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Sam Henry

Professor Yakubova

COM 405

9 April 2024

My Everyday Aesthetics

The art of everyday aesthetics can show us how we can organize how we perceive the

world. With the help of Tom Leddy, I’ve come to expand my mind on how I find a connection in

everything. Finding beauty in everyday objects, activities, and the surrounding environment.

Looking at all the functioning moving parts to each thing we are perceiving and emphasizing its

meaning. Searching for how these things overall make you feel emotionally and physically.

Recently I have been offered a job that requires me to move to another country. This job has to

do with traveling and implementing guided trips for people on holiday. After finding out about

this job and going on to accept the position I knew I had to change daily routines and rearrange

specific areas of my life to get myself ready. I made an aesthetic choice to become a minimalist.

Minimalism can be very important for taking a position like this. At this point in my life,

I am about to graduate college and have collected many belongings during the four years that

I’ve spent at the university. It’s hard for a person to get rid of something that they think they

need. We as humans collect so much stuff every year that we don’t even use it. The art of

minimalism takes a headstrong approach to organizing your belongings and pushing aside what

you don’t need. Obendorf shares a great line in his book Minimalism: Designing Simplicity,

“Minimalism always denotes an extreme case of reduction, and a central proposition of this work

is that we can learn from looking at these extremes” (6). Minimalism helps us gain a better

perspective on things. We learn a lesson by cutting down on the number of things we have and
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then giving ourselves time to realize we don’t need it. Once I got this job, I knew I wanted to

take the minimalist approach. I blindly sold most of my belongings so when I leave the

university in the Spring, I won’t have much to my name but a backpack. If I were to ignore this

approach, I would be moving overseas with nowhere to store all the useless stuff I’ve collected

over time. Choosing this aesthetic to better my way of living along with how I perceive my

living I’ve become much happier. Psychologically my mental health feels better from pushing

forward with this aesthetic and I feel more determined for the future. Without the physical factor

of belongings clouding my future, everything feels much clearer.

Minimalism is just the first approach to gradually immersing myself in this new way of

living. My way of life for the past four years has been routine: going to classes, working, and

studying. Making a macro-level shift for myself must be driven by something. Ever since I was a

kid my brother has gotten me excited about traveling and seeking new cultures. Over the past

decade of my life, I’ve experienced many new destinations getting me excited for new things.

After being confined to one space for four years I’ve come to figure out what the next step is and

what it’s supposed to be. Tom Leddy describes this perfectly in The Nature of Everyday

Aesthetics,

Perhaps even more fundamental than these is the quality of ‘rightness,’ as in ‘sounds

right,’ ‘looks right,’ and ‘feels right.’ Nelson Goodman has drawn our attention to the

aesthetic quality of rightness and ‘good fit’ with respect to architecture. These terms also

relate to everyday aesthetics. For example, if a particular arrangement of furniture in my

living room does not look right to me, this may be an aesthetic matter. A good massage

feels right. And this is part of what we mean by saying that it is good” (8).
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Moving out of the country and throwing myself into a completely new area where the culture is

different “feels right” and “looks right” to me. This has been something I’ve wanted to do for a

long time and the opportunity has finally come around. Last year I had the opportunity to visit a

new country for a couple of weeks. This is where I knew for sure that I wanted to do something

like this for my next stage in life. I loved problem-solving my way in a new area. I loved that the

language spoken wasn’t English, I loved the diverse food, and I loved the friendships that I had

made along the way. The different culture enthralls me, making me want more and more.

Americans get so distracted and caught up in their own culture making them realize that they

don’t know what is outside their boundaries. Everything becomes way too political pushing out

the true underlining and art of one’s culture. Americans become so confined to one space, refuse

to travel, and make false accusations of what another culture can be like. The cultural aesthetic of

visiting a new country can only be done by truly being immersed in it yourself. There is so much

that is offered in a new country, so much exploration, and so much interaction. Felski captures

the true thoughts of what’s happening in the world distracting people from the true beauty. Felski

states, “The first is that cultural studies had declared war on art and aesthet- ics. It is the

implacable foe of all talk about beauty and pleasure, style and form. Cultural critics believe that

such terms are nothing more than mystifying babble that distracts us from the coercive rule of

hierarchies of taste” (1). Many individuals remain confined within their own familiar spaces,

hesitant to venture beyond their comfort zones and explore the world beyond. The true

“hierarchies of taste” can only bring one the right experience through truly embodying the trip.

Last year when I got the opportunity to visit Israel for the first time all kinds of cultural

aesthetics were hitting me left and right. Visiting one of the oldest countries in the world and

observing the way of life. How two types of people, Israelis and Palestinians live in the same
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country together that do not get along at all. Seeing that people can still enjoy their life in a

beautiful country still knowing that there is war. From breathtaking, magical views, to amazing

food there are so many special significant roots to that place. I’ve come to appreciate the cultural

aspects of new countries I’ve never been to before. It makes me curious and hungry for more

wanting to see as many new cultures as I can. I want to learn and understand where they come

from and why. My time in Israel and little time in Greece have shown me so much in such a

small amount of time. It’s shown me that I want more and that I belong to adventure and find

more true beauty to take upon myself. No matter the macro level of restraint upon a certain place

people are living there every day accepting their situations and enjoying every single day. It’s so

interesting to see how these people pursue certain ventures in their professions. From working in

these markets which were called “shuks” to spending every single moment praying in the

Synagogue. It helps you gain a new perspective and show you where your place in the world is.

“The pleasures, problems, and politics of texts were not etched for all time in the form of the

texts themselves, but were created and recreated in the social flux of engagement and

interpretation. Seeing culture as a practice meant shuttling between texts and institutions,

aesthetics and social analysis, semiotics and power” (Felski 38). Culture can be broken down and

organized like aesthetics. It helps us learn, understand, and determine what the nature is. From

physical interaction to written literature years of history can be unfolded in front of you.

With my new perception of everyday ethics, practicing minimalism, going on by what

feels right, and understanding the true roots of diverse cultures I feel I am walking in the right

direction. I have found what is truly there for me and where my belonging is. I have come to

realize the true association of my own set of aesthetics. Discovering true beauty in my everyday

surroundings, activities, and way of life.

Works Cited

Felski, R. (2005). The role of Aesthetics in Cultural Studies. The Aesthetics of Cultural Studies,
28–43. https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470774182.ch1

Obendorf, H. (2009). Minimalism: Designing simplicity. Springer.

Tom Leddy.”The Nature of Everyday Aesthetics.” Aesthetics of Everyday Life, Light, Andrew.