"I Own Nothing" - Why I Got Rid of 99% of My Material Possessions

Around the end of 2023, I decided that I had enough, literally and figuratively.

I had many of the markers of success that, by western societal standards, should’ve made me happy. 

I had a nice home in an upscale neighborhood. The home had a dedicated office from which I could comfortably work remotely. I had a library of books, some of which I purchased with the intention of reading but never got around to it.  I had a wardrobe of clothes, some of which I never wore.  I went above and beyond to style my home with furniture that created a nice “vibe.” And most significantly, I had a decently paying job that allowed me to finance my lifestyle.

Despite all of this, something really never sat well with me.  Every time I found myself commuting to work, sitting in meetings, or spending my days focusing my time and energy around some corporate goal that was not in alignment with my personal interests and curiosities, I couldn’t help but to feel like I was traveling down the wrong path in life.

I get it.  By society’s standards, I should’ve not only been content, but I should also have felt like I’m doing the right thing by climbing the corporate ladder, building a comfortable and convenient life for myself, and continuously growing my financial assets. 

Afterall, isn’t that what life is all about?

Well. I don’t think so.

You see.. I have been on this health and spiritual journey for many years now, and with each passing year of deep introspection I felt like I have slowly gravitated toward a greater state of clarity regarding what I want for myself in this life.

It dawned upon me that everywhere we look, every direction we turn, we are bombarded by messaging from marketers, from our peers, and even from prospective romantic partners that distract us from what we truly want, and instead try to convince us that things we don’t actually want or need will bring us happiness.

So for me, the first milestone was understanding that the prevailing narrative places consumeristic contingencies on happiness, and the second was getting to a point where I began to fundamentally reject the notion that the pursuit of more, the pursuit of comfort and conveniences, the pursuit of things that convey symbols of status, etc… will bring true and lasting happiness.

In fact, I started to believe that the pursuit of more actually does the opposite. It leads to unhappiness. It leads to a lack of gratitude, and a mindset of scarcity because we’ve given external factors the power to dictate our internal state of consciousness.  And when we hand that power over, the world will try it’s best to convince you that your unhappiness, your boredom, your discomfort, or your inconveniences will be cured if you buy whatever thing, service, subscription, they are selling.

But in the process, doing so moves us even farther away from the aspects of life that actually make us feel content and fulfilled.  I can’t speak for everyone, but I’d argue that financial security and independence is pretty high up there on the list of desires.  I’d also argue that being healthy in mind and body is high up on the list of things that people really want for themselves.  I’d argue that being able to spend time however, wherever, and with whoever people wish is high up there on the list of satisfying life circumstances. 

The irony is that consumerism moves us away from these ideals. It places us in a state of greater financial insecurity.  And because the financial insecurity persists, we must now depend on a job that, for many, has deleterious effects on physical and mental health. And because we’re working this job, we also can’t spend our time with who, how, and where we please.

Only after I genuinely started to believe that the pursuit of more stuff, and the consumerist lifestyle, is not only misguided, but actually a major hinderance for me and my life.  I knew that significantly downsizing and simplifying my life would be a major piece of my grander life strategy. Getting rid of most of my material possessions would be the first step in creating more space for myself, physical, financial, and mental space, to explore pathways that enable me to truly feel gratitude, and to be fully present in the journey of life as an explorer… To ultimately realize my life’s purpose.

But what is my purpose in life?

I always say that finding what makes you feel fulfilled, finding your purpose, is not necessarily an easy task.  So I use a process called “anti-visioning” to find my greatest pain points in life. Then I use those pain points to direct me towards my purpose.  Or another way to look at it is that your most basic purpose in life is to alleviate the pain points that are present in your life today.

My top pain points included:

• Feeling like I was being forced to sacrifice my health in the name of feeding the capitalist machine.

• Not being able to spend my time freely exploring interesting ideas, and engaging with like-minded people who are also interested in entrepreneurship, self-improvement, health, etc.

  
  

• Feeling like my potential to do great things was being stifled by having to direct most of my energy towards my 9-5 job.

  
  

• Feeling like unnecessary obligations and liabilities were preventing me from exercising geographic autonomy.

Now let’s see what happens when I take these pain points and envision what life looks like without:

• I have plenty of time and flexibility to make my health and wellness a priority every day.

  
  

• I’m able to freely dive deep into different topics and projects that interest me.  For me, this specifically means pursuing a life goal of learning a second language, starting and growing my wellness business, and learning a wide array of new skills and expertise.

  
  

• My work allows me to tap into my knowledge, creativity, skills, and unique perspective of the world based on my personal experiences.

  
  

• My life is more worry-free because I have minimized my obligations and liabilities down to the bare essentials for my lifestyle.

Simplifying this into a few words that are easier to keep in my back pocket, I can say that the following are values that will guide me to my greater life purpose:

Health, autonomy, connectedness, simplicity, and peace.

What’s notable about this list is that it really has nothing to do with the markers of success in western society, particularly in the United States. In fact, the traditional success measures are by and large antithetical to my ideal lifestyle.

