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This is Video Part 1
the apartment minimalist challenge so
at this time in my life I'm currently looking to change the amount of time
am spending taking care of all the stuff that I on
my hope is that at the end it is challenge not only am I going to own
last
but I'm also going to be spending last on consumer goods
and become more eco-friendly in the process in the modern world where all
surrounded with
what to buy what to eat what to wear what to do all that comes down to one
thing:
what will make us happy so I've spent the last
10 years of my life find these messages to the point where I'm finding
I'm not so happy because when I am home i'm saying a majority of time
taking care of all the stuff that I am and
I'm looking to take that at least a portion
on that amount of time and spending you're doing well
so over this past week
actually did a study on my cell and documented how much time
and money I'm currently spending on consumer goods
and counted every item that it currently on so the first area that examines
was how much time all week I am spending doing
I'm household chores basically
anything taking care of the stuff that I am and the house will try as they
included in this include
laundry doing dishes vacuuming organizing tidying up cleaning and
trying to find
stuff that I own in as a girl finding your things is
always a problem my first thought was that I was spending about 15 minutes a
day
and about an hour and a half on the weekends doing but when I actually took
a timer
and added up at the end of that we can much time I was
actually spending actually found I was spending clustered
30 minutes a day and about two and a half hours on the weekends
now I am in a city apartment
and it is a rarity and any city apartment actually has
I'm a washing machine or on
a dishwasher it's actually Mericle if you find one so
I am you know doing my dishes by hand stars lined yugos
I am using a laundromat but and just calculating
on taking Mike how how long it takes me to take my clothes
to the laundrymat and just to give an idea
what exactly it is that I'm here some I'm
when I added up the total amount of time at the end of that one week
actually found them spending about five hours a week i'm taking care of all the
stuff today on and then
over a period of about a month that's twenty hours I'm not
I'm spending on stuff now
I did find some interesting statistics and information that I posted in the
About section of the speech
and that is that the average American spends about seven hours a week
taking care of their stuff now with the statistics
there are a lot of parts that go into you
I be able to accurately I'm
you know decide are just calculate
what those statistics are but and for this purpose
I'm not trying to get into the nitty-gritty details I'll
on geography here a journey thing like that I just was looking into it because
I just wanted to give myself a general idea
up when I'm working with and the reason being is because I want to
I wanted to set realistic goals for myself the second area that I looked
into US how much money and spending
a week buying consumer goods and to meet consumer goods means clothes shoes
jewelry
HomeGoods hobbies electronics basically
any product and I'm buying breaking into my home
and staying my guess would have been that I was spending about sixty dollars
a week
but when I actually went to my bank account it was actually closer to eighty
five dollars a week
and I'm compared to average
american consumers spend about fifty six dollars a week
I definitely am coming in a little over on
now I am calculating York City places so things here are a little bit more
expensive
but I still liked you I'm cut back on that amount of money that I'm spending
and start saving and sad
on okay so the thirty year and I looked into US
County items I currently on and the amount of items that are currently on
is 400 in ninety-six items and yes
actually account every single item that a on
so as of right now I have 29 items in my
after 51 items in my kitchen
19 items in my living room 63 items in my closet
and a whopping 334 items in my bedroom which gives me that total
496 items
so looking at these numbers obviously my two
biggest challenges are going to be my closet MI badger
not suspect actually ha I'm actually in my room right now
and I've actually hold out everything
from the cause its and Dom opened up all my chores just to give an example
%uh wants I'm 334 items actually looks like so
as you can see I hold on holed up in my
quiet my dresser drawers
I'm a vanity over here you can see the boxes on the floor
and vanity over here on the jurors are open as well
on and the reason I'm showing this is because
I think especially over an accumulated amount of time
we start losing track of how much stuff we actually own actually
mentally I don't think we can really picture what exactly that looks like
so on I just wanted to show this all
visually so here in my room alone
actually actually had eighty percent everything
that I own I was unable to find how many items
the average consumer owns however
I did find a study that was done in net that did show that
on average American household has about 2500
items and given that each household has about on average 2.6 people
and U-mass it actually comes out to you
on average the American consumer owns 962 I am
now I'm not saying that these are facts this is just
through my own personal research just to understand
once again I'm just trying to provide understanding I love
on the information or just
certain statistics that are out there I'm to set those realistic goals
so I am happy to say that I am at least consuming last
than the average american but I can still get rid of a lot of things
said the big challenge that I'm giving myself is to minimize my apartment 200
items
total so what does this mean well first off to me
a minimalist lifestyle means to only own
the things they're necessity and add to your life
