The Pinnacle of Efficiency

I love minimalism.

A year ago, I sold/gave away most of my excess possessions and was left with a 30L backpack that was all I had when I moved to another country.

I value the freedom of not being attached to possessions.  The freedom to pack a bag and disappear to a faraway place.

I only buy stuff that I absolutely need and would be able to travel with.

I’m not anti-ownership, but I prefer to own things instead of the things owning me.

I would not buy something so out of my price range, that I would have to trade more of my time and money to service that loan.  Instead, I would buy something if I see it as an asset; as an investment.

I used to have six pairs of jeans, but only took one pair of my favorite jeans down to Brazil for 15 months.  Now I have two pairs and that’s enough.

I used to have a million t-shirts, now I have five or six.

I used to have a car, and the accompanying insurance, repairs, maintenance and lost time while in traffic commuting to and from work.  Now, I take public transportation or rent a car for those rare out of town excursions.

I’m always looking for ways to be more efficient; to have something smaller that lasts longer.  Sometimes those factors come at the expense of convenience, and that’s fine.

Sometimes they do not.

The empty portion of the bottle (1.2 oz) above represents all the shaves that I’ve done in 16 months.  It’s not like I shaved once every month; I shaved every 2 or 3 days.  And I still have about a quarter left.

That’s the pinnacle of efficiency.

The product is an all-natural shaving oil and it costs about $10.  It replaces two existing products most people use: shaving cream and after-shave.

It lasts longer, is cheaper, smaller, and you can take as a carry-on on the plane.

America is a consumer-driven culture.  It thrives on people buying new product all the time to replace the old ones.  The economy depends on it.  The jobs depend on it.  But in order for things to move forward, we need to continue getting people to buy products again and again.

Many businesses rely on this behavior: Gillette makes money from razors, not from the stem.  Brita makes their money from the water filters, not from the container.

The plethora of consumer products provides a choice, but with it comes the confusion.

That’s why I love minimalism: it forces me to always cut through the fog and strive for the most long-lasting, reliable products.  It forces me to strive towards the pinnacle of efficiency.