What if everything you've ever wanted
you don't actually need?
What if everything you've ever owned, actually owned you?
Have you ever really stopped and asked yourself
why you want the things you want?
The average Australian household spends
more than $1,226 ever year
on things they'll never use.
All this stuff
this shopping
these meaningless choices.
It makes me despair, to be perfectly honest.
I feel like people are beholden to their idea of having new stuff.
And most of it's just so unnecessary.
Most of it's just crap.
I don't get it anymore. I don't get it.
There's nothing wrong with wanting things
but you've got to ask yourself
whether or not it's actually adding to your life.
It led Brooke McAlary, a 32-year-old married mother of two
on a five-year path to minimalism.
A sort of intentional lifestyle being
taken up by more and more people.
I think the biggest misconception definitely
is that it's all about these white empty cubes.
Minimalism is to me a way of life
and a way of thinking about things.
So me minimalism is a guiding principle.
What excess can we take away?
to allow us to have that?
Brooke donated or sold 20,000 things from her home.
even finding that the extension that she just finished
putting on her house and the double garage
weren't needed anymore.
This was the empty space where all the
things you used to own lived?
Exactly. And that's what we've got now.
- A trampoline? -Yep.
- Much more fun. - So much more fun.
It was one of the most liberating things that I've ever done.
I didn't realise that I was sentimental
until I was faced with the decision to let go of things.
And that's when I realised that the memory
is not in the item.
If it's important enough, then I'll remember it.
I'll show you inside by wardrobe if you like.
Your husband has more clothes than you do.
- These are all the shoes you have? - Yes.
That's all of our combined shoes.
I do like the matching his & hers Ugg boots though.
Yeah, it's important!
Even minimalists need good ugg boots.
Absolutely.
I'd give up my thongs before I'd give up my ugg boots.
Brooke's family only have one box each
to keep sentimental things.
And what about your box? Do you have a box?
I have got one box of photos.
I think some people would see me as quite cold about it,
but I look at it and see it more as a box
full of deferred decisions.
So this is your minimalists dirty secret?
-She does have things! -I do!
I know people look at us sometimes and think
you know, you have the opportunity to give your kids anything they want.
But I don't think that the answer's in that.
If it were up to me, we'd be living in a much smaller house but it's just a matter of
convincing other people that we don't need as much house as we have.
You've got three guitars.
Some might say, I don't know, your wife, that this is a bit excessive.
So if you had to get rid of one, would you choose one in particular?
Oh look you know, they're antiques.
I've had them for a long, long time.
I wouldn't keep them if they were mine, but they're not.
They look nice so you know, on the wall.
High up.
Yeah exactly.
Putting a cool edge on the worldwide movement of less, are Joshua Fields Millburn and Ryan Nicodemus.
The minimalists.
Their US website speaking to a book and documentary is devoted to teaching people how to have less.
So minimalism is a tool
that allows people to, it helps them question the things in their lives.
It helps them get rid of the superfluous things to make room for life's most important things.
We came up for this idea together
where we would pack up all of my possessions in my 2000 foot condo
and the idea was to unpack things as I needed it, day by day for 21 days
to really get a feel for what I was using, what possessions really made a difference for me.
It's an idea or process that Mark and Jess, a couple who have become quite passionate about having less
are about to do again today.
Just found myself overwhelmed, in debt
and just not, not really being able to do
everything that I wanted and I was lost, and not happy.
So as you look at the entire contents of your kitchen, do you feel like you could get rid of a couple things?
Yeah, yes definitely.
Mark and Jess do this every six months, as they struggle to maintain their minimalism.
The kind of things we got rid of, were things like our TV.
And I got rid of so many clothes
I counted at one point, I had 33 dresses.
I don't have enough time to wear that many dresses.
We just do our thing and enjoy nice meals, and have a little dance around the place.
We have the space not only physically but mentally and emotionally.
That's what we need.
And for me also, I got to rediscover my love for juggling.
But the decision to live a minimalist life can happen quite suddenly.
I started the journey towards simplicity just after our first child was born.
I was running my own jewellery label, it was quite a busy little independent jewellery label.
And there was no question, I wanted it to be successful and I wanted to be able to stay at home with my kids
I wanted to have a nice house, I wanted all of it.
It was ridiculous, the amount of stress and pressure I put on myself
and that continued to grow over the next 18 months.
to the point where when we had our second child I was diagnosed with really severe post-natal depression.
It was a combination of stress and the expectation that I should be able to
do all of these things and do them perfectly and constantly
that kind of drove me to that breaking point.
In fact, an emotional or traumatic push factor is something all minimalists seem to have in common.
Back in 2011, I had a back injury which stopped me being able to perform as a juggler and magician.
And it was a shock, that was my livelihood and what I did, so everything had to change.
It was late 2009.
My marriage ended and my mother died, both in the same month.
And it was, sort of the precipice of this journey.
What we're seeing a lot of is people asking the same questions, people from Occupy Wall Street
and CEOs from major corporations, asking the same question of:
How do I live a more meaningful life?
For us, we were able to add more time spent together as a family, not cleaning the house.
And we were able to add travel, rather than adding presents and gifts and all that stuff
that we would otherwise spend our money on.
We were able to add experiences.
But wouldn't a true minimalist have no possessions at all?
At some point it becomes about convenience as well.
You know the reality is, we do have young kids.
And sometimes it's a compromise.
A compromise all minimalists make by holding on to one thing they just couldn't do without.
So the one thing that I would never want to get rid of is my passport.
My guitar.
My camera.
My laptop.
My teddy.
My dinosaur.
I think minimalism today is very applicable, because we are steeped in this consumeristic ideology
that if we buy the right car, or if we go to the right vacation destination, or if we own the right coffee maker
that we're going to be happy.
So I think it's a pretty simple takeaway: love people use things.
Because the opposite never works.