Deb J

How do you live your life? Are you a person like me who used to have an active, busy life with work and other outside interests but now you spend the majority of your time at home? Do you have children at home or did you recently become an “empty nester”? What is your life like today?

It took my mother and me awhile to realize that our home no longer matched our lifestyle. I think it took longer for Mom than it did me but it was true. We had changed. Our lives had changed. Mom was always a very active person who entertained people in her home, was very involved in activities at our church, had numerous social activities and loved to cook and bake to give away. I was also involved in my church, had a very stressful job, and was also socially active. The first major change was when I was diagnosed with three incurable but not life threatening diseases, chronic illnesses. My active lifestyle and stressful job had exacerbated my conditions and I eventually had to go on disability. It took a couple of years for me to realize that not only had my health changed but so had my lifestyle and my finances. Then Mom started to have some new health issues and started to slow down. When you are very active people and you have always been socially inclined toward entertaining and doing, the need to change to a more at home lifestyle not only means having to accept this emotionally and mentally but learning to let go of things related to that old life.

To put this in perspective means taking a new and unbiased look at your life and how you live it. I found that everything from what we had in our kitchen to the furniture we had to the crafts we did were affected. I have always been one who was very organized and kept little above what I needed so for me this change only meant taking the time to declutter what I no longer needed. For my mother this was a major issue. Not only has she struggled with the changes in her energy and abilities but she has struggled with the decluttering of no longer needed items. Coming from a generation that learned to store things “they might need” and have more than one of an item, Mom really did struggle and is still struggling.

Here are some things that I have come to realize during this time.

1. If your lifestyle changes your need for “stuff” changes. My mother no longer does any craft making. She had drawers and boxes of craft supplies to declutter. She also has been decluttering many kitchen items as we no longer entertain much and when we do it is very casual.
2. Your lifestyle changes affect more than stuff they also affect how you use rooms and even how big a home you may need. As Mom has gotten older we have moved more things up to counter level or above so she doesn’t have to bend over as much.
3. Each person will struggle with these changes and for different lengths of time. Like my mother is doing.
4. If more than one person is affected by the changes then the person who first instigates any decluttering needs to express why and how they have come to their decisions with any others affected. Mom was very agitated by my decluttering until I realized that talking about why I was doing something took that problem away. It also helped her to make similar decisions.
5. Don’t push anyone else involved but keep communicating about the changes YOU are making. This is what I did with Mom.
6. It doesn’t have to be done today or even tomorrow. One item a day or less is fine.
7. Don’t declutter something on a whim or because you haven’t done any decluttering lately. Think things through. We have an immersion blender and a regular blender. We kept both because of how we use them for different things.
8. Don’t get depressed if it takes a while to get others on board. Do what you can with what you can.
9. Remember that when organizing what is left to fit the storage placement to how it is used by the one who uses it most.
10. Remember to take a Strangers View every once in a while.

Today’s Mini Mission

In the inimitable words from Peter Walsh ~ “If you bought it over the phone after 8:00pm , chances are you don’t need it.” Declutter it.

Eco Tip For The Day

Got flies ~ Break out the old fashioned fly swatter rather than the spray. Propellent, insecticide, the can, manufacturing… ~  none good for the environment.

For a full list of my eco tips so far click here

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

Cindy

My in-laws are visiting, and I was thinking about my father-in-law. He really likes to do home improvement projects, to work on his own vehicle, and he’s done some truly outstanding woodworking projects.

My husband is not really like his father. No one else I know works on their own car, my husband can only do the simplest of woodworking, and although he does home improvement projects, he doesn’t love it. Yet at least some of his clutter reflects who he thinks he should be (see his Dad, above) and not who he really is.

The fancy name for this is “aspirational clutter,” but I’m going to call it “should” clutter because it defines who you think you should be.

You may have a bookshelf full of classic books, when really all you enjoy reading is popular fiction. However, you think you should be a person who owns, collects, reads, discusses, and enjoys classic books.

