At the peak of your minimalist meridian, you look below you, the landfill of numerous but high-complexity options, low-value information choices, multi-function and therefore, supposedly, multi-[useful?]-purposes, quantity-obsessed neighbors, and the newest-shiniest genre that continually dance around the bonfire, oblivious to the destruction that prevails at the heart of this immense heat.

We radiate many beautiful expressions, some of which complement one another. The rest? They are left to retire, to slowly exhaust themselves into a deep, slumbering death.

Minimalism could always, and may potentially always, be about outward tangibles. But truly, does this make us happy deep down?

Accept loss forever. Some things were never yours to begin with.

Here’s a little exercise for your mind, bringing to light the things we choose, subconsciously and consciously. Pick first, quickly, shuffling through the words. Think and reflect upon your choices afterwards. (I’ll help you with this at the end.)

Pick One:

Plastic | Individualism

Sun | Eagle

Breath | Cold

Parrot | Cotton

Macs | McDonald’s

Coffee | Football

Love | Father

Banana | Yoga

Sound | Soul

Lust | Pencil

Nudity | Plagiarism

Leather | Squirrel

Bacon | Broccoli

Pen | Intimacy

Lettuce | Peace

You | Infatuation

Gossip | Salad

Full | Starve

Circle | Splay

Space | Dinosaur

Cup | Activism

Truth | Stuffing

Candle | Virtue

Simplicity | Bundle

Gray | Gay

Conservatism | Yellow

Ego | Gorilla

Hair | Blanket

Tattoo | Camera

San Francisco | Avocado

Earl Grey | Fabriano

Miniature | Trophy

Forever | Hourglass

Elvis | In and Out

Cheap | Horse

Fancy | Dance

**

Were some of your choices surprising? It may be, depending on what you instinctively chose.

There was no order to these random words; I simply plucked them out of my head and into the page which you read right now. This itself was an act of letting go on my part, to not incessantly fuss over minute details.

Say you chose broccoli instead of bacon, as an example. Does this mean you are a vegetarian or vegan? Not necessarily. It just means you chose broccoli at that sliver in time. That is all.

This act alone, of instantaneous choices, exercises your mind’s ability to let go of forever dwelling on things, meanings, purposes, explanations and intentions of whatever it is that you are pondering about.

Minimalism is the simplest way to a solution, to a choice.

The clutter becomes the ascetic. The many becomes the few. The trendy becomes the classic. The noise becomes the clarity.

Listen.

What do you hear, right now?

Is it the quiet drip drop of the leaky faucet, stubbornly staying put, not fully shutting itself for fear of never streaming again?

Is it the beat of your heart, thumping faithfully in your body, fueling your very essence of physical being in this world?

Is it the music you’re playing, sounds vibrating in your eardrums as you allow the soft sounds to infuse themselves into your bloodstream, the elixir of life?

Listen.

This is life. Right now. You are in it. You are it. You are the World.

**

Black nail polish. A choice. Makes me happy.

Drawing on my body in Sharpie marker words and symbols that resonate with me. A choice. Makes me happy.

Last-minute decisions to hop on a bus/plane/boat/foot/tuk-tuk and go. A choice. Makes me happy.

Breathing deeply with mindfulness in Yoga stretches and poses. A choice. Makes me happy.

Doing whatever I want, whenever, wherever, with whomever, the end of permission living. A choice. Makes me happy.

Choices. We all have ‘em. I don’t care who you think you are and how sorrowful your life has been up until this very moment. You. Are. POWERFUL.

Start believing in the power of your choices. Make yourself happy; don’t weigh your happiness in other people/things/destinations/merits/external validators. Just not gonna happen, folks. Just not gonna happen.

**

I turn 27 on August 12. I want to do something different on that day (besides headstands, handstands, back bends, cartwheels and leaping off couches like Trini the Yellow Power Ranger — couchsurfers beware. coming to a leap near you!). I would like to answer 27 reader-asked questions of any (publicly appropriate) nature.

If you have any questions you’d like to ask me, anything at all, please tweet to me @ninayau by Saturday, July 23. Alternatively, you can post the question on Castles in the Air Facebook page.