• Why cognitive flexibility is vital for a minimalist lifestyle
    Changes are afoot. You’re beginning your journey into minimalism and the outcome is yet unknown. Nonetheless, you’re willing to test the theory, give it a go, see what happens. That’s when […]
  • How cleaning and organising eases stress
    Do you ever find yourself speed-cleaning after an argument? If you pick up the vacuum or start frantically tidying after dealing with a difficult situation this could be a way that your brain tries to ease your stress levels. A sort of reset, if you will…
  • Why your friends are hindering your minimalist journey
    When we go along with the consensus of our peer group, our mind doesn’t object. Our brains don’t even recognise that we’ve been caused to change our mind by others. It happens subconsciously. Here’s why your friends’ opinions might affect your own minimalist thinking…
  • How to prevent recluttering
    You’ve made a decision to live with less and I bet you’re thoroughly chuffed with your efforts. However, within the physical and mental space left behind by the decluttering process, you may become tempted to fill that void. Here’s what to do if you feel the urge to reclutter…
  • Why lockdown 3 turned me into a compulsive shopper
    Why lockdown 3 turned me into a compulsive shopper and how I was able to step away from the shopping basket before I filled up my wardrobe to bursting point…
  • The desire to acquire: Why the novelty of buying new things soon wears off
    Why does your brain stop being excited by something as soon as you acquire it? What turns our ‘wants’ into ‘whatever’s? Here’s why the novelty of buying new things soon wears off…
  • You are an antelope: Why evolution causes us to be stressed by clutter
    If you’re stressed out by clutter, it’s because you are programmed by nature to be stressed out by clutter. Here’s why your pre-civilisation limbic brain is calling the shots…
  • The clutter of collections & letting them go
    When a childhood collection becomes clutter, how can you let it go? I watched a video that changed my perception and cut through the nostalgia…
  • How practicing gratitude can support a minimalist life
    Learn how new things distract us and provide a short-term boost, why this feeling soon wears off and how gratitude can help you hop off the hedonistic treadmill.
  • The decluttering journey – Deciding what to keep
    After feeling despondent about my decluttering efforts, this quote by Francine Jay blew my mind. It changed everything for me and I began minimising with renewed vigour…
  • The non-monochrome minimalist
    Just because many social accounts are dedicated to the monochrome aesthetic of minimalism, it doesn’t mean you have to adopt the same style in order to be a minimalist yourself…
  • How Freud’s 5 Stages of Psychosexual Development relate to hoarding
    According to Sigmund Freud’s Stages of Psychosexual Development, we all go through 5 stages while growing up, and our experiences during that time will affect our future selves. So can the tendency to hoard can be traced back to our childhood?
  • The ‘hyper brain’ of high IQ individuals + how minimalism can help with these anxieties
    With findings originally published in the journal ‘Intelligence’ this article reports that highly intelligent people have an increased chance of suffering from psychological issues, including anxiety disorders. Can minimalism help to diminish these effects?
  • The Hotel Experience
    If you’ve ever spent a or two night in a hotel and thought to yourself ‘well, this is all I really need’, you’ll understand what I mean when I say I want to achieve The Hotel Experience in my own home…
  • We’ve all got boxes we haven’t unpacked
    Which is the perfect excuse for decluttering when you’re becoming minimalist but don’t want people to think you’ve gone to the extreme.
  • Why the pandemic turned me into a hoarder
    A surprising side-effect of lockdown for me was the urge to re-clutter my home. Here’s why it happened…
  • Welcome to the Theoretical Minimalist blog
    I’m interested in the psychology behind minimalism. What theories you can apply to it and how we can all understand ourselves better. How minimalism can change our lives through the power of our minds. Wow, that’s a big promise, isn’t it?

It seems we can’t find what you’re looking for. Perhaps searching can help.