You may have a sewing machine – maybe even a sewing cabinet – and not even know how to thread the machine. But you think you should be the sort of person who is either so crafty or so frugal that you have need for a machine and all its accoutrements.

You have tools for home maintenance or automobile repair, but no interest, aptitude, or knowledge for doing these things, but you think that a “good” person should do their own home and car repairs.

You have craft or hobby supplies – probably a lot of them – for crafts that you’re sure you should try. The fact that you’ve owned them for more than a dozen years and haven’t tried the craft yet is only making you feel worse for not being what you should.

Stop “shoulding” on yourself. It’s nonsense. There is nothing you should be, just what you are. You are under no obligation to continue owning a bunch of items that simply remind you how insufficient you are in becoming what you (or maybe someone else) thought you should be. Move on! Sell it, give it away, return it to its owner, and free up your physical and emotional space for becoming what you are.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter any item you haven’t used in six months. This could be a tool, dishes, some other not very useful to you item or  even an ingredient. You could do a use it up declutter on that ingredient. These items are usually found underneath useful things in drawers and in the mirky depths behind everything else in the cupboards.

Eco Tip for the Day

 Natural way to clean silver ~ http://greenliving.nationalgeographic.com/natural-way-clean-silver-3121.html. Warning:- It always pays to test any cleaning product or suggestion on an inexpensive, easily replaced item first.

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

I think this week’s mini missions just about cover the basics of decluttering your kitchen. But I shall make a list of suggestions here just in case I missed something.

• Get rid of ingredients you haven’t used in a long time.
• If you want to improve your diet but suffer from lack of self control then declutter ingredients and prepared foods that you should not be eating. You could do a use-it-up declutter mission on these items, sparingly of course. There is no need to rid yourself of these items altogether just ration how much you stock and how often they are replaced.
• Declutter gadgets and small appliances that aren’t doing much more than wasting space.
• Be rational about how many cups, plates, bowls, glasses, knives, forks and spoons you need. Do a trial separation if you aren’t sure. That is, pack up what seems like excess and move it away from the kitchen. If you don’t find yourself retrieving any of it them perhaps you don’t need it.
• It has been written more than once that the cluttered state of a house can be assessed simply by viewing the front of one’s fridge. You might want to keep this in mind while you are decluttering the rest of your kitchen.
• Once all the clutter is out of the way rearrange the items you use regularly so they are in the most convenient positions.
• You might also want to consider moving items you store in your kitchen that aren’t in keeping with the purpose of the room. If your space is limited and your kitchen has to be multipurpose then a compromise might be necessary, but best that kitchen is primarily organised to be used for food preparation. If you eat at the breakfast bar then it should not be covered in school papers, things needing repairs, kids toys and bills.  Factor this in while decluttering to make a proper space for these items if necessary or find another more appropriate place to organise these things in your home.
• Continue to observe over time if what is left is used often or seldom and consider decluttering some more.

There are circumstances that affect the quantities and variety of things one needs in a kitchen. What suits my circumstances and what works for your family could be, and I am sure are, two entirely different situations. For instance, I have a dishwasher and a family of three adults so I keep enough cutlery, crockery, glassware and utensils to cater for washing a full load and having enough left over to use while the others are getting clean. You however may wash by hand or have a split drawer or small bench top dishwasher, four children or live alone so the numbers will be different for you.

You might bake a lot so need a variety of pans and a sturdy mixer while I could live with fewer and mix by hand. You may have a Mediterranean diet and regularly use a pasta maker, while I have long since decluttered mine because we eat low carb so pasta is only a special treat that we have infrequently. You may enjoy a little French treat and often serve crepes for dessert. I am not at all French however I am not parting with my crepe maker because I love crepes too and make them often. Only on Saturdays of course because that is “Anything Goes” food day at our house. You may enjoy spicy food so require a large spice collection. I also love spicy food but have simplified these days and use prepared curry pastes. When the spices I have run out, there are many I won’t be replacing. So as you see your kitchen may be stocked quite differently to mine but neither need to be cluttered with unnecessary things we don’t use.