and the things that you do choose to own you are fully utilizing those items
and when purchasing new items you're doing so
in order to replace the things that you are using because they've been more now
so deciding what two hundred items I'm going to keep
is going to be quite the challenge
now I'm definitely not saying 200 items
is the magic number for anyone I'm in fact if you are somebody that does own
nine hundred-plus items this challenge is definitely going to be a bit more
extreme
I'm but the play to this whole exercise
is defined what your balances in your home
how many items can you own so you feel that you're living comfortably
but not feeling like you're being consumed by these items
so it really comes down to how much time and money do you wanna spend on your
stuff
and as much as like is about spirituality into motion
it's also about math and science so for me owning
496 items is causing me to be over around
but owning 0 items is also causing me to be over around
and you find that middle range up how many items
can I own so that I still feel balanced
as a person and also
my that not that number items that I'm using
is not taking away from my life and is actually adding to the very experienced
other
so when looking through all the stuff today on I can be easily tell you right
off the bat
I'm not using half this stuff in fact if it's if
sitting in my closet for who knows
six months a year well doing in there like obviously it's not doesn't have a
place our purpose
now if that's the case should probably think about
I'm getting rid of some of that stuff now I do you live on the east coast so
there are a lot of
on weather and seasonal changes here so I do you own
items for the Four Seasons
and in this whole process I still wanna live comfortably in fashionably as well
so for me two hundred items is
a good number to shoot for but if I come in a little over
you know I think it's just all about where's your balance
and what's comfortable for you that that's basically what this whole
exercise
is about so I have to rule that I'm actually going to apply to this
challenge before getting started
and the first rule is items aren't regularly disposable
are to be counted so items that I'm not including
just to make that very clear is food
beauty products on personal care products
on also I'm not including socks and underwear because those are things that
we wear through
I'm quite frequently and definitely more quickly than anything else
the second rule that I'm applying is if on
items to be paired together so for example
if I have take my cell phone and I have my charger on top of it
I many campuses one I am because I really can't have one item
without others I'm carrying this item together and counting it as just one
saddam talk about some other questions and concerns that I currently have
before taking on this challenge
first is how I clench decide what to keep
so I've decided that would every item that I own
I'm going to ask myself have a uses 8 a.m.
in the last six months and the reason why I'm choosing the time span of six
months is because
there's enough life and weather and it just basically event challenge I'm
changes that have happened in this amount of time
that you know it it's just a good approximation
to use for time period so if I can remember when I use an item
where it's been longer than half a year I'm not going to keep it
my next question on that I have is
when I needed you with the items I don't like
now all this of course depends on the actual item that you no longer want
on but just to start I'm actually gonna actually created three different bands
that are behind me
so just to show you I have
have my Selby might donate and then
my trash bin so obviously my goal
is with the things that I don't want the number one choice would be
is to actually sell as much stuff as possible
but where to do this of course depends on the actual item
so in my follow-up videos I'm actually in a cover
items that I did wanna sell and how I went about doing that
on the next thing is for donation so I'm using this pain for items that are still
good
but I can't necessarily sell urge maybe the value
I'm other item is it really work selling just the man a tiny have to put in
selling it maybe it's not worth it
but it's still the front people to use so it's best to donate it
and then the last spin that I have is my trash can
and I I want very little in this band overall and the reason being is because
I wanna go about this in the most
eco-friendly way possible so items that I am playing in my trash bin
are basically ir broken on or will be taken to donation
the next question I have is so what do they really didn't think about doing
this
and my answer is that it surely only matter what you think
and I'm courses is always easier said than done
but I do have a close on a few close friends and family that I've already
talked about all this to you
and they actually are some ima climbing on board
and down they're actually doing the same in their homes as well
and so in the follow-up video also be able to you cover
what the results are. am in more detail
but I've yet to come across anyone that doesn't feel that they need to hire do
the same
or at least get rid of the few things
so right now I'm feeling quite excited about taking this challenge
I'm already feeling like there's a big weight that's being lifted off my age
my shoulders and also anxious because I'm not exactly sure yet what challenges
and then come across during all this
so in the next video on going to post am it's gonna cover in detail what happened
after I completed this apartment minimalist challenge
on way to talk about the challenges they came across however after those
challenges and my overall final results
and also gonna work through and there's different boxes behind me how I went
about selling stuff how I went about donating stuff
on and just and basically
what all happened in the and sell thank you for watching and make sure to check
out the links they posted
on this video page so stay tuned