My TEDx Talk: Everyday Essentialism

In April 2017, I gave a TEDx talk. I've spent 6 months preparing for 13.5 minutes on the stage. In Ukraine, I was an essentialist before it became popular—and I was spreading the word about this movement.

Unfortunately, the video recording of my speech had major problems with the sound. However, I found a way around — to publish a translated talk and illustrate it with photos.

There's also a 30-seconds video included at the end (in Russian). Enjoy!

Imagine a gas balloon. A balloon so big that it could take up the whole stage, with cables holding it tight and with its wicker basket. 

There are sandbags attached to it to provide ballast. That way, when a balloon flies, the center of gravity shifts, and the balloon takes the right direction. 

It also needs them to control the altitude. When the pilot is ready to soar higher, it’s best to shed them. 

If you think about it, a balloon and a human are very similar. We also have our “sandbags” holding us down. Except, the balloon doesn’t have a choice – it’s the pilot that attaches the bags. But as humans, we are the pilots, so it’s all up to us. 

I divide these “sandbags” into three categories: unnecessary things, people, and meanings. Neither of them brings us any value. Yet we hold on to them and keep dragging them around.

Every day, we choose what’s important – what it is that gives us joy, makes us happy, inspires us to move forward, and what isn’t.

We do it on three levels:

1. Physical (material)
2. Relationship level
3. The level of thoughts and meanings 

Let's take a look at what each one means. 

The material level is the easiest. It's everything we can touch and see. It's everything that surrounds us.

When we surround ourselves with the same things every day, it becomes hard to notice the clutter.

Why do we only do spring cleaning once a year? Why can't we choose not to accumulate things we don’t need in the first place? Most importantly, how can we notice this clutter and do something about it?

I chose a bit of an extreme way of doing it. One day, I gathered essential things, put them in a 25-liter backpack, and went traveling around the world. 

On that trip, I visited 7 countries, all the while carrying only that one backpack. Every day, I made a choice: this I need and that I don't. Do I need this shirt? Do I need this shower gel that's more than 100 ml? You don't usually ask yourself those questions in your normal everyday life. 

That way of living changed my perspective on ownership of material things. If all this time I've been able to fit my belongings into one backpack, will I need more things when I come back home?

Now, I'm not encouraging any of you to pack your things and go chasing adventures as I did. All I'm saying is that it's possible to live fully owning less. 

If one day you decide to declutter your space and don’t know what to do with all the things you don’t need, my advice is to share. Give them away, give them as a gift – find another meaning for those things. 

And also, slow down. Don’t rush to accumulate things. Every time you want to buy something, ask yourself if you need it. 

Next up is the relationship level. 

This one is a bit more difficult than the first one. Here's why. 

We don’t think twice about saying words like "important person", "the most important person in my life". 

But try saying "unnecessary" or "unimportant" person. Feels a little uncomfortable, right? We're not used to hearing or saying stuff like that. We're polite, and we feel bad for calling someone "unnecessary". 

More often than not, though, someone who is not important is usually unnecessary. They're someone who takes our energy and time, whose company we don’t enjoy. And we should be able to say goodbye to those people. 

Before you jump to any conclusions, stay with me for a moment. 

Here’s how I see it. When you let a person go, you share them with someone else who needs them. If you don’t have space for that person in your life, someone else will. By clinging onto them, you stop them from making someone else happy. 

Slow down. To know if you should let someone go, think about how this person makes you feel. What kind of relationship do you have with them? Are you happy and energized or exhausted after talking with them? There lies your answer.

The third level, the level of thoughts and meanings, is the most difficult one. Here's what it's about. 

We all live according to certain standards. We create patterns and follow them. 

The hardest part of identifying patterns is realizing we have them. The reason why it’s so difficult is that we don't usually stop to think about what goes on in our head. 

I discovered one of my patterns a couple of years ago. As I realized later, though, I started building it in my head a while back.

When I was 16, my friend told me I wouldn’t be able to grow waist-length hair. I knew I could do it, but he didn't think so. We made a bet. I thought it'd be fun to try and grow my hair that long.

And so began the race. Years were passing by as my hair grew longer. At some point, I even forgot that it was a bet. My hair became part of me, part of my personality. 

I would get so many compliments! People would comment on how feminine I looked, how beautiful my hair was, how well it suited me. 

Sometimes, though, I would wear a turtleneck with my hair tucked in. It made it look as if I had a bob cut – and I loved it! If I cut it, I thought, I'd look like someone from France, a femme fatale.

But I'd always stop myself. I would think, “How can I cut my hair, I'd stop getting compliments, and all my femininity would be gone. No, I can't do that”.

Eventually, through conversations with other people, I realized that I was the only one who cared. So why in the world was hair length so important to me? How and at what point did it become such an important part of my identity?

As you might’ve guessed, I ended up cutting my hair. 

One cold February morning, I braced myself and went to the closest and cheapest salon. A friendly Armenian hairdresser greeted me and asked how I wanted my hair. I showed him a picture I found on the internet. He nodded.

The result…well let’s just say it didn't turn out exactly like in the picture. But it didn't matter. The point was, I made a decision and acted on it. The hairdresser put some effort into my new haircut, and it was enough. 

I came out of that salon feeling excited but also a bit scared. 

Excited because I realized that I'd found a pattern in my head and was able to do something about it. I shattered it.

But scared because it got me thinking. Even something as obvious as refusing to cut my hair because of an old bet was hard to confront. How many more patterns must there be in my head then? What else is stopping me from moving forward?

From then on, I decided to start sharing my findings, thoughts, and meanings. I also became more attentive to what people had to say.

Everyone has something to share. Don't underestimate that. Don't ever think that what you say is not unique, something that people have heard many times. Don't let it stop you from sharing your ideas.

It may be exactly now that someone needs to hear what you have to say. It may be this exact moment that what you say transforms someone’s life.

And again – slow down. Give your new thoughts and ideas a rest. You won't always be able to use them right away. Sometimes you need to put them in your “resource” box. 

Those “thought resources” will wait for you to use them. Later, when you're ready to go back to them, you'll connect the dots in a more creative way. You’ll get a new combination of some sort, a new idea. That’s how we discover new things that are important to us and weave them into new standards and patterns.

Every day, we choose what’s important and what isn’t on these three levels – material, relationship, and thoughts. In fact, we do it every minute. 

For the past few minutes, I was choosing you as an important person in my life. 

And I hope you were choosing me as an important person back. 

Thank you!