If there is a particular something that you enjoy only on occasion, do you really need the specific pan, gadget or utensil to make it yourself? Especially if that something is a treat that isn’t so healthy for your diet, perhaps ice-cream, cookies, cakes, crepes, donuts, deep-fried anything… Wouldn’t it be better to only indulge in these treats occasionally outside of the home rather than having the ingredients and equipment to tempt you to eat them too often. By decluttering these items you not only reduce the clutter in your kitchen but you also declutter unhealthy options from your diet and free up space which makes your kitchen easier to function in. And remember a treat seldom enjoyed is enjoyed all the more. Trust me most of these gadgets are easily replaced at a thrift shop for a few dollars should you suddenly decide you actually have a use for one. That’s because the majority of people usually come to their senses and donate them sooner or later.

My Kitchen

The Kitchen Drawers

I have decluttered my kitchen slowly over time. No surprises there I suppose! 😉 Items continuously kept coming to the fore that obviously weren’t being used, not used often enough to warrant keeping, or that I realised I had more of than I needed. This will continue as the kids leave home and at that time I will give stuff to them if they want it. Right now I have a shelf of various glasses and some excess Tupperware canisters that my daughter will be taking. Aside from that I am pretty happy with the shape my kitchen is in… for now.

So be realistic about what you need, use and are likely to use in the future and considered decluttering the rest.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter a small appliance that’s primary use is to produce unhealthy food. The deep fryer would be my first choice had I not decluttered it fifteen years ago. Other suggestions would be an ice-cream maker, donut maker, popcorn maker, chocolate fondu set…

Eco Tip for the Day

If you must use ziplock bags wash them out and reuse them, rather than wasting them after only one use. I don’t use many these days because of changes in habits but when I do I wash them and then dry them by hanging them open side down on the fridge placing a magnet on the top inside edge to keep them in place.

For a full list of my eco tips so far click here

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

Mini Mission Monday is about finding ten minutes a day to declutter. To make it easy for you, each Monday I set seven declutter missions, one for each day of the week for you to follow. It takes the guess work out of decluttering and makes it easy and “fun” for you to achieve some quick decluttering.

In keeping with my post from Tuesday last week ~ Apply-the-365-approach-to-other-areas-of-your-life ~ this week’s mini missions will all be taking place in the kitchen. I have found, over the last three years of my slow declutter, that I have returned to the kitchen over and over again. Simplifying and healthifying my choices has freed up a lot of space and made food preparation much easier and efficient.

Monday – Declutter any kitchen tool you don’t like using. Chances are you have already found an alternative for this tool, in my experience that substitute is usually a knife.  It is no less than astounding how many gadgets there are out there that one good knife can replace.

Tuesday – Declutter a small appliance that’s primary use is to produce unhealthy food. The deep fryer would be my first choice had I not decluttered it fifteen years ago. Other suggestions would be an ice-cream maker, donut maker, popcorn maker, chocolate fondu set…

Wednesday – Declutter any item you haven’t used in six months. This could be a tool, dishes, some other not very useful to you item or  even an ingredient. You could do a use it up declutter on that ingredient. These items are usually found underneath useful things in drawers and in the mirky depths behind everything else in the cupboards.

Thursday – In the inimitable words from Peter Walsh ~ “If you bought it over the phone after 8:00pm , chances are you don’t need it.” Declutter it.

Friday – Some gadgets are just not worth the effort. Declutter those you don’t use because they are too complicated to assemble, to difficult to clean or that you can’t use because some parts are missing.

Saturday – Start a use it up declutter challenge on items and ingredients in your pantry that just aren’t good for you. In future be more moderate as to how much or what you stock and use. White sugar, white flours, pasta that isn’t wholemeal, cookies, potato crisps, fizzy drinks, sugar laden cereals…

Sunday - Sunday is reserved for contemplating one particular item, of your choice that is proving difficult for you to declutter. Whether that be for sentimental reasons, practical reasons, because the task is laborious or simply unpleasant, or because the items removal requires the cooperation of another person. That last category may mean that the item belongs to someone else who has to give their approval, it could also mean there is a joint decision to be made or it could mean that the task of removing it requires assistance from someone else. There is no need to act on this contemplation immediately, it is more about formulating a plan to act upon or simply making a decision one way or another.

