Simplicity, Minimalism, and Finding Enough w/ Rose Lounsbury – Episode 021

Episode 021 - Simplicity, Minimalism, and Finding Enough w/ Rose Lounsbury

In this episode, Chris and Debbie talk with their guest Rose Lounsbury. Rose is an author, speaker, and simplicity coach. She shares her wisdom in this moving and inciteful conversation. We learn that simplicity (minimalism) is about so much more than just decluttering and having fewer possessions. It’s more about coming to a place of enoughness from within. Listen in to learn more about:

  • why the search for enough externally is a constantly moving target
  • how the “feeling of not enough” affects our relationship to our possessions, achievement, approval-seeking, feelings of success, and more
  • how Rose made the transition from teacher to entrepreneur
  • developing a mindset to overcome fear and uncertainty in entrepreneurship
  • her need to simplify her stuff so she didn’t have to serve it every evening
  • actionable tips for simplifying your household

Notable quotes from this episode:

  • “…the journey is the return to believing you are enough.”
  • “Be the change you wish you see in your house.”
  • “You need acknowledgment from only one person in your life, and that is yourself.”
  • “The physical state of our homes reflects the cluttered state in our heads.”

We leave you with this thought: 

As a simplicity coach, it would appear that Rose helps people transition to a minimalist lifestyle, or at least own fewer towels they need to wash, fold, and find a place to store. If you’ve seen her TEDx talk (it has almost 500k views on YouTube, btw), you’ll understand that reference. But in our conversation with Rose, we’re reminded that all of the stuff we surround ourselves with externally really speaks to a search for something much deeper, something internal.

In our discussion about worthiness last week, Chris and I concluded that worthiness can never be found through something external. So it is with “enough”. It seems our human search for enough causes us to strive for more possessions, more money, more approval, more success, more, more, more…Is it about enough, or is it about wanting more? The truth, it seems, it’s about not enough, about feeling like we’re not enough.

When having, being, and/or doing enough is a constantly moving target, just like with worthiness, it was never really about the external thing we mistakenly thought it was about in the first place. Enough is about a feeling, or lack of a feeling, internally. When we feel that we aren’t enough, inherently, right now, in this moment, there is no amount of clothing or money or titles or followers or cars or bedrooms or success that can make up for it. Nothing teaches us that quicker than getting exactly what it is we think we want, getting to what we thought would be enough. Simply by reaching enough, we learn it’s no longer so. We learn, once again, we need more.


So how do we get to enough? How can we ever acquire enough? do enough? be enough? It turns out, the only way to enough is realizing you’re already there. You are enough, right now, as you are, with what you have, today. Then remember, as Rose, says, “the journey is the return to believing you are enough.” That’s a journey you may need to take again and again. 


Brittany Burgunder says, in her book Safety in Numbers,

“If only you knew how beautiful you are unconditionally. Don’t you know it’s enough if all you do is breathe?”


May you begin to peel away and discard all the trappings you’ve surrounded yourself in in your search for enough today, friends. In doing so, may you finally find deep within, once and for all, that it’s been there all along–enough–in the very being of who you are. Then may each step you take from this point on be from that place–enough–rather than toward it, reminding yourself as many times as it takes, that you’re already there. And may your choice to begin from enough, rather than fruitlessly seek it, make the journey so much better for the taking along the way. After all, you’ve got just this ONE LIFE. What better day to truly LIVE IT! than today?

Other resources from the show

Get your free “Stop the Drift” workbook HERE.

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