After a year of slowly increasing attention on how I live, and about 3 months of really cranking it up with the minimalism, there are a few things that I find really hard. Here is a short list, feel free to add your own!
1 Shopping ban
The first step of the ban was of course accepting that I have a problem. It’s not even that I was spending too much money- though I was -, but more my inability to not shop, along with the astonishing amount of time, self-identification, thinking and life that went into browsing and choosing things. I have also started marathon training (yay!), which brings out a fierce Amazon, no wait an Amazon addict in me. Thanks to “training shopping” in past years, I am the proud owner of a handheld water bottle I never use, a rain jacket that is not really waterproof, an ill-fitting sports bra and a pair of teal Nike leggings that show crotch sweat to an extent that I had never thought possible.
I wanted to see what it feels like to pull the plug on all of this bullshit, and haven’t bought anything in 8 weeks now, hooray! But here ‘s the catch: not shopping is HAAAAARD, you guys.
It feels super empowering to know that I am not not channelling all sorts of anxieties straight to H&M. I really enjoy opening my closet and only seeing 33 items. I have done so many things on weekends instead of browsing shops! But it is also spring and new seasons are linked in my brain with “refreshing my wardrobe”. I also miss having the illusion of a pick-me-up when I feel tired and stressed.
2 Capsule wardrobe
As a capsule newbie, I made some bad decisions when constructing it. Welcome to my life, jeans that I somehow never wore before (spoiler: there was a reason. There is always a reason!).
3 No plastic
This is our challenge for April- objective zero plastic packaging. It is a fun way of raising our awareness of the impact of small daily actions, and maybe also a way to eat healthier (though Nutella comes in a package that contains wonderfully little plastic).
Here are the catches so far, from a week of #noplastic:
- You still end up generating waste, only now there is a lot more glass waste as you have to buy things like milk, yoghurt and canned tomatoes in bottles.
- It is expensive! The only place where you can buy bulk grains and pulses around here is the hippest biological supermarket, where you end up dropping a ridiculous amount of cash for Belgian quinoa. This makes this whole noplastic thing feel very elitist.
- I just had to give up consuming some foods as lactose-free dairy products all come in plastic, and so do vegetal milks.
- Cats eat meat, and that means noplastic cat food requires one to work chicken legs and lamb kidneys in one’s blender.
Have you ever tried any of these challenges? What do you struggle with? And what are your solutions? Quick, I need solutions!
More Intentional. 
Just please don’t call it Fat Jeans. It’s your Currently Comfy Jeans. 🙂
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Ha good point! I corrected the caption to read what is my *real* problem with the darn things (ie that they don’t go with the rest of my clothes :p) We’ll be trying to make it work together though, me and Stupid Jeans. xxxx
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Wow, it just makes me realize how fortunate I am here in NZ to have Binn In shops where we can buy in bulk, taking our own containers, for a huge selection of foods at reasonable cost. There’s a great opportunity for someone to open a shop like that in your area then. I buy pet mince from the butcher in my own containers too. I strike problems buying cheese and milk, but at least the milk bottles are recyclable. There is still too much other plastic packaging on sundry things , but I too am working my way through it. Best wishes for your work!
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It definitely is an idea to open a bulk shop here, packaging is such a scourge. Supermarkets are full of things like *two sweet potatoes on a polystyrene tray, wrapped in plastic wrap, marked “organic”* WTF!
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Wow, great on you with the plastic!!! I am so impressed as I have been thinking about it for a while now… but as you say, it comes with a heavier price tag and this feels very elitist. For me, there is also always the dilemma of making healthy food not elitist, being able to tell clients: you do not need to go to bio-shops to get all your stuff from there. However, in the normal supermarket much is in plastic packaging and weirdly enough usually the organic stuff. How twisted is that?
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