Good luck and happy decluttering

Eco Tip for the Day

When washing your hands don’t turn the tap on too hard, quarter speed may be all that is necessary to wet and rinse.

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

On Fridays at 365 Less Things I share with you my favourite comments from my wonderful readers and my favourite web finds of the week. I hope you will enjoy them as much as I did.

Favourite Comments. Enjoy!

Loved that Jane has found a finical benefit in her new attitude towards stuff. She tells us about it in this comment.

This next comment from Hunter_xs was Cindy’s pick in response to her post on Wednesday.

Here is another testimonial from Jane on how she has lost weight by giving up fizzy drinks.

I just had to include this comment because I know how thrilled Moni is to reach this point in her decluttering process.

Favourite Web Finds. Happy reading!

Wendy F, after Jenny brought it to her attention, found and sent through this link to a PDF from Purdue University ~ Mindless Eating:  Why We Eat More Than We Think!

Here is a link to an article by Gretchen Rubin from the Happiness Project.

This next article was written by Marianne from The Spendwise Moms on the subject of clutter & eating habits.

Sanna sent me through several link last week and here is one of them from Just A Little Less.

Here is something to think about from The Minimalists.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter a filing cabinet. Once you have decluttered your accumulated paperwork and have become realistic about what you really need to retain in the future, perhaps decluttering your filing cabinet, or at least downsizing to one with less drawers, would make sense. The lack of excess filing space may encourage you to stay on top of the paper clutter in the future, having no place to store it out of sight out of mind.

Eco Tip For The Day

If you are going out to dinner and suspect you will have leftovers, take your own reusable container to bring them home in rather than request a throw away container from the restaurant.

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

Rebecca J sent in a comment on Tuesday and two lines really struck me as something worth sharing with you all in a post. Here is what she wrote…

“6 years ago, my parents decided they both wanted to lose about 50 pounds. They did lose the weight and have kept it off. One aspect of their approach was that they weighed themselves each day and plotted their weight over time in Excel.”

Rebecca J’s parents were clever, maybe unintentionally but clever nonetheless. Whether they realised it or not they actually put in place a task that gave them extra incentive to lose the weight. Seeing the weight drop on the Excel spreadsheet was probably more tangible than seeing it drop on their bodies which would no doubt have added inspiration to keep improving their diet. Rather than focus on what they were missing out on, they had turned the table on those nasty potential cravings by replacing them with a  craving to see the weight drops in the spreadsheet.

This is a great tactic to utilise, whether it be through a spreadsheet or just by focusing on an alternative gain. I have done this with my decluttering. By simply focusing on being one item less cluttered everyday, and the joy of passing those things on to someone who can use them, made it easy for me to let things go that I might otherwise have been unable to detach myself from. I replaced a bad habit of holding on to stuff with a new joy of letting it go, even though physically it wasn’t all that obvious I was making a difference.

A fraction of the items I decluttered in 2011

Photographing all the items was also a help for me to see that I was making a difference. It is nice to be able to look back on the sheer bulk of stuff that has left my home. I wonder how it ever fit to me honest. I must be a genius at organising is all I can say about that.

So give it a go. Focus on the joy of letting go, the freedom that living with less affords you or the joy of helping others. Perhaps start a list of the items you are getting rid of or begin a photo file on your computer so you can see the progress you are making. Measure your departing clutter by the box load, by the square metre or by the trunk load and keep a count. Keeping track and looking back on how far you have come gives you insentive to keep adding to the the count.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter a piece of furniture, especially if its only purpose is to hold items that need dusting.  Hopefully your previous decluttering efforts might have freed up such a piece by now.

Eco Tip for the Day

Need a new wooden spoon, salad bowl or even bathroom accessory consider buying sustainable bamboo items.

