What does it mean to live more with less? I'm Katie Wells and welcome to the Maximized Minimalist

podcast. If you found yourself caught up in the hamster wheel of modern day motherhood and want to

rewrite the script, congratulations you're in the right place. I'm here to be your guide and help you take

back your motherhood

and achieve a simpler, more joy-filled life. Cheers to being a maximized minimalist. Enjoy the show.

So who are you simplifying your life for? Now, most of you are going, well, me, Katie, or my family.

But someone shared this story recently. That's really what

brought this whole episode to light. And it's a story about a mom who, like a lot of us,

maybe a lot of you listening, considers herself a minimalist and who, based on this,

doesn't allow her kids to have outdoor toys. She's got, I don't know, four or five kids.

So any outdoor toys are just out of the question, like soccer balls, baseball, bikes, roller skates, anything that one would consider an outdoor toy.

She does not allow, purchase, or place in her home, all for the sake of minimalism. And it kind of made my

heart sad. Part of that is because we spent so much time outside in our house. And while I don't

believe outdoor toys are necessary to have an amazing childhood, like we're on our bikes all the

time. We play with our outdoor things all the time.

But even outside of that, right, that's a general interest we have in our family. Even if I didn't

have that interest, part of how she framed her decision is also what made me sad. And so let's

talk about this for a second because everybody's minimalist journey, I get it, it looks different,

and I am an advocate for that. There is no right or wrong answer here, but I still think it's

worth diving deeper into this conversation today because what I heard from this mom is what

honestly drove me away from minimalism once I was in it. And even

before I got into minimalism, it prevented me from understanding what true minimalism is and could

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