 This year I had to renew my passport in 2019. It was expired and when you renew your passport, they actually send you back your old passport and This thing has some nostalgia This thing, you know, if I had a sentimental Possession this would be it. I mean I've been I've been all over with this. There's Bolivia Belize that was a great trip. There's Where is this? Peru Mexico Guatemala See in lots of stuff. Oh Cambodia so this thing you can see it's pretty large a lot of amazing memories in here and When I got this back, I thought okay now This is something that I want to keep and many of you know that for a while I had literally just a hundred eleven possessions all of which fit in my backpack and then after that I've lived in a tiny house in in Orlando with almost no real material possessions there as well So, you know, I don't really hold on to material possessions or sentimental things, but this Actually gave me that feeling of something that I wanted to hold on to but I really practice non materialism and non ownership and living in the present so I decided I was gonna do something and That is that I wasn't gonna keep this Just as continuing that practice of Not holding on to the past and living in the present. So I decided that you know thing that would make sense to do is just Cut it up but then Just last night as I was planning this video what I was gonna say I thought about it and I thought This actually doesn't make sense to cut up Not because I'm gonna keep it though Because I don't want it But I thought about my mom and I thought about all the postcards that I sent her from these many countries And how much joy that brought her and I thought of ten years of those postcards and those conversations Wrapped up in this passport and I thought this would bring my mom a lot of joy She would absolutely love to have this so rather than cut it up I'm gonna send it to my mom and you know honestly for me. I'd it's a it's The selfish thing to do would be to cut it up because I'd rather just have it not exist and I know that Years down the road. I'm gonna see this again at my at my mom's house. So it won't be completely Removed but it will be no longer a possession of mine And it's a possession that will bring value and happiness to my mom So love you mom and this is gonna be in the mail coming your way Basically the meaning for my mom is much more meaningful to me. So that's where it's going The reason I'm making this video though is that I see this as a great opportunity to Share something with you to talk about Simplifying your life to talk about downsizing. I Get you know so many people that look at my life and they they ask How they can start to simplify how they can start to free themselves from their huge amount of possessions that are tying them down And I see it, you know, I see that it's something that millions of people Want right now, but they're stuck and they they don't know how to Start and they don't know how to get to where they're trying to go so I wanted to share my story a little bit and At the same time give tips on what you can do to get started So I grew up very low income in a house with you know a very small house with my mom and four siblings and Because of that, I believe that I sort of had this thirst for Material possessions. I wanted to fill the holes inside of me that existed because I thought of myself as poor and Different from other people. I looked at my friends that were wealthier and I saw myself as lacking So material possessions were my way to fill that so I was a collector I collect I collected everything that you could collect cards coins Pogs action figures Rocks stamps and my biggest addiction really was beanie babies. I actually had over 700 beanie babies and my mom had I think over 500 we were beanie baby addicts major beanie baby collectors and For you know a large portion of my life I was very focused on material possessions because I saw them as a way to build myself up to to create a Vision of who I was that might have been through having a huge closet of clothes was you know through my car It was through my material possessions through financial wealth but then Something happened and I realized that that's not the life that I wanted to live anymore. I Realized that those material possessions were not bringing me the health and the happiness and the purpose and the passion that I wanted and That maybe my life could be better with less and so One of the early things that I watched was actually the story of stuff and I learned about the destruction that our stuff causes from You know the extraction of the materials to make it to the production of it to the shipping of it to the usage of it to The trashing of it and that was a big wake-up call to me Just realizing that my stuff was destroying the world and that it wasn't bringing me health and happiness and That I was just buying into this corporate idea that I needed their things to be happy and healthy So it was a wake-up in many ways personal environmental Truth justice equality and That's when I decided I was gonna start getting rid of stuff now at the time though. I had a lot of possessions I was living in a three bedroom apartment in San Diego And I actually had the biggest room in the apartment because of my stuff And there was the living room in the closet and the kitchen and it was all Stuff so I had to figure out how to get rid of that and that was a big task and I really wanted to make it clear that where I am today and where I was in the past was not overnight It was because of a lot of work. It was because I made it my full-time job to simplify my life and unravel The mess that I had gotten myself into over the last few decades the last couple decades so I started with an activity and that was that I would The goal was to get rid of stuff that I didn't want that added clutter to my life that didn't add value So what I did is I would I would go through my house and I would look at each item and I would say Does this bring value to my life? Is this making my life better or is this actually Taking away time is it adding clutter which makes the house harder to clean so it takes more time to clean Is it possibly costing me money through insurance or you know constant updating and If the answer was no it doesn't bring me much value and it actually takes away from my life Then the answer was to get rid of it. So that was the big big That was a big starting point and the other question that I would ask is have I used this in the last say six to twelve months if it's not something I was getting used out of then I could Remove it from my life to make space For doing what I really wanted to do. So those are two really helpful questions