In Moderation

Personal Photo

I purchased a digital camera. When I told my mother, she replied "A new camera? That's not very minimalist of you". (Yes, she reads my blog and knows everything about these big questions and small theories of mine). Which made me think about my behaviours and choices, as actions say way more about a person than words and writings.

Of course, I replied that the purpose was not to own a camera, but to learn photography, make pictures and create something, which participates to my growth as a human being. Nonetheless, I think I have a rather moderate approach to minimalism. I even decided not to call myself a minimalist after all.

When you read minimalist blogs, some live in a cabin in the mountains, or in an RV, or explain how their toured the world with all their possessions in a backpack. Although I adhere completely to the minimalist philosophy and understand their point, I never imagined myself going into that level of extreme practice.

I like to believe that the objects I surround myself with serve a purpose, either of utility or beauty, that I remain conscious of my purchasing behaviour, and that I wouldn't go crazy if my appartment burned down with all my curated selection of material items in it.

But when I reflected upon my mother's comment, I realized that, without noticing it before, in many aspects of my life, I have chosen the path of moderation.

Moderation in purchasing habits

Although I am probably not a big spender, I am not an ascetic consumer either. I believe that the most important is not to buy as few objects as possible, but to make educated choices, according to my chosen ethics and values, and that these objects fit my needs and serve a specific purpose - they are a mean to something else, not an end.

I am sure that many would think I buy way too much stuff to be considered "minimalist", while others would find me much more reasonable than average. I think the important is to keep a balance between utility and beauty, budget and indulgences, and not spend too much time or energy on it all.

Moderation in food habits

After reading books like  Barry Grove's "Trick and Treat, Why Healthy Eating is Making us Ill", and watching videos like this one on sugar, I have questioned my food habits and beliefs a lot. I considered several options, like going vegetarian for example, but none of them really sat well with me. Then I watched this TED talk by Graham Hill:




Basically, he explains that one can ally diversity and ethics by being a "weekday vegetarian", eating less meat and more vegetables. I liked this idea of moderation and balance, so I have gathered all the important facts from my documentation on nutrition and set myself a balanced diet tailored to my taste and activities.

Moderation in sports

Practising more sports was my great challenge of 2012, and I have kept quite a regularity in my sport activities. However, I never stuck to aggressive schedules and heavy training, I prefer to keep sports as a pleasant hobby to keep me healthy. My progress is slow but steady, and even if I don't hit the gym 4 times a week, I have been training regularly for more than a year, in moderation.

Why moderation?

I have illustrated three examples of habits of moderation I have chosen for myself. Why sharing this with you? I am not trying to convince you to do the same, we all have our rules that work for each of us. I just realized that moderation was my rule to stick to habits and improve myself.

For example, rules like forcing myself to work out every other day or stop eating sugar completely always failed. But ever since I have decided to commit to moderate habits, a little bit over the long run, most aspects of my life have improved a lot lately. Now that I know that, my future projects will most probably also be approached with moderation.

Do you have your own rules that work for you? What do you think of this moderate approach?