Introduction to a Minimalistic Lifestyle - Tips and Techniques to Decluttering Your Life Table of Contents Introduction What Has Stopped Now? Spring Cleaning Fever Rules of a Minimalist Lifestyle Why Are You Buying Something? Can I Afford This Thing Creating Tension for Ourselves Decluttering your living space Changing Yourself to Gain Happiness Author Bio Publisher Introduction A minimalistic lifestyle has been part and parcel of the human social fabric for millenniums. Why did humans need it? There was the time when humans were more interested in the struggle for survival against the elements, and against dangerous animals and also other human beings of other tribes. Slowly and steadily, human beings began to get more settled. Peace came onto the earth - or at least in their regions. Settlements began to grow. People began to settle down to an agriculturalist style of living, instead of going in for the Hunter lifestyle followed by their ancestors. Their Hunter ancestors 10,000 years ago - and ours, perhaps 25,000 years ago, and more - were not bothered much about gathering plenty of physical and material belongings to them. The concept of "your" and "mine" was not a common thing at that time. Nevertheless, they knew that they needed some basic materials to survive. These included clothing, hunting weapons and shelter. Utensils, they could do without, because all they needed was to have any hollow space available, and there they were, they could cook the food hunted during the day, and next day move their camps to other hunting grounds. But as human beings began to settle down, and began making permanent places in which to live, there began a steady search for knowledge and the expansion of mankind's creative and artistic sensibilities. That is when the concept of Your and Mine came into existence. The instinct of possessing something which was not easily available or which was just the possession of one particular person began to crop up in the lives of human beings. And that brought with it sorrow, jealousy, envy, greed, and all the other negative emotions, which unfortunately are parts of our lives today.