When I fill out job applications or write cover letters, the first skill that I mention is how organized I am. Something I do not mention (with the ability of common sense) would be how I hoard anything and everything physically tangible, regardless of whether or not it is of use. I used to keep receipts, make a journal about what I had spent. After I started keeping all the packaging that came with beauty products, even keeping logo tags from my clothes. I have realized that I like to keep things because you never know when you’re going to need it or use it (I say as I hoard all my notebooks and binders from the 6th grade).

So I admit, I have a problem. My new years resolution for the past two years has been to declutter my life. And I do, for the first few months of the year, until I start buying more and more material goods. And I believe that I buy things to fill a void, sort of like an insatiable quench for status and happiness. It’s been a lot better (now with the lack of income from the lack of a job) then it has been in the past few years. I don’t really buy beauty products if I still have a product that I have to finish at home and my clothes shopping desires have diminished due to a greater interest in sustainable and environmentally-friendly fashion.

Minimalism, a documentary (that can be found on Netflix) is about “the important things”. It follows a core story of two men, Joshua Fields Millburn and Ryan Nicodemus, on a tour across the USA promoting their book “All That Remains”. In addition, it also brings in the voices of neuroscientists, economists, and others that have created organizations or have wrote books that value the same philosophy of “less is more”. The documentary clearly states that the growth in consumerism as the people of the United States has inclined at a shocking rate. People have more money now (compared to the past few decades) and material goods are cheaper, which results in buying more, especially in bulk. A few other topics that the documentary touched on were living with less, less material goods and less room, meditation, and how one can still be a minimalist even with a family.

As a (rookie) advocate of sustainable fashion, an important part of the documentary was when Juliet Schor, a Ph.D economist and sociologist, explained that people are too materialistic in a way that we covert and care for material goods, as if they were as important to us as people, however not materialistic enough that we do not care what happens to the goods after they are not only useless to us, but out of trend and unfashionable. We are not taking into consideration how the cost that fast fashion, fast consumerism, is resulting in waste piling up and taking a toll on the environment or the horrible conditions of sweatshops in other countries. This is a very important topic that I believe is catching on with more and more people which result in sustainable fashion companies, such as New Classics and Rêve en Vert.

Another important part of the documentary was how the material goods are portrayed by the companies and brands. It is as if one’s life could not go on without purchasing said item and upgrades are being created just as quickly as one buys the former. Magazines, television shows, even society states that one’s success is based on how much money and possession they have. Isn’t that why, as people, we are so caught up with the sparkles and the riches? Is this the American Dream? Or is it the modern version that we (as a society) have created? So it made me think, as a public relations major, what my purpose was and what I could do to better the industry. It maybe naive of me to think that as one person that I could change an industry that has been doing the same thing for decades, but 2017 calls more more self-confidence.

Now minimalism is not about the rejection of consumerism, but of mass consumerism. It is the active though of whether or not a material good brings value into one's life, or it is merely and object that one wants because 1. to fill the void within 2. media and companies tell you so or 3. to buy simply to buy (addiction). As a consumer, you have a choice of what you choose to buy and intake.

So, as for one of my new years resolution, or a goal more like, I want to find myself and my contentment in other things such as God, my friends, and my family. Also follow the words of Marie Kondo, a Japanese organizing (guru) consultant. It is going to be a long process, but hey, I have a whole year to do it.

Cheers.