Become a Valuist
Before we dive into this topic I have to pause and just say…Guys, I am SO glad you’re here! You have no idea what it means to not only have this knowledge for myself but to be able to share it with you is even more amazing!
Today we’re talking about becoming a “VALUIST”. If you don’t know what that really means, here’s a quick description in my own words:
Valuism or being a valuist means prioritizing the things in your life that bring and hold value to you over things that don’t. You determine what those things, ideals, etc are.
On the flip side, things that are NOT adding value to your life get discarded and removed, filtered out if you will (whether it’s a job that’s causing way too much stress or a bin of outgrown clothing in the garage). Conceptually the intent is to simplify and streamline your life by GETTING RID OF THE CLUTTER! These things are a real hinderance and take up mental and physical space in our lives that keep us from truly focusing on and pursuing what matters.
Here’s a good example:
A couple years ago, my husband and I realized how much time we were spending commuting to and from work. I spent 45 minutes 2x day and he spent 1.5 hrs 2x a day to get to work in the opposite direction. While we loved our “forever home”, it had started to feel as though we were earning a paycheck just to pay for renovations and upkeep. It was also sucking our time on the weekends that we wanted to be spending together as a family, with our son.
So while we had thought that purchasing our “forever home” was going to be the biggest blessing ever and we were just going to be set for life, we actually decided it was time to re-prioritize our values and we listed the house that summer.
This best shows you where our value was at and what wasn’t aligning that needed to be adjusted in order to get it back front and center. I break it down even further below.
Our new goal was to move into a smaller home with a much smaller mortgage so that we could essentially thrive on one income. {We’re part of the F.I.R.E. community and I’ll post on that in the near future.) We targeted a community an hr north-it was a great family oriented area with excellent public schools and near our church (which is where my husband works). It took us nearly a year to sell & buy but we knew that this is what we were supposed to do. When our faith in this decision did start to waiver, we were quickly reminded why we were doing it a few months after listing when we found out we were expecting a baby girl!
Drastically downsizing was a decision we made as I mentioned above. Now, I’m not talking tiny living, but going from 3100 sq ft to just over 1700 is still pretty drastic in my book. We knew we couldn’t take everything in our 3100 sq ft house to the new one so the purging started and I cannot tell you how GOOD it felt to get rid of the STUFF! (insert touchdown emoji here). This time it was a literal decluttering. We sold on ebay, facebook marketplace, offer up you name it! We made some cash and it felt awesome. The stuff didn’t matter to us, our time with our kids and each other did and the more we sold the better we felt and the more we realized this was what we truly needed to thrive as a family. You also start to really be able to appreciate what you have because what gets kept is what’s actually important! Maybe it’s a family photo you haven’t paid attention to in two years because it was sitting behind a pile of unread magazines. Or maybe it’s a guitar you haven’t played in 6 months because it had been stuffed under the bed but now you have a place to proudly display it because you cleaned out the guest room.
The move shortened my husbands commute to just over 30 min. While some may argue that’s still too long, we felt it was the best compromise to be in an excellent school district as they are few & far between. Shifting from a 1.5 hr to 30 min drive was a massive improvement in itself. His energy levels are higher, he now leaves later and gets home earlier, and we all get to spend more time with him.
Community is SO important for your family to thrive! I cannot stress this enough. Where we previously lived we had barely any. We couldn’t get involved in our church due to it being 1.5 hrs away and we just didn’t feel connected to our immediate community where we lived. It wasn’t clicking and we knew with kids we needed to be plugged in. Regardless if you’re active in a spiritual community or not I think you can agree that community matters. This move allowed us to start a family group in our home and start to build friendships with other people in the same stage of life-something we never had before. I could go on about this but for now, you get the gist. Find your people and get plugged in!
There is a true calm & a peace now in our household thanks to the above. Is it perfect? No way, but it’s perfect for us.
Wherever your value lies, my point is this.: prioritizing your values leads to tremendous change in your life. For us it lead us to a much better fitting lifestyle and wholeheartedly believe it will for you too!
There really is no judgement in what holds value to you. It’s simply an accountability to keep your life free of things that are junking it up. When you intentionally start to put this at the forefront of your mind and let your daily decisions start with this as the basis, I wholly believe you will start to see major shifts!
And one last thing, as a valuist myself I get tremendous value out of bringing joy to other people’s lives. Try this out for a week and come back to let everyone know what changes you see happening, I can’t wait to hear from you!
Until next time….