Declutter Your Life

We live in a more-is-more society. If you don’t have it yet, you should get it. If you haven’t traveled there, you should plan it. If you haven’t upgraded to the better version of the thing you already own… what are you waiting for? Having more means you are able to have more choices, more toys, and more FUN! More fun means more happiness. Right?

I mean… in a way, yes. Need is not fun. It’s unhappy, and desperate, and worried, and scared. Which leads me to another thing. Most people can no longer identify the difference between a need and a want. The Oxford dictionary states that a need is to “require because it is essential or very important.” Even that definition seems to imply that needs are objective.

Often what happens, when you get past a certain point, is that actual “needs” are not a concern anymore; comfort is now the goal. Don’t get me wrong! There’s nothing wrong with comfort. In my opinion, the trouble starts when comfort transforms into a monster which shows it’s presence with clutter, disorganization, and stolen time. Science has confirmed over and over how clutter is harmful to our health. In my experience (not to mention legit researched studies) clutter leads to anxiety, stress, discontentment, and lack of gratitude.

What I have found, in my somewhat minimalist home, is that having less means less time cleaning. I have the freedom to leave my house whenever I deem necessary without feeling guilty about messes. I have more space so I don’t feel claustrophobic. I have more time to spend doing the things that I love and serving the people that I love to serve.

When we first started to declutter I started with an easy room- the bathroom. It seemed like the best place to start. I wasn’t personally attached to much in there, and I figured decluttering would make it easier to keep clean. I took everything out of the medicine cabinet, shower, and under the sink cabinet and cleaned it thoroughly. So in essence, I reset the room to it’s original factory setting. Then I put back only the things that we used on a daily or weekly basis. I also made sure to take out the duplicates. The rest of the items were severely scrutinized. I began rephrasing the thoughts in my head. Instead of justifying why I should keep said item, I made the item justify it’s place in my life. I would ask myself a series of questions to help reframe my state of mind.

• Why don’t I use this item?
• Is it expired?
• Do I need it?
• Will I feel the need to replace if I no longer have it?
• Is it complicating my life?
• Do I actually use it or does my “fantasy self” use it?
• Do I have something else that I could use if I got rid of this?

When I finished, I had a bag full of unwanted, unused, unneeded items and a clean, uncluttered bathroom.

“That was a fun experiment,” I thought, “We’ll see how this goes.” I was very surprised to find that I kept gravitating to the bathroom for peace. It was the one space in the house that didn’t feel like a to-do list. After about a week I decided to tackle another room. In all reality, I wanted to get the kids toys under control right away, but I couldn’t justify going through their items without first going through mine. That meant that the next stop would need to be my room. A little side note. We had no living room at the time, due to living with my parents, so the only other options were the girls room and the playroom/schoolroom. If my room became a safe, calm, peaceful place it would defiantly help my mental health.

My room was much tougher. I didn’t have good systems in place for everything to “have a home.” I needed bins that fit the space so I could organize. But first I was determined to get rid of anything I no longer needed so I knew what space I needed to account for. I started with clothes.

Clothes aren’t sentimental to me so it seemed a good place to start. I had researched many minimalist philosophes before attempting to change my lifestyle. I knew that Marie Kondo’s philosophy was that if something doesn’t “bring joy” to thank it for it’s service and send it on. That wasn’t going to work for my clothes. I hated wearing most of them. If I did indeed get rid of those that didn’t “bring me joy” I would have maybe one full outfit left. Seeing as how I had no money for a whole new wardrobe, I decided to try a different minimalist tactic. I wanted clothes that were versatile, in good condition, and fit my lifestyle. I also played the numbers game. I wanted no more than one week’s worth of clothes. I narrowed down my wardrobe to seven days worth of options including sportswear, loungewear, and casualwear (I didn’t need formal wear but I kept one outfit for the rare occasion). Then I methodically went through the rest of my dresser drawers, underbed storage, side tables, etc. My pile of donations was growing. Once I sorted though everything, my mother helped me by buying bins for the closet that fit perfectly for the space. They made organizing the remainder items so much easier. Now finally everything I owned had a “home.” Great thing about this method was that I didn’t have more than I needed and I knew exactly which items I could stand to upgrade for Christmas or birthdays.

My room became organized was hardly ever messy like it used to be. I didn’t have huge piles of dirty clothes in my hamper at all times. I knew where everything belonged. And what’s more, I didn’t miss a single thing! I couldn’t even name the items that I had bagged up. They were simply not needed. That shocked me the most. The secret it seemed was choosing what to keep rather than choosing what to get rid of. As I shifted focus it was easier to let things go. Isn’t that a lovely truth? The glass half full method works better than the glass half empty.

Letting go of things in my life freed me to spend more time with the people that I loved. I didn’t even realize how much time every day was devoted to cleaning, picking up, organizing, searching for, and managing all the stuff in my home. I realized that many of the books I “had to have” were free to borrow at the library. Many of the games we “needed” to own weren’t reached for on game nights. Many of the clothes in my closet were in there in case I had nothing else I’d rather wear. I often told myself things like “it works,” “it’s still usable,” “it’s in great condition,” or “it was a gift” to justify keeping something that simply wasn’t suiting me. I was able to rewire my perspective by seeing the benefits of having less.

I learned that less really is more when I took back the time that those items were stealing from me. Now I could clean the counter in seconds because all that was on there was a soap dispenser. I could put everything where it went easily because the storage bins weren’t overflowing. What an amazing feeling. Our culture is so inundated with this desire to have more. But we decided to be counter culture and try another way. As Robert Frost once wrote, “Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.”

Once I started to feel the benefits of minimizing, I was able to help teach my kiddos a new way. See my next post for more info on how I did that. Now that we’re in an apartment of our own, we’ve kept our habit of having less. Our apartment feels plenty large enough for seven people living even though it’s only about 1000 square feet. We have more time to play and learn and grow because we aren’t constantly cleaning and picking things up. It’s such a sweet blessing. I love this way of living. I will happily talk minimalism with anyone willing. Feel free to leave me comments or questions and I will respond. Next post… minimizing with kids.