So, this leads me to deciding to get rid of most of everything I own.  And the important thing here is that I’m not looking to get rid of stuff just for the sake of getting rid of it.  That’s not a very helpful approach.  But in doing the work to really understand myself and what it is that brings me joy and fulfillment helps me to be more specific with what I decide to keep and what I decide to eliminate from my life.

Since I have more clarity on what my anti-vision, my vision, and my purpose are, I can selectively, yet ruthlessly, eliminate anything in my life that doesn’t align with my purpose to great effect.  And that’s exactly what I did.

If it doesn’t actively bring me health, autonomy, connectedness, simplicity, or peace, then I eliminated it.

I put my primary U.S. residence in Chicago on the market because I’m only in Chicago part time now, I don’t want the stress that comes with owning and maintaining a home on the other side of the world.  I should also note that I considered converting it into a rental property, but once again, when weighing the earning potential against the cost of the home in terms of my time, my peace of mind, etc., I decided that it was better to sell.

Out of the maybe 100 books I owned, I gave away about 95 of them.  This one was particularly difficult because reading is such a fundamental part of my joy. One might ask why I would give away books if I enjoy reading so much, but that’s the thing… books that are sitting on the shelf are not being read. A book that is in the process of being read is a book that is adding value to my life.  But a book that I have finished is no longer providing value.  The value transfer has already taken place, and the physical book then becomes just one more thing that I have to worry about (I have to store it somewhere, maintain it, take it with me if I move homes, etc.)

Clothes were another big part of my minimization effort.  This is another one of those things that I think unknowingly brings much stress into people’s lives in the form of clutter, decision fatigue, laundry obligations, storage, etc. The stress and anxiety that comes from trying to decide what to wear, or what to pack in the case of travel, is not something that has a place in my life. What’s more is that one of the first things people look for when buying or renting a new place is closet space, and oftentimes not having enough of it is the “deal breaker” because it’s not enough to hold all of the clothes that people have accumulated over the years.

Situations like that are far removed from my values and from my purpose identified earlier in this article, so I donated or tossed about 2/3 of my wardrobe, keeping only the items of clothing that I wear often, or are of high utility (like a raincoat).

I also gave away or got rid of all of my household furniture. All of my art. All of the random items that were in my home.  If I had a car I would have sold that too, but fortunately I already went carless back in 2016 for similar reason that I am downsizing today.

I got rid of basically everything I own with a few exceptions.

One thing that’s quite striking about getting rid of most of the stuff you own is that you quickly realize that your stuff is not that valuable. No one is willing to pay anything close to what you think it’s worth, and in a lot of cases, depending on what it is, people won’t even take your stuff for free.

Another thing that probably doesn’t come to mind when talking about getting rid of stuff is subscription services.  I prefer to read and do other things with my time, so I pulled the plug on all of the streaming services that I had, in addition to my Amazon prime subscription.

So, what is the result of this?  Is my life changed for the better? Do I regret it?

I’ve reduced my life down to basically whatever can fit into one large moving box. I don’t have that burden of having stuff to weigh me down or prevent me from really exploring the world.  I don’t have to think about, “what should I do with all of my stuff?” when some unique opportunity comes along.

I’ve since quit my 9-5 job and immigrated to Portugal, where I live a much slower, a much more connected, much more purposeful lifestyle where I’m much more aligned with my values.  One of my values was “health,” and here in Portugal I’m able to eat fresh foods and get fresh air working out in the park every day.

I also talked about autonomy.  Since I drastically reduced my living expenses and liabilities, I no longer need to depend on income from full-time work and can now focus on my online entrepreneurship projects.  In doing this I have far more ability to dictate how I spend my time.  I’m also able to travel more freely.

My life, although not perfect, is all around less complicated. I have fewer bills to pay, less property and possessions to worry about maintaining. I have more financial freedom, not because I make more, but because I spend less.

I rent fully furnished apartments now, so when it’s time to move, I don’t have the burden of needing to move all of my furniture. I can go anywhere in the world with my box, sit my box down, and be fully moved in.  Also, when I decide to move to a new place, I’ll never find myself saying things like “there’s not enough storage space.”

Whenever I visit Chicago, I can just rent an Airbnb for an extended time instead of dealing with the burden of home ownership.

I could go down the list of how much more connected my life is now that I’ve taken this drastic step to be in more alignment with my values and my purpose, but that’ll take forever. So, I’ll just say that in all, I feel so much lighter, I have so much less pressure to live the standard lifestyle that we’ve been told we need to live.  I have far less physical, mental, and emotional clutter, and therefore I’m able to focus much more of my life energy on things that bring me true joy and fulfilment; the things that are nowhere to be found in the consumerism-centric lifestyle.

And I’d like to think that you too would benefit from downsizing in your own life in whatever way aligns with your values.  But to do this you need to know your anti-vision, your vision, and your purpose.

And on that note, I’ll end by saying that if you have also feel like you can benefit from simplifying your life but maybe you’re’ a bit unsure as to how to go about things… or if you need additional perspective from someone who has a more objective point of view, then feel free to schedule a consultation with me and we’ll not only talk about it, but we’ll also make sure you walk away from the conversation with more clarity and actionable steps that you can take to start really creating the life you want for yourself.