18 Keys To Discovering The Essentials

Simplifying life in every way, in everything that does not add value to us, implies putting the focus on the fundamental, both in the material sphere (consumption, use of technology …), and in relationships (as a couple, as a family, labor …) and in the management of our time and our money.

1. Debug

It is an exercise in purification, to praise what is essential, what reconnects us with who we are, with what is important to us, and which also frees us from many worries, streamlines our daily experience and motivates us to live a longer existence. full of meaning than of material goods.

2. Define real and unreal needs

The consumer society encourages us to acquire goods and services without them being as necessary as we are led to believe.

However, if we think about it, reducing consumption is a very real planetary need because, according to figures from the Genoese entity Global Footprint Network, we currently consume 1.7 planets Earth in natural resources per year.

In other words, we are producing and consuming above the Earth’s capacity to renew itself. And in 2030, according to WWF (World Wildlife Fund) we will be consuming twice as many resources.

3. Reduce social gaps

In the last four decades of splendor of the neoliberal economy, production and consumption have quadrupled, creating serious problems such as climate change, a widening gap between rich and poor or an increasingly precarious labor market.

All of this has a lot to do with environmental and social impacts, with how products and services are produced and consumed today.

4. Consumption and happiness

Money and consumption do not buy happiness. They can cause momentary satisfaction, but happiness implies having a purpose beyond the merely material and what is expected of us.

5. Two paradigms

The “so much you have, so much value”, the possessing and pretending push us to the competition of one against the other, to the comparison with the others and, therefore, to the constant dissatisfaction. In front of the paradigm of “having” is the paradigm of “being”, which values ​​who we are and how we fulfill ourselves as full individuals.

6. More income, better?

As the saying goes, “the richest is the one who needs the least”, but also the material accumulation does not make us happier.

As studied in the 1970s in the United States,Although per capita income had tripled, levels of happiness had hardly increased : it was, and is, one of the countries with the worst mental health and with the most suicides, many linked to frustrated economic efforts.

7. Generosity and satisfaction

In 1974, the so-called “Esterling paradox” confirmed that money influences happiness up to a certain level of income; beyond that there are no significant increases. That is, wealth does not create happiness by itself.

The only money that “buys” happiness, once personal needs are met, is money spent with prosocial intent because, according to Michael Norton of Harvard University, it is generosity that makes us happy.

8. Unconscious consumption

However, we consume and accumulate belongings as if they would make us happier and feel whole. The psychologist Geoffrey Miller, from the University of New Mexico, points out that much of the pleasure reported by consumption derives from the unconscious desire that what is acquired increases or better communicates our virtues and our personality.

9. Handling

Brands take advantage of it to build aspirational universes to which they encourage us to belong. And although we should only consume what is necessary, most of the time we acquire goods and services for emotional, compulsive reasons, driven by advertising, marketing …

10. What does consumerism hide?

We consume to calm dissatisfactions, to compensate for discomfort (at work, at home …), to cover up (consciously or unconsciously) unpleasant moods such as boredom, frustration or discouragement; by necessity of belonging to a real or imaginary group or by desire for security, status, social approval …

11. Expectations and time

We also consume because of the expectations that other people have about us, about how we should be, how we should behave or how we should live.

And we also consume harassed by the lack of time to take care of ourselves, to cook, to stop to reflect on what we really need to acquire, what is best for us, for those around us and for the planet.

12. A personal drag

Behavioral experts say that thought generates an action, that repeated action results in a habit, and that this habit, when maintained over time, ends up causing a certain transformation.

Therefore, unconscious and uncritical consumption not only impacts our pockets, but can also be a burden on our personal fulfillment.

13. When buying demotivates you

The consumption unconscious can act immobilizing other resources, tools and solutions we have, we can develop or even can already implement to positively transform our lives (change jobs, put limits on the couple, family …).

It is preferable to act on the root of problems (work, relationships, objects …) than to cover them up with consumption.

14. Choose the positive

In this way, if we generate responsible consumption habits, simple and focused on our own health and that of others, and if we avoid negative social and environmental impacts (opting for fair trade products, agro-ecological foods …), we will obtain lasting satisfaction and transcendent beyond the material and using consumption as a subterfuge for other problems or concerns.

We will be using consumption as a tool for socio-environmental transformation that rewards good production models, as well as well-made services and products, with positive impacts on the planet and its beings.

15. Focus on what’s important

As in every daily act, raising awareness in the act of consuming (why we do it, what place it occupies in our life …) helps us to focus on what is important and significant, to reduce consumption to what is necessary, granting ourselves a whim, but sticking to buying less and better, enjoying more than having (for example, renting instead of buying) and that leisure does not always imply the obligation to consume.

16. What do we want to support?

We can repair or recycle damaged or unusable appliances.

And reflect when buying on the origin of the articles, on the production model from which they come (industrial, ecological, fair trade …), on their possible impact on health, on the planet and on other beings or people involved.

And consciously decide if we really want to support that with our money and consumption.

17. Less to enjoy more

It is about owning less and enjoying more (there are more options in addition to buying) and when we go to buy something, let it be little and of quality. Not only is its result better, but in the short term you gain space (mental and physical) and in the long run you save money (for everything you stop consuming).

18. We are unique beings

We only live once. What makes this journey of life meaningful is not what we possess, but who we are. Each human being is much more special than any consumer object because each one of us is completely unique and unrepeatable.