Creating a balanced system in my wordrobe.
Hi, this is my first time writing in this community. I was intrigued by this week's #KISS prompt, especially this one: “some individuals perceive minimalism tendencies as a flaw. please tell us about a time when someone took your habits personally. how did the situation conclude, and what were your key takeaways?”
I personally never called myself a minimalist; I just simply live that way effortlessly. It may seem effortless, but we all know how hard it is to avoid getting carried away by materialistic lifestyle nowadays. One thing that come to my mind when I read that prompt was clothes. I personally kinda follow “1 in, 1 out” system for my wardrobe, which refers to rules where for every item entering a space, one must leave, creating a balanced system.
Initially, I didn’t plan to follow the rules at all. But somehow, I unconsciously developed the habit over the years. The reason is, having a lot of stuff makes me simply feel uncomfortable in some ways. I just don’t want to organize many things. That’s why I keep my wardrobe simple.
So, when I want to buy a new clothes, I have to sort through my closet and see which items I rarely wear. Sometimes I donate it or give it to family members, but other times I’ll sell it at online thrift store if the price is quite nice😁 The real challenge is when I can’t find any clothes to declutter. So that means, I can’t buy a new clothes. That isn’t always happen; sometimes I break my rules when I really wanted the clothes.
I’m also a creature of habit in this case, where even though I’ve enough clothes, I somehow always wear the same ones over and over again. Even when I was working onsite, I try to keep it simple with 6 shirts and 2-3 bottoms throughout the entire week. However, with that system, it may seemed like the clothes I’m wearing on Monday would be the same every week, right?🤣
Perhaps that was triggering someone close to me to comment on the way I dressed up. I once heard my mom asked me something like, “Don’t you think people look at you and think you dont have anything else to wear?”. At first, I was definitely offended by that comment. But I realized that I didn’t need to.
I’m not someone who doesn’t care at all about appearance, but I also won’t bother myself with something unnecessary. As long as I feel comfortable and my clothes are clean, that’s enough for me. Growing up has also made me realized that people don’t think about us as much as we think they do, right?
My personal takeaway is that we were raised and growth differently. I don’t have to get offended because lifestyle is also a personal journey in my opinion. My perspective may differ from my mother's. And I know she was just worried that others probably would think the same way as how she think about me, so she tried to talk to me first before someone else made the same comment and I become even more offended.
I can’t remember how I responded to my mom at the time, but now I think I’m more comfortable with my lifestyle. Because I’m also trying to understand where my mom’s perspective is coming from. I think we’re so lucky to have a community like this where we can share our values with each other, which also leads to an improvement in our belief systems about certain lifestyle.
Meanwhile, in my mom’s environment, that might not be the case. Perhaps she was surronded by people who valued material things more than anything else, so she herself wasn’t able to consider other values beyond that. That alone could be another disscusion; about how being surronded by people who have the same values can help us stay grounded.
I wish I can write about this topic a bit better another time, but for now, that's all I can share hehe thanks for reading! I’d love to read your thoughts as well, hivers :)