AUTHOR ' S corner
Jordan Rosenfeld
Jordan is the author of four writing guides and three novels. Her articles
have been published in such places as: Alternet, The Atlantic, Marin
Magazine, the New York Times, the Petaluma Magazine, Salon, the
San Francisco Chronicle, the Washington Post and many more.
Erica Layne:
In 2011, Morgan Hill author Erica Layne
felt overwhelmed in her life. Managing
a building of 53 units, with two young
children, while living in a small unit
herself made her feel claustrophobic, she
said. Something had to give.
She’d already been blogging about
living intentionally and with purpose
but now she knew it was time to put that
into practice in all aspects of her life.
She started with decluttering her
physical space, giving away all the stuff
they didn’t use or need. But then she
took it further. “I started reducing my
commitments. I started saying no more
and tried to focus on the things that
mattered most.”
She continued blogging about her
process, and developed a following of
“overwhelmed women trying to find
more focus, peace and self-acceptance in
their lives,” she said. Then, a publisher
reached out asking if she wanted to write
about minimalism as a lifestyle, not just
a decluttering technique.
The result is her book, entitled The
Minimalist Way: Minimalism Strategies to
Declutter Your Life and Make Room for Joy.
In the book she defines minimal-
ism as “the privilege of building a life
based on your values,” emphasizing that
physical stuff is only one element.
She recommends that people who are
overwhelmed “start inside before [they]
go outside” though she acknowledges
that not everybody operates that way. To
do this, she says, “Define your top three
personal values. Once you have those
defined you can run all other choices
through those values.”
For example, if one of your family
values is “connection” then you might
go through a closet full of items and ask
if they foster connection—say board
78
games, or not. This can help you make
better choices.
To keep the minimalism process
do-able she suggests setting a timer for
ten minutes and tackling just one little
area at a time, such as a junk drawer or
a closet. “When the timer rings, you’re
done, guilt free. But if you want to do
another ten minutes, you can set the
timer again,” she says.
From there, she takes her approach
into relationships, recommending that
people do a “relationship inventory.”
As she describes it, “A minimalist
approach is choosing to invest in those
best relationships that build you up and
allow you to build up others. Steer clear
of toxic relationships.”
Her method appeals to busy, over-
whelmed people—largely women,
though there are some men in her Life
on Purpose Movement. Women seem to
be particularly prone to “mental load,”
she explains. “Soccer schedules, who
needs what shoe size, work commit-
ments, what email to send, all that info
that really wears on us.”
She has adapted her book into a
7-week online course called “Declutter
Your Life” that teaches her participants
how to decrease this mental load through
a process she itemizes as: “Eliminate,
delegate, table, do.”
Participants also work on eliminating
“emotional clutter,” which she defines
as “reoccurring negative thoughts you
have about yourself, your life, or others.”
She finds that by identifying them, and
then pushing back on them, “You can
find better feeling alternatives to those
thoughts.”
She gives an example of the negative
thought: “Nobody cares about me.” She
acknowledges that a person is unlikely
GILROY • MORGAN HILL • SAN MARTIN
WINTER 2020
The Minimalist Way
to make a complete transformation from
that thought to: “Everybody adores me,”
so instead they can take small steps
toward better feeling thoughts. “You can
tell yourself ‘I care about myself and my
family sees me,’ something that feels
true.” Then you practice it: write it down
every day, say it in the mirror, repeat it in
your head. “Your brain starts to carve a
new pathway instead of the old one you
do on default,” she says.
Though she takes her minimalist
approach seriously in her home and
family, she is not militant about it. “I just
try to hold space for my kids to be who
they are, but also ask them to follow
the general family values.” Their family
purpose statement, which they wrote
together is, “Seek beauty and adventure,
be brave and kind, do hard things, and
live with vision.”
You can’t discuss minimalism without
talking about Marie Kondo, the celebrity
of the form. When asked what makes
her approach different, Layne explains,
“Marie Kondo’s is an all-in, no-holds-
barred approach. Remake your life in one
week and never turn back. My approach
is more sustainable and more of a long
game. I think you need to do the internal
work in tandem with the external work.”
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