to me that I would recommend to you now What I did is that I would basically go through my house say every six or twelve months And I would do that exercise over and over and over Over a period of years and so I would half my stuff and then half my stuff again And a lot of the things that the last time around I wasn't able to get rid of the next time that I was so it was a transition And slowly but surely I shrunk my possessions I actually went from the biggest room to the smallest room then I moved into a six by six closet in my house I still had the living room and the kitchen but as far as my possessions I had the six by six closet as my room Then I lived in a the 50 square foot tiny house in San Diego and then I got my life down to just 111 possessions that I traveled for two years with all on my back or on my bicycle So the point is though it took time. It was a transition. It's not something that I could do overnight It's not something that you'll be over able to do overnight You have to start somewhere and that could be with one item and And it's gonna take time for some people it's gonna take it could take five or ten years for me I was deep, but I wasn't as deep as many people with Storage lockers and large houses. I had a three bedroom apartment, but no storage lockers and no garage So it was easier for me, but still took years of Detachment and getting rid of things. So all of these questions were basically like Marie Kondo's question Does this spark joy? but basically a little bit more Practical but going for the exact same essence really I think Now I want to share some other things that I did to help get rid of stuff and Questions that I asked and tips that you can that you can use as well So another thing when I was trying to get rid of things. I would ask myself is Can I rent this instead if I'm not using it very often can I rent it? For example a surfboard if I was only using a surfboard every couple months Could I just rent it instead so I didn't have to store it and have all that space or a car Ultimately in 2012. I decided to get rid of my car and that was a big step for me But I did all the math and I was spending $7,000 a year on my car and I realized if I just wanted to rent a car once a month I could do that so I could still use a car when needed by renting it even better than renting is sharing Talking to your neighbors getting connected to your neighbors talking to your friends Maybe your friends my friends at the time had a whole bunch of surfboards So I didn't really need one since I wasn't going often So it's about you can rent the items and then sharing and sharing can be with friends and family But it can also be the bigger picture the sharing economy. There's all sorts of websites There's there's all sorts of ways to share resources with others the library is a perfect example You can rent tools. There's so many ways to rent or to share and that's something that I would really recommend Another way that I dealt with possessions and that you can as well is if there's something that that you Really like and you would like to continue using but rarely as you can give it to a friend Who would use it way more than you and he would get you know a far better use out of it and just ask them Hey, if I give you this, maybe it's the maybe it's a guitar or maybe it's um, you know A high-power kitchen, you know a blender for the kitchen if they would use it all the time And you would use it sometimes you could say hey, can I give you this and could I Borrow it from you once once in a while. That's a great way to pass something on but still have Access to something that you would need Now what about things that are extremely meaningful to you? I've had a lot of people ask me questions about sentimental items how to Get rid of those and one guy asked me he had a guitar for decades And he loved that guitar and just could not see getting rid of it So what I suggested to him is to find somebody with no guitar Who couldn't otherwise afford or access one maybe a young developing youth and Give them that guitar so that they can love it and they can appreciate it and they can get value out of it Then much more value than it's sitting in his In his living room or in his closet and in that way this possession can bring you more joy By not having it by knowing that somebody else has it and even better you can follow up with that person I told them follow up with that person and and and see the joy that it brings them and if you want to go even further go ahead and be Selfless and purchase lessons for that person and actually help them develop With that guitar so that's another way to deal with sentimental items to give it to somebody where it brings more Value and more sentiment to them and that can bring you joy and that possession can live on in your mind and in your legacy And not be clutter and not be something that you have to feel guilty about that's sitting around and not getting used So a few other things that you can do there's thrift stores, but I do want to Keep in mind that with thrift stores a lot of that stuff does get thrown away The thrift store dumpsters are full of stuff You know thrift stores are great, but just keep that in mind that it doesn't necessarily mean it's not ending up in the garbage And also that it's not creating problems a lot of stuff that we donate like our clothes is shipped to other countries Where there it actually can cause problems it can destroy local business opportunities and local businesses So donating it is definitely a great option But just keep that in mind that that it doesn't that there's there's some realities behind it Another thing that you can do is you can have a giveaway party So it takes a lot of work to get rid of things what you can do is you can have a party for your friends and Anyone in the community if you want and you can have them over and everything that you want to give away can Be obvious whether it's in one room of your house or Labeled within the house and have people come and they can take those things which saves you a lot of work makes a great you know experience and Helps get those possessions to people that can use them. You can also sell Possessions, you know, that's a great way to get the money back. You could sell them on Craigslist you can do eBay you can do yard sales. There's all sorts of websites for for selling possessions So that's another thing you can do. You can also donate it for example to places like materials for the arts So there's organizations that that repurpose things to make Costumes or to make art so you can donate things to organizations like that Get creative. There's so many ways to deal with the stuff and it can actually