Greetings!
Many times, I've written here about how a low income and poor family background pushed me into living a minimalist life, cutting down a lot of expenses, and living simply. Sometimes, this simplicity went beyond minimalism and was actually due to a lack of money to live even a moderately simple life.
At a certain stage in my life, I've come to realize that minimalism is not about being poor or living a poor lifestyle. Of course, one can have all the money to squander and still choose to live a very simple life.
There's no doubt about it, lack of money can make someone live simply, but such a person might not be comfortable with it. Meanwhile, minimalism entails living simply and happily. If happiness and satisfaction are removed, then I doubt such a lifestyle can be termed minimalism.
I've lived a very compromised life before, all in the name of practicing minimalism, especially during my schooling days.
There were days I ate one type of meal for a week without changing it. I had that particular meal in bulk, and because I didn't want to spend further—seeing that spending on another food was wasteful—I went on eating 'eba and soup' for a whole week without having another meal. I was on track, living simply (living with what I had), but come on, isn't that poverty mentality?
Let me tell you something about this food called Eba(Cassava flake made in Africa way). There's a saying that eating too much 'eba' can blur the eyes. Imagine if my eyes were blurred at that moment! Who knows? Maybe the effect is still coming, but God forbid, it won't.🤩
That's one of the mistakes I made then: mistaking practicing minimalism for living a poor life.
It didn't end there; it extended to my wardrobe too. I used to see wearing good outfits as a waste of money, especially having them in numbers. A few days ago, I scrolled through my Facebook gallery and laughed at the kind of dresses I wore to school. It's not that they were bad; no, they were fine, but they weren't really school dresses.
They were church dresses. I had a lot of them back then, and instead of dressing like my classmates with polos and simple footwear, I was dressing like I was going to church with leather shoes. Man, you should have seen me in those days. At some points, there was money to buy simple outfits like polo shirts, but no way—I saw that as a waste of resources and decided to stick to the church dresses I had. Although I looked good in them, people gave me weird looks because I always appeared as the 'righteous one' due to my overly decent attire. Honestly, I wasn't satisfied with my dressing but I couldn't change them, so I had to live like that.
But now, things have changed. I have a better understanding of living simply. Living simply is not about living like a poor soul; no, it's about living smart, simple, and satisfied.
Thanks for reading.
This is my entry to #Kiss prompt
| Photos are mine|
Your outfit is really cute and matured and doesn't look poor one bit, I would choose it over the polo and jeans you just mentioned.
Hahahaha!
I grasp.
Some people prefer this type of dressing to the nowadays trend.
Thank you for stopping by
This image belongs to millycf1976 and was manipulated using Canva.
Sending Love and Ecency Vote!
Thank you always!🙌