For a full list of my eco tips so far click here

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

Cindy’s Weekly Wisdom

Cindy

Several people have recently asked me how to begin decluttering, and someone confessed last week that she thought all of us were running to the thrift store every single day as we decluttered, so I decided that it was time for another review.

Where Colleen and I started from

For those of you who are newer readers, you may not know that Colleen and I started our decluttering journeys from very different places. (And we didn’t know each other then, either.) Colleen’s house was well organized and very tidy, but she realized that she simply had way too much stuff. Her children were in their late teens when she began.

I moved into our current house with a two year old, and I was pregnant with my second child. The house never got fully organized. In addition, we did a lot of work on the house, so some area was always disrupted. When we finished all the work, the house looked fantastic, and I didn’t want the junk that was everywhere to make my beautiful house look ugly and cluttered. The inside of most cabinets were organized, but every surface was covered and there were laundry baskets of miscellaneous all over the house. By this time, I had one child in elementary school and one child in middle school.

What are your decluttering goals?

Different people declutter with a different goal in mind. Colleen thought she had too much stuff. I wanted my house to look nice, to be able to use my furniture and surfaces as intended, and I wanted to not be embarrassed to have guests.

Categories of clutter

Different people will have different sorts of clutter. I’m sure we all have a few toiletries we need to use up, some medicines that have expired, too many gadgets in the kitchen, some clothes we never wear. I think our trouble areas, however, are more specific to our interests, our psychology, and our personalities. Here are the main categories of clutter for all the members of my family:

Me – All sorts of household miscellanies, things I kept putting off making decisions about, craft supplies, office supplies, toys and games, books.

My husband – Books and papers leftover from college, books in his field (computers) that are now hopelessly outdated, hundreds of career-related magazines, electronic this-and-that, accumulated garage items.

The girls – Clothes and toys that they outgrew, art supplies, all sorts of tiny things that girls like to collect, unwanted birthday and Christmas gifts, art.

Some things you might have – Clothes, impulse purchases, decorative collectibles, books, magazines, newspapers, items you inherited, gadgets, excess food in your pantry or freezer, hobby items, crafts supplies, furniture, gardening tools and planters, stationery, incomplete projects, things that might be useful “someday”, love letters and photos that hurt you, souvenirs, things you have identified to declutter but haven’t actually gotten rid of.

How to begin

Beginning is usually easy once you decide to do it. You probably have an area that’s been bothering you. Take one thing from that area, put it in your discard box. Do not get it back out. Hurrah! You’re on your way.

Over time, you’ll find things that you would like to sell or need to give back to a friend, items that are harder for you to discard or need more thought. In the beginning, skip those and go for the low hanging fruit. You’ll make more progress and feel better about your accomplishments that way.

You’re on your way!

Today’s Mini Mission

Do you really need an alarm clock when your cell phone can carry out this task. Consider decluttering it.

Eco Tip for the Day

When packing items you have sold on eBay use recycled packaging materials when possible. I get used product boxes from my local hardware store.

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

Have you ever felt you need to make changes in your life, whether that be adding something healthy in, or stop doing something that isn’t good for you. Have you ever decided those changes are too hard to make and give up before you begin. Well, just like our small steady steps in decluttering you can also utilise this approach with other good habits you would like to implement.

I am using the 365 approach to cut back on the amount of coffee I drink. My goal is to only drink coffee outside of the house which of course isn’t everyday. I started out by not drinking coffee at home after 4pm for a while. Then I stopped imbibing from midday onwards. At this point I don’t have coffee at home unless I have had it by 10:30, the next step will be breakfast only and after that not at all. Much easier than cold turkey don’t you think.

The same method can be used to give up soda drinks (soft-drinks, pop whatever you call it), processed food, fatty foods, sugar laden treats, fast food, simple carbohydrates in general… whatever you feel is not contributing to your good health, the way you feel or the way you feel about how you look.

You can also reduce the portion size of these treats to begin with rather than, or as well as, reducing the number of times a day you usually imbibe. Cutting back is cutting back no matter which way you go about it. By continuing to reduce you will eventually find you no longer feel such strong cravings for these things in your life. And the joy of feeling so much better about yourself is the extra payoff to encourage you to stay strong.

