I’ve been reading a lot of minimalist inspired writing this year. I fancy myself an aspiring minimalist and recovering consumer. I enjoy hearing different perspectives and can usually find nuggets that I can apply to my own developing minimalist philosophy. As I’ve been reading, I’ve noticed that although there are many common minimalist principles there are a few distinct differences in the philosophies. I have begun to classify them in my mind as five different schools of minimalism. The Five Schools of Minimalism Each of the schools is driven by a root motivation that the philosophy places ultimate importance on. These five motivations are the following: saving money, protecting the environment, freeing oneself from oppression, living conveniently through simplicity, and sacrificing for others. Before I describe the schools, I would like to caveat what I mean by minimalism. In general I am referring to those that are consciously and explicitly
My Former Desk As of last week, this is what my desk at work looked like. There wasn’t too much to it as far as work spaces go: Macbook Pro 30″ Monitor Framed picture of my wife & recently-printed-from-the-design-team-printer picture of my son Headphones & Mouse Water bottle & bowl for afternoon snacks A few trophies I won at work events That filing cabinet under my desk is mainly storage for running clothes (only clean clothes of course). We have an active culture and every day there is some sort of afternoon activity; running, basketball, flag football, yoga, etc. My decision to experiment with not having a desk happened by accident. It started with my new laptop, a 13″ Macbook Pro Retina. It only weighs about 3lbs which is why I got it. I wanted to have something small and light so I can carry it back and forth to