be fun And it can be enjoyable to let go but I do want to say it is work It's something you have to be intentional about and it is definitely going to take work a couple other things to mention Recycling there's a lot of things that you can recycle so Getting rid of things that way through recycling Some things are probably going to have to go in the trash. I don't feel bad I didn't feel bad about having to put some things in the trash because honestly Whether it's sitting for 80 years in your house or it's sitting in a landfill plastic containers, for example That can't be recycled or something It doesn't really make a difference. It's all trash whether it's in your cabinets or it's in the landfill a Lot of it is garbage regardless not saying go out willy-nilly and just throw everything in the landfill But there's some things that you know that that garb the putting things in the trash can make sense Another little note on that side. I see people who you know They have all these plastic utensils or plastic cups in their in their drawers or their shelves because they got them Eating out and then they want to use them over and over and over so that they Get more use out of them, but they have perfectly good metal utensils and glass cups It's delusional to think that using that plastic spoon 20 times is in any way beneficial to the environment When you have your reusable ones in the counter in you know there in the kitchen It doesn't make any difference. You're not doing anything more environmentally friendly So you can let go of those things you don't have to hold on to them Filling your space with with junk that really is a delusion to think that using it is Making things better all of those tips were on how to Get rid of things and the idea of getting rid of things isn't so that you have less it's so that you have more It's about making space to do the things that you love to spend time with friends and family to to follow your passions and your purpose to learn to spend your time learning and immersing in the world and For me that's been the big thing. I've gained from having less. I haven't I haven't taken away from my life I've added value to my life. Otherwise. I wouldn't be doing it So I want to talk a little bit about what you can do to prevent more stuff from coming into your life Because getting rid of things is only one part of it. It's easy to accrue more possessions So when you're gonna buy something one thing you can you do is you can ask Do I really need this or do I just want this and? Is this just a passing feeling in the long run? You know, will I be fine without this? That's a basic question that you can ask in order to not accrue stuff if the answer is I don't really need it Then you can not buy it Another thing you can do is you can be okay with saying no being okay with saying no to other people when they want to give you something and Just explain that you know You're trying to live a life with less possessions and more simply and that you value them and you value their desire to give You something but it's just not something that you need right now be soft be gentle and also Explain that you can share Experiences if people want to give gifts you can tell them that you'd rather have the experience of a dinner together or or going To an event together or something like that a big one is Not having a car or driving the car a lot less or if you're a multi car family having fewer cars And one of the big things is when you don't have a car You don't have a trunk when you don't have a trunk It's harder to buy things if you ride your bike locally to the hardware store or to the grocery shop Go to the grocery store or whatever it is. You don't have a trunk to fill up with stuff So not having a car or driving the car a lot less is a great way to end up buying a lot less to accumulating a lot less another great thing to do is buy Quality items that are gonna last not things that are gonna break and then you have you know them sitting around so buying quality items and then buying items that are multi-purpose so things that can be used for many Different ways a multi-tool knife is a perfect example. It's got many tools on it It's a small thing But that can go to to many different things whether it's in your kitchen or your living room or your bedroom buying multi-purpose items that can be used in many ways I Mentioned earlier sharing, but I can't say that enough times just sharing things Not everybody needs to have one of everything in the neighborhood if ten people have a blender But most of them are not using it very often. It's just completely unnecessary So sharing with neighbors a lawnmower is a perfect example of that Ten houses could definitely share one lawnmower, which saves you a ton of money a ton of storage space You can split the costs also of maintenance and things like that So sharing as well as through the sharing economy all the websites that exist your public library. There's libraries of things car share programs bike share programs sharing is incredible and Then connecting with your community one of the best things about all of this is that This is a way to actually get you more involved with your community get you out of your house get you more Social bring that value to your life through community and again, none of this is about it's not about Suffering it's not about living without it's all about Living in a way that we can live with our purpose with our passion with our actions and alignment with our beliefs So my hopes is that you know through this video. You've gotten some tips. There's a lot here So I'm sure you now have what you need to get started to get going and remember it's gonna take work It's gonna take time. It's gonna take effort. It's there's gonna be times when maybe it's gonna make you cry And you're gonna feel down. It's gonna take work, but This video hopefully gives you those tools to get started to inspire you and empower you and now it's about starting that journey So if you got a lot out of this video if you got inspiration You got some education and you think that this is a video worth other people seeing then I encourage you to Share this video share it with your friends that you want to help downsize Like the video or click that thumbs up that'll help get it out there across YouTube to other people comment ask questions, I'll try to answer most of the questions and That'll help spread it as well and I can share some more information with you And if you haven't already definitely subscribe if you want to see more of this So it's been great sitting down with you and sharing how you can simplify your life to live with more and I love You all very much and see you soon