The messages are out there — buy more, have more, get more, and your life will be better.  As anyone has experienced, new things get old and the joy of more stuff erodes quickly as you have to figure out where to put things and how to manage them so you can find them when you need them. In light of the over abundance of commercialism telling us we need more, I’ve comprised a list of quotes to inspire you to live a life of less*.   Hopefully you will inspired by some of these famous people (and one not so famous) who recognized that the key to a happy life often lies in less, not more.

  • Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful. –William Morris
  • Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. –Leonardo da Vinci
  • We buy things we don’t need with money we don’t have to impress people we don’t like. –Dave Ramsey
  • Stuff is not passive. Stuff wants your time, attention, allegiance. But you know it as well as I do, life is more important than the things we accumulate. –Dave Bruno
  • Get it til it’s perfect, then cut two minutes. –Fred Astaire
  • Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage – to move in the opposite direction. –E.F. Schumacker
  • Be content with what you have; rejoice in the way things are. When you realize there is nothing lacking, the whole world belongs to you. –Lao Tzu
  • Our life is frittered away by detail. Simplify, simplify, simplify! I say, let your affairs be as two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand; instead of a million count half a dozen, and keep your accounts on your thumb-nail. –Henry David Thoreau
  • One can furnish a room very luxuriously by taking out furniture rather than putting it in. –Francis Jourdain
  • Work less, wear less, eat less and we shall be a great deal wiser, healthier and wealthier people. –Brigham Young
  • There are two ways to be rich: One is by acquiring much, and the other is by desiring little. –Jackie French Koller
  • Success is getting what you want. Happiness is liking what you get. –H. Jackson Brown
  • If you live for having it all, what you have is never enough. –Vicki Robin
  • Real freedom is having nothing. I was freer when I didn’t have a cent. –Mike Tyson
  • Don’t let the shiny objects that were so appealing at first become tarnished amongst the clutter in your life.  Toss more, donate more, and organize what is truly important to you. –Lori Krolik

* These quotes were originally featured on LifeEdited. Thank you Graham Hill for always inspiring me!