I am in the market for a new bed, but I want it to be one that is: minimal, lasts, is easy to move and works for various apartments and their weird often small layouts. I am debating on the size though, between a double bed and Ikea's Utaker stacking bed (solid wood), which becomes roughly a king (76 by 78 inches). A double (54 by 75 inches) would fit fine in any apartment.

For context my partner stays with me most (99 percent) nights, and we have three cats. The old bed was a full and doable mostly. The cats take up a good portion of the foot though. The Ukater offers more flexibility, but I am not sure we need such a large bed and don't want to regret buying it. And as a minimalist, I try to avoid excess and waste.

Does anyone have advice or experience on the matter?

Here in London for an year, I am prone to cold weather, I would like your suggestions about the minimalist wardrobe for the winter season here including jackets, thermals or whatever. Thank you so much in advance!

This is the total amount of clothes owned, is this an acceptable amount or is this amount too many to be considered minimal?

Hello this is my first time posting here and I don't know if this is the right sub to air these thoughts but I'm seeking advice on the following situation. Here's my background history of where this all started:

Ever since I can remember I was raised in a family that without question would just compulsively collect just about anything. Be it movie related memorabilia, collectibles/antiques, out of state souvenirs, family related heirlooms, etc. You name it we probably had it at one time.

We used to go out of our way to go antiquing and thrifting just for the thrill of collecting more stuff. Adding to this pretty much everyone we knew and hung out with was also caught up in this mentality and would always give us stuff or encourage us to buy certain things saying it'll be worth money decades down the road.

I spent 20 plus years being raised in this mentality so it's like second nature to feel drawn towards certain things as I struggle with a compulsive need to collect but also feel nostalgic for things that bring me closer to how I used to feel before dark times came into my life and the lives of those around me. There have been so many times I've had to walk back into a store to return something or years after the fact try to re-sell it to a third party just to recoup at least a third of what I spent just to recover my losses once I realized this was an impulse buy and that I didn't need it to begin with.

I think a lot of this became unhealthy coping mechanisms for whenever family dysfunctions occurred or when tragedies happened this became the go-to distraction to preoccupy our minds rather than getting to the root of the issue. Thankfully they've started to recognize the habit for what it is but unfortunately they are mandating a complete 180 and have become basically anti-collecting and expect me to let go of pretty much everything at the drop of a hat threatening to either throw stuff out without my consent or force me to rent a storage unit to put it all in.

I feel like they are not owning up to the role they played in raising me by enabling this situation in the first place. Also feel like they aren't giving credit for the progress I have been making.

I've called them out on this and have even taken it a step further to say the collecting issue has been a Band-Aid solution and that we aren't really addressing what caused this habit to begin with. I've tried stressing to them many times the importance of our family understanding the root cause to help solve the attachments in these areas.

But whenever we've had a sit-down conversation they don't take full responsibility for their part or don't want to get into the nitty gritty behind these mentalities. They just want to see more progress ASAP. It's getting to a point of not only getting on all our nerves but borderline OCD with how clean and decluttered everything has to look at our house--and even when there isn't something to nitpick they gripe about how much cleaner it could look especially if we had guests over.

As a side note having company over is something we haven't done for literally many years because of aforementioned issues. This makes it very hard to want to invite anybody over because it becomes such a mental exercise as my family insists the house has to look a certain way even if guests aren't judging us or nitpicking whether there's dust on the counter or shoes that were put into a corner most of the people I know are pretty easy going and they themselves don't have a very clean house and yet my family will obsess over this stupid standard (an entirely different issue unto itself).

I think a lot of this can be chalked up to my family doesn't have enough healthy hobbies to engage in or they're stuck in a rut and take out their misery on me but when I tried to call them out on it they evade the question.

Because of this I rarely go shopping with them. One time recently we came across a t-shirt that looked cool but I ended up putting it back because I specified I don't need it/ it's not that important. But family kept insisting I buy it even though I kept saying no and putting it back.

This got to a point where my family literally brought it with us to the checkout stand and by that point had convinced me in the thrill of the moment to get it even though I flat out kept saying no and had a total disinterest in buying it and trying to explain that this is part of the mentality we've been talking about but they completely ignored what I was saying.

Or often times they put it back on me when call out similar patterns that they are struggling with in this area I've tried encouraging gently to tackle some of these areas but almost immediately they get defensive and put it back on me by saying "you need to focus on your own stuff!"

Or if there's a weird collection involving a literal pyramid of empty containers piled up in a corner they justify its existence by saying it's for shipping purposes which never happens. Other fallacies in their logic has included but not limited to items in the freezer and refrigerator or cd/movie/book shelves that -- no matter how many times they are 'definitively' reorganized-- somehow always manages to get cluttered again and then we go through the whole spiel of arguing about why stuff is out of order yet again.

It's at a point where I would honestly like to seek family counseling and medication to specifically address this reoccurring issue. The closest thing was least one member attended regular counseling for a couple of months which I was highly encouraging of but after the last few visits this member stopped going on the basis that they keep crying during sessions and is tired of being embarrassed -- even though it's a one-on-one counseling session every two weeks.

