The Collection

Joshua Fields Millburn (0:39)

Yes, The Minimalists, Joshua Fields Millburn here, TK. Coleman. Here's something to chew on.

A collection is intentional. An accumulation is accidental. Now, I almost said incidental because I wanted to play around with the alliteration and I wanted to iterate on the alliteration.

But then I realized, well, accumulation is accidental. There's also alliteration here. And so my question for you, based on that little maxim, a collection is intentional and accumulation is accidental. What's the difference between collecting and curating?

T.K. Coleman (1:14)

So that's an interesting follow because when you compare collection and accumulation, I thought you were going to ask me to expound on the difference between those two. But collection and curation are a little bit closer to each other, whereas neither of those things are accidental. So I see collection as gathering with intent.

And I see curation as something like the process of organizing, simplifying, and presenting that which has been gathered with a sense of aesthetic intelligence.

Joshua Fields Millburn (1:50)

Yes. Yeah. Professor Shahn was saying that a museum curates their collection. And I think that's a good distinction, a way to look at it here, because when I go to a museum, the vast majority of their art is not on display.

Their collection is stored, but the curated piece that we see is usually a show. It's what is on display, what we put out, what we have visible. And I do think it's possible for, depending on how we use the term, it's possible for a collection to be unintentional. If we're just going around collecting sticks and rocks and putting them in corners of the room, because you don't have an intention behind them. I like the way that you highlighted it there, a collection, there's some sort of intent with these things, and I can curate that collection. Also, I do accumulate a collection as well. And so we're just playing around with some distinctions here to make you think about really the intentionality about the things that we bring into our lives. We're gonna talk about that a lot today on this episode, because we're gonna talk about how minimalist might curate an intentional collection, what to do with antique clutter, our favorite black t-shirt brands, and much, much more. Also on page three, we're going to review seven items minimalist avoid to keep their living rooms calm and clutter free. So let's dive right into our callers, 406-219-7839.

If you want to join the show, or you can head on over to theminimalists.com/podcast, and record a voice note right there on our website. Just a quick one there. Record it, send it over. You can listen to it before you send it as well. theminimalists.com to record your voice memo. And let us know if you're a Patreon subscriber when you call in so we can prioritize your message. By the way, shout out to our patrons. Your support keeps this podcast 100% advertisement free because sing along at home, y'all.

T.K. Coleman (3:43)

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Joshua Fields Millburn (3:45)

Our first question today is from Sean in the United States.

Sean (3:51)

So how do I become a minimalist if my entire life I've been an antique dealer, antique picker, collector.

I'm constantly out looking for the next good deal, the next cool thing. I even thought for a time like, well, if I could be a minimalist, maybe I could just collect antique marbles because they're tiny, but there's still some really bad ass marbles out there. How do I curb that collection obsession?

Joshua Fields Millburn (4:23)

Did you hear his solution there, TK.? Maybe I'll just collect something smaller. And the distinction you made earlier had something to do with the intentionality behind it. So I would say I've used a similar justification in my past.

I'll just collect something smaller or different or better, right? We're always looking for, well, you know, this type of collecting is bad. So what's the good form of it? As opposed to, I don't know, identifying whether or not I actually need the collection at all. What purpose does this serve? Instead, I was very good at finding loopholes that would let me, I don't know, perpetuate the same behavior just in a slightly different form.

T.K. Coleman (5:05)

Yeah, you know, I think you don't want to, I know we're using the word obsession here in the positive sense. There is a passion for something. And I don't think you want to cure your passion or approach your passion as if it's something to be cured. And I don't even think you want to blame unhealthy habits on your passion. You want to say, my passion is good. What's the best way for me to support my passion by entering into a more healthful relationship with the habits I have around it? Because sometimes our habits just don't support us, even though they might seem reasonable when we're first implementing them. And so I think of the old quote that Bruce Lee made famous, running water never grows stale. That water is good, but water, even water, is capable of growing stale. But how do you counter that? Not by getting rid of water, but by continuing the flow, letting it run. The energy that comes into our lives, that's passion, right?