#017 ✰ 2 adults, 1 toddler, 1 month, 2 carry-on luggage
Let's do this!
Good day to you!
I hope you’re having a good start of the day.
As you know, our mission is to help people free themselves from rampant consumerism, so that they can dedicate more time, money and bandwidth to be and build.
Know people who feel the pain of having too much stuff + are curious, value knowledge? We’d love to talk to them!
Thoughts
Last Wednesday, we did it 🙌
Lisbon to Lyon ✈️.
For 1 month.
2 adults and 1 toddler.
2 cabin luggage of 8 kg each, 1 stroller.
You can’t imagine how great it felt. How our whole trip experience felt just perfect. Instead of worrying about your stuff and the kid, you just focus on the kid. That’s a major difference 😇
Why fit everything in 2 small suitcases? Maybe a combination of the following reasons:
pain => way too often in our travels, we’ve felt the pain of carrying too much: oversized luggage you have to carry along everywhere, waiting lines to check-in, waiting lines at the belt,… while constantly feeling that “I don’t have anything to wear / no book to read” chorus in the back of your mind.
money => flight tickets were twice as expensive with check-in luggages. So to be honest this was probably our #1 reason at the time we purchased our tickets
challenge => we’re always up for a good old challenge! And this seemed like an interesting experiment to get out of our comfort zone
mindset => it also sounded like the best excuse to kindly decline any physical gift for our toddler over the course of the month 😅
Those of you who don’t (yet) have kids might wonder what’s the deal here, but trust me we had to cut in A LOT of things, to keep only the essentials.
Lessons for future self:
most consumables can be find anywhere
“just in case” item does not mean '“necessary” item => out. I picked up my things according to the season and the kind of activities I’ll be doing most of my days. I forgot about the rest. Cause it will probably never happen. And if it does, there’s a chance I can find alternative equipment on the spot. Since I hate doing laundry every other day, I packed enough for 5 days. Seems like a fair deal.
light-weight suitcases/containers are essential. We started packing with a 3.8 kg old suitcase. When the total weight can’t exceed 8 kg, it’s kinda challenging…
avoid the standard last minute preparation. To be honest, I probably started thinking about what I’d pack at the time I purchased my tickets. I created a special tag in the app for this trip 👇, to document the items I’m taking with me. [one for me / one for our toddler] This has helped me pack faster, not forget anything (flying out / coming home) and probably save time packing again for a similar trip in the future.
bring a limited amount of toys. There’s a chance my toddler will probably enjoy better browsing the food section of a flight magazine or make faces to random passengers than playing quietly with their usual toys and fluffed animals 🤷🏻♀️; we carried just one.
after a week with our essential stuff, I still haven’t missed anything (!)
Conclusion: traveling light is SO peaceful ! It’s an absolute luxury.
And even with a toddler, it’s doable 🤓
September Triangular Challenge 🥁 [reminder]
Goal ➤ Have too much stuff? Know what too much is.
How it works ➤ Use the app to document 9 things today (Sep 9th), 10 tomorrow, so forth and so on. Until September 30th.
Reward ➤ a digital book -or physical one (+1 stuff 🙃)- of our selection 🤓
What’s new in the app 📱
Here’s a resume of the past seven days:
our September triangular challenge is on.
Turn on daily reminders and off you go!⭐️ [most wanted] ⭐️ you can now customize your flow when adding stuff ;
Document only the characteristics of an item that are essentials to you, untick the rest.you’re now given your Ghalimi level. (I am level 7 - that’s without counting what’s at my parents still… 😬). We’re using this scale as a measure of our possessions.
you’re now able to quickly find your recently added items ;
Thank you Johanna, Xavier, Claire, Linette for your precious feedback 🙏
Readings
I am starting this section to share the best of what we’ve been reading lately.
Book
Everything that remains, Joshua Fields Millburn & Ryan Nicodemus (The Minimalists). I was curious to read this classic one. Underneath “mid-life crisis” or GenY (now Z) seeking meaning, there’s probably something to do with the endless rat wheel of running after always more money & possessions. This book relates Joshua’s and Ryan’s personal journeys from opulence to peace of mind. Lot of common sense that one can relate to.
Podcast
[French] In Minimalee’s latest episode, Theo, co-founder & CTO at Multis is sharing his nomadic work life with 99 stuffs. Thanks for talking about us ✌️🙃
Video
The whole interview is gold but what Naval’s saying around 1h46min about the 'material possessions trap' resonates deeply of course.
Have a beautiful day! 🦞
Mathilde