has not been used for a long time must be considered as a thing
unwanted! It may be more required by someone else! In such a situation, it must
be given away to someone who needs it more and will be of help to that person! While leading our life, we need only about a hundred
things, which are of dire significance. Otherwise these things are truly useless
stuff. The lesser the useless stuff we possess, the more will be the freedom we
experience!
We will be freer, have more time for our loved ones and for
our health, for our hobbies and have a better environment around!
If you talk to a person who is an expert in science of
architecture, one who advises about how to keep your house peaceful and holy,
he will also advise you to keep it clutter less! So let us pledge to be a minimalist!
We can change our habits and behavior in such a way that we
can use minimum, want less, utilize less, hence save more!!! This will be an
environment friendly behavior, where one needs less and saves resources!
Best wishes!
Green Blogger
Dr. Jaya Kurhekar