It frustrates me because the person was on the right track and admitted how they could see good progress came of it but totally copped out and never returned back to it even though they keep saying how I need to attend counseling, namely claiming that I am a hoarder -- the new 50 cent word that my family has called me several times which I do not appreciate especially if they're not going to be part of the solution as with other issues it will continue to fail.

On other occasions I finally had a peace about letting go of certain things and as soon as a family member saw some of the stuff I was getting rid of he would lament oh you're getting rid of that? Do you know how much trouble I went to to find that for you blah blah blah which in turn makes me feel like a horrible person for getting rid of something he got for me during a special time in our lives even though I had very little attachment to the item in question.

I can't preface this enough: I want to maintain permanent progress in my life and let go of possessions-- only keeping absolutely important things-- however the progress I am making my family doesn't recognize because it doesn't meet their brand new standard and I feel like they are constantly verbally attacking me for it.

Just for additional context they've acted this way towards me with other situations when it comes to expecting instant results or unreasonably high expectations conjured up in a very short time frame despite ingrained habits that should have been curbed a long time ago (including leading by example and not just taking everybody else's word for it when it comes to making life-altering decisions or following after trends-- I've noticed this many times how easily swayed they are by other people/trends AKA subjective versus objective of other thoughts and ideas).

I'm stuck in a toxic cycle and I don't know how to get out of it. I've made some good progress in my life and I am striving to become more of a minimalist because of how liberating it feels but between having to overcome my personal demons with some of this stuff as well as my family's black and white mentality extremes mixed with hypocrisy I'm not really sure how to approach this.

All I know is I'm angry at my family for raising me with this mentality and then demonizing me for having a collecting issue, while still enabling these tendencies.

Any advice concerning this is very much appreciated!

Curious…how have you dealt with the prospect of inheriting your parent’s stuff: collections, china dishes, trinkets, storage containers or storage units, etc? Have you had conversations with them to try to help them minimize in advance? How did that go?

Tried the whole 'less is more' thing with my clothes, but now it feels like I'm living in a 3-shirt universe. Does this mean I'm doing minimalism right or am I just terrible at laundry?

How long does it usually take you to clean your house/space? I just am starting my journey with being a minimalist I feel it takes me too long. It usually takes me almost an hour to clean just my bedroom even though it's not too cluttered or dirty. I feel like I just have too many things that I never really use or look at. I have started donating or throwing out things that can't be given away. I can't get rid of all of them because we have very cold winters so I have to store my fall/winter clothing here.

Hello! I am conducting a research for my theisis on rebranding and minimalism. This survey is quick and anonymous and it will only take a few minutes to complete. Thank you so much for your time and support! You can access the survey using this link: https://forms.gle/imwPUnCTo5ThUkucA

I live in a small two bedroom apartment and really don’t have the room for a tree. We don’t miss it at all. I still put up minimal decor but I’m curious what you guys do?

Honestly, I just love having a clean inbox. Does anyone else do this too?

Regarding emails, the only emails I can’t delete are my work emails, but I store those emails in different folders so that my main inbox is clean 😊

I'm 32 years old and I was born in era of smartphones but I'm not really into technology. I'm really a digital minimalist. I use phone mainly for calling, sending messages, browsing the Internet, listening to music and sometimes I take some photos (but not often and I don't really pay attention to it). For me, a phone is an investment for years. I want to use it for 5 years or more. What matters the most for me is battery time.

I value minimalism and efficiency and I heard iPhones are like that and iOS is much more simple than Android. What phones can you recommend to me? I want it simple without any fancy stuff.

Hey everyone, I have been practicing minimalism for a while now. It has brought me so much mental clarity, improved my mental health significantly, and made me more in touch with my authentic self; overall, I felt much happier and wiser. About 2 years ago, I secured a well-paying job and was finally financially secure enough to splurge on my hobbies. However, I kept contemplating almost every day about buying a gaming pc; I wanted to get it to play videogames that are pc exclusive, such as CS 2 and TF2, and more importantly, to connect with other people my age in different parts of the world such as Turkey and Eastern Europe where the PC market dominates consoles. The fear of missing out on the fun with others I could have from this region became so annoying that I caved in and bought it. Needless to say, that did not make my mental health any better, and the presence of this PC started creating mental clutter. I enjoyed my Xbox (A console that barely has a player base in the mentioned regions); I have hundreds of games on it, and I like the simplicity and the couch experience, but the idea that I had to make an effort to decide what platform I will play on on a particular day and the presence of this pc caused so much mental clutter it became annoying as well. I am stuck in this dilemma: should I keep it and deal with the mental clutter, or should I sell it and have a constant FOMO haunt me.

Hurdles: I am a Mac user and enjoy the Apple ecosystem a lot, so having a gaming PC for multiple uses is something other than what I want.

If it was 1 option which one are you choosing

Has anyone here stopped using shampoo altogether…like a simple no poo method? If so, what were the results?

‼️and NO…I don’t mean buying the “no poo shampoo” brands that rape your wallet‼️