"If you want a golden rule that will fit everything, this is it: Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful."
- William Morris
Very Recently, I was asked, how do you apply minimalism to keepsakes. In general, whether we are talking about keepsakes or just any item that we have, I think William Morris's rule can still apply. Now, whether that rule is 50/50 or only 1% useful and 99% beautiful, at the end of the day that is up to the individual to decide what works for them.
The retail price of something when we purchase them does not represent the full price of the item. What sometimes people forget is the "hidden cost" of things. The total cost of ownership for anything would always include the "cost" of sorting, storing and cleaning them, sometimes even some sort of periodic maintenance or upkeep is warranted. Now for every amount of time and effort devoted to doing these activities; be mindful that this is time and effort that is deducted from creating experiences and nurturing relationships. I mean do we really want to spend valuable vacation time just cleaning? I don't think so.
I think a funny analogy (or metaphor?) to this rule on utility and beauty, is the feisty character of Edna Mode, from the movie The Incredibles. When Mr. Incredible asked her to design a new suit for him, she was adamant that there will be NO CAPES ! This is due largely to the fact that quite a number of superheroes were killed when their capes got caught in jet turbines, elevators, missiles etc.
Capes are beautiful, but it's not essential for doing real superhero work. And as much as possible, we don't want distractions from being the beautiful superheroes that we are.
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