The More of Less: A Review

On Memorial Day weekend in 2008 Joshua Becker was on a mission--a mission to clean out his garage.  He planned to take everything out, clean the garage, and put everything back.  Throughout the day, his 5 year old son kept asking him to play, and Mr. Becker kept telling him that as soon as the garage was done, he could play.  Each time, he'd say, "almost done."  On that day, gazing at his driveway full of dirty, dusty possessions, Mr. Becker realized that his stuff was the source of his discontent.  He noted, "I already knew that possessions don't equal happiness.  Doesn't everybody?  At least we all profess to know that our things won't bring true satisfaction.  But in that moment, as I surveyed the pile of stuff in my driveway, another realization came to me: Not only are my possessions not bringing happiness into my life; even worse, they are actually distracting me from the things that do!"

Thus began Joshua Becker's journey toward minimalism.  In the years since that day, Mr. Becker has learned a lot about minimalism, and he shares the best of his knowledge in his book, The More of Less: Finding the Life You Want Under Everything You Own.  Minimalism is about, quite simply, owning less so that one may have more time and energy, more money, more generosity, more freedom, less stress, less distraction, less environmental impact, higher quality belongings, less comparison, and more contentment.

This is a good book.  Mr. Becker has some great advice about why and how to go about minimizing.  It's well written and engaging, with a good mixture of anecdotes, statistics, and techniques.  There is nothing special about this book, however.  I imagine there are any number of books about minimalism that contain roughly the same information.  I, personally, have been feeling drawn toward less lately, so I enjoyed the book and found it inspiring.

If you'd like to get a feel for Mr. Becker's style before committing to buying the book, check out his blog, Becoming Minimalist.

I received this book for free from the publisher through Blogging for Books in exchange for my honest review.