4 days ago, I moved out of my place in Japan, and now I am writing this blog post in the hotel (Comfort Hotel® Winn) in Umeå, the northern part of Sweden.
My long-cherished dream has now become real; to live in Sweden.
One of the reasons I have moved to Sweden is because I have found the relationship between Sweden and minimalism.
Why Sweden for minimalism?
There are 2 reasons why I thought Sweden and minimalism are so closely related.
The first reason is the Swedish / Nordic design.
Sweden-born furniture brand IKEA is a typical example of simplicity in its design.
It is always easy to make things complex, but the difficult part is to reduce.
In general, the design comes from the Scandinavian area is always simple but never boring.
I haven’t studied any of the design so I have no idea why this simple design can fascinate us, but as a minimalist, when I look at Scandinavian design, I always feel something right about it.
Being close to that simplicity, I am extremely comfortable as a minimalist.
So if you are also a minimalist and are looking for a country to reside, nordic countries may be in your consideration.
The second reason is the Swedish nature.
Sweden has a lot of nature in its land especially forests and a great amount of snow.
If you go visit the northern part of Sweden during the winter, you will notice that it snows quite a lot.
I was born in a developed city in Japan and spent most of my time in the developed city area, so I have always wanted to live in a country or in a region that is very close to nature.
As you can see, this is the view from the hotel room where I spent last night.
You can notice that not far away, there is the entrance to the forest.
Appreciation of nature is truly minimalism for me because if you want to get healed, the only thing you need is just yourself and nature.
Why? Because nature has been with us for such a long time and I think we are programmed to look for that comfort from nature by nature.
The relationship between nature and digital detox
Enjoying nature is the best way to have fun without being connected via digital devices.
As I am not a professional digital detox advisor, I am not giving you a proposal on how to do digital detox based on scientific data, but I am giving you some tips based on my own experience.
Until I met the notion of digital detox, I had a hard time putting away my smartphone; I was with the smartphone all the time, and even one second before I sleep, I wasn’t even putting the smartphone away.
When I was addicted to digital devices, I always felt something wrong with me and exhausted every day but I did not know what to do.
Then I read some kind of article talking about digital detox, and finally, I recognised myself as a digitally addicted person.
Since then I have tried to do the digital detox by unplugging the Wi-Fi cable before I sleep, and going to nature or a park without any digital devices in the morning.
All of those worked very well for me and that is why I have been writing blog posts about digital detox.
Going back to the mainstream, Scandinavian countries especially Sweden is the best place to appreciate nature and also the easiest place to start the digital detox.
Now, I am in Sweden so I would like to share some of the interesting things about living here with the category name "Life in Sweden".
Thanks for reading and I will see you in other articles of mine.