{"id":5491,"date":"2010-04-16T07:00:07","date_gmt":"2010-04-16T12:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/?p=5491"},"modified":"2010-04-16T23:06:34","modified_gmt":"2010-04-17T04:06:34","slug":"what-do-i-really-need","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/what-do-i-really-need\/","title":{"rendered":"What do I really need?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Day<\/a>
Day 8 - Purging 19 DVDs | Photo by Jonathan Blundell<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This question is really coming into mind more and more since starting WeLiveSimply<\/a> — but even more so as we start packing to move.<\/p>\n

What do I really<\/em> need?<\/p>\n

Leo Babauta<\/a> writes…<\/p>\n

It\u2019s amazing what our culture has done to us: we have been conditioned to believe that luxuries are a necessity, that we need things that most of the world doesn\u2019t even dream of having.<\/p>\n

Look around your home right now (or when you get home). What do you see that\u2019s really a necessity? What could you do without?<\/p>\n

You already know that most of the world lives with much less than what you see around you. They\u2019d be happy with clean water, shelter, some food. Forget about Macs or big-screen TVs or plush couches or iPhones or closets overflowing with shoes and clothes.<\/p>\n

But we also forget that only a few generations ago, our grandparents and great-grandparents also lived with much less, and were perfectly comfortable and happy. Most people had very little other than the necessities and perhaps a radio. Not that long ago, people lived without TVs, cars, microwaves, electric stoves, computers, video game consoles, air-conditioning, washers, dish washers and more. Not that long ago, shopping malls didn\u2019t exist, and ordering from the Sears catalog was a luxury.<\/p>\n

What we need is very little: a few changes of clothing at most, a pair of shoes, perhaps a few toiletries (toothpaste, deodorant, soap), some food, a roof over our heads.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n


\nI’ve been purging things<\/a> from my house each day this month — and there’s still so much that I don’t need (or even use on a regular basis). <\/p>\n

We have three shelves of DVDs in our guest room. Each of them have 50+ DVDs on them. <\/p>\n

And I’ve probably watched 3 of them since Thanksgiving. <\/p>\n

As I went through them all the other day I kept saying, “Well I really like that one… I’ll keep this so I can watch it with my kids… this one is really good about (fill in the blank).”<\/p>\n

But do I really need them? Will I really miss out by not owning 200 DVDs?<\/strong><\/p>\n

What do you think?<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This question is really coming into mind more and more since starting WeLiveSimply — but even more so as we start packing to move. What do I really need? Leo Babauta writes… It\u2019s amazing what our culture has done to us: we have been conditioned to believe that luxuries are a necessity, that we need … Continue reading What do I really need?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[19],"tags":[3490,3489,3066,459,2595,3427,2905],"class_list":["post-5491","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reflections","tag-cds","tag-dvds","tag-leo-babauta","tag-media","tag-need","tag-stuff","tag-we-live-simply"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pEnSo-1qz","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5491","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/84"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5491"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5491\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5491"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5491"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5491"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}