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I read an article yesterday that was just ridiculous. A 19 year old casual employee is already $42,000 in debt – the result of a car, plasma TV and an overseas holiday. While the article claims to be about how Generation Y are getting their act together financially, I’m just reading another piece of tripe by News Corp.

I’ve always had an issue with image. Not personally – as mentioned I’m a fairly resilient person, so I don’t hugely care what other people think of my lifestyle or how I look, but coming from a private school I was inevitably part of a competition to look as rich as possible, regardless of where I actually stood in the pecking order. It’s amazing how some parents push their kids out of the car in Ralph Lauren and Nautica, despite their car running on three cylinders.

Only now have I realised that a large part of a lot of males’ image is tied up with cars. I personally have had a few nice cars, and while I have never consciously bought them for the image factor, now that I think about it image is the only reason for your car to look good. While nowadays it’s easy for me to let go of that dream, I find that most Australians consider others to be “successful” dependant on how new their car is. Going on that judgement, I must be fairly unsuccessful, right?

Whether it be for a car, house, TV, boat, bike, clothes, laptop or so on – are people actually getting into debt purely just to boost their self-image? In this crazy world that we are living in, I’m a firm believer that nine times out of ten they are.

I don’t profess to be exempt from this, although I consider myself to have things under control – a good friend of mine asked the other day if I was sick of not having a car, and that “surely you could afford it”. Quite honestly, we could afford another car, but we just don’t need one at the moment – it doesn’t make any sense.

Nowadays you just don’t seem to get any kudos for paying down your loans and owning things freehold. To date I have never had a loan for a car, and only ever taken out a loan to buy our property. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I wrote an article about the Minimalist Lifestyle not too long ago, and I feel that this ties in perfectly – to me, debt means stress. It is something that will always be in the back of your mind until it’s gone. Get rid of it and it will be one less thing to think about. Be content with less, and enjoy life rather than worry about it constantly.

Minimalism seems to be a word that is used predominantly with art or design, but I’m beginning to think it’s a good way to describe a lifestyle.

While I’m still a considerable hypocrite with most things I say on here, I feel as though one day my life will be quite simple.

A few years ago my fiancee and I decided to get a joint bank account. Financially we were the one entity – neither of us kept tabs on money spent on each other, so it made sense to join the accounts. All of a sudden I realised how much easier it was for the both of us. In the process I got rid of my Visa card, my high interest account, my normal account, and an account that I used to use for business and never bothered to close. So much less paperwork, so much less hassle!

Next up I decided to start cleaning up my old email accounts and other internet accounts. You know, the ones that bug you from time to time about coming back to a forum or that someone has replied to a post from two years ago. Took a while, but I sorted it out. Even just by removing these small annoyances from my life I feel more relaxed.

Since then I have been slowly selling small things from my spare room on eBay. I have a ridiculous amount of bike parts, car parts and computer parts just wasting space and driving me nuts every time I walk in there. It’s taking time, but I’m slowly getting rid of the gear that I don’t need.

I’ve mentioned my bike before that I ride to work on. It’s a single-speed. One gear. Pure simplicity! You’re never in the wrong gear, and there are no derailleurs to break and leave you stranded at 8am in the rain. It’s mentally so much more enjoyable to ride than my geared bikes. All I have to do is pedal and not get hit by a car. The rest of my brain is free to ponder the topics that end up on this very blog.

“Less is more.”

- Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, architect.

While I do love minimalist design, and believe that the house that my family will live in will incorporate lots of these principles, I believe minimalism to be a term that has such a broader meaning than what it is usually used for. To me, a simpler life quite plainly means much less stress. Without stress, life is pure fun. What more could you want?