Also, you may think you need to add a little exercise into your daily routine. You are reminded every time you are confronted with a set of stairs that your fitness could stand some improvement. The mistake a lot of people make is to think they have to do at least an hour of exercise three times a week for it to be of any benefit. They also think this requires expensive equipment or gym fees to accomplish. Approaching it in this fashion is fine if you think you can manage it but if the thought of that is keeping you immobile then once again the small steady steps approach might be the best to get you started. If you can manage to find ten minutes a day at first to go for a brisk walk then that is better than nothing.

You can also choose to take the stairs instead of the lift. Take the parking spot the furthest from the shopping centre entrance (quite often this is actually quicker and saves gas in your car). If it is a rainy day I will often climb my internal stairs twice per trip. That is if I am going up for some reason, I go up, I come down, and then I go up again, do what I have to do and then do the same in reverse on the return trip. It is great exercise and because it is done in short bursts and although I raise my heart rate, which is good, I don’t raise a sweat, therefore not needing a shower at the end of my exercise. Do this a few more times and I have added quite a bit of aerobic exercise to my day. It may not sound like much but the idea is to build on this as you start to feel fitter and keener.

Even things that are, in moderation, fine for you can actually become bad when overindulged in. You have found this out through how your shopping habits contributed to your clutter issues which in turn affected your peace of mind. So imagine how bad for you things are that weren’t even good for you in the first place. It is in your best interest to at least try to improve personal habits whether for health reasons, energy levels, for your own mental well being or perhaps to improve an external appearance that you aren’t happy with about yourself.

We have discussed before that resistance to old habits can be well established by 21 days so why not give it a try. What have you got to lose except maybe potential heart disease, insomnia, gout, diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, skin problems, bowel issues, tooth decay… and even a few pounds if that is your goal.

Today’s Mini Mission

Consider decluttering your second television or the third one if you have that many. Let’s face it how much time do we really need to waste sitting around watching TV or videos.

Eco Tip for the Day

Taking care of yourself can mean consuming less, consuming fresh and consuming natural all of these things are better for the environment as well as you.

For a full list of my eco tips so far click here

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

Mini Mission Monday is about finding ten minutes a day to declutter. To make it easy for you, each Monday I set seven declutter missions, one for each day of the week for you to follow. It takes the guess work out of decluttering and makes it easy and “fun” for you to achieve some quick decluttering.

This week’s mini missions address items that you may not have considered decluttering in the past. You may not even consider the idea when you see what they are, but I thought I would make the suggestion anyway and allow you to give them some thought. I have to say that the only one I could consider is Thursday’s mission because I no longer have any of the other items mentioned. With all of these items you could instigate a trial separation where you don’t use them for a month and see how you cope.

Monday – Consider decluttering your home phone. Do you really need a static phone as well as a mobile for each person in the household?

Tuesday – Consider decluttering your second television or the third one if you have that many. Let’s face it how much time do we really need to waste sitting around watching TV or videos.

Wednesday – Do you really need an alarm clock when your cell phone can carry out this task. Consider decluttering it.

Thursday – Declutter a piece of furniture, especially if its only purpose is to hold items that need dusting.  Hopefully your previous decluttering efforts might have freed up such a piece by now.

Friday – Declutter a filing cabinet. Once you have decluttered your accumulated paperwork and have become realistic about what you really need to retain in the future, perhaps decluttering your filing cabinet, or at least downsizing to one with less drawers, would make sense. The lack of excess filing space may encourage you to stay on top of the paper clutter in the future, having no place to store it out of sight out of mind.

Saturday – I have mentioned this next item before but not often. Consider decluttering your second fridge or freezer. I know that some people use theirs for economic purchasing reasons but if that is not the case do you really need it. Many second fridges in Australia are used almost purely for storing beer and soft-drinks (soda), neither of which are good for you when consumed in large quantities and/or too frequently.

Sunday - Sunday is reserved for contemplating one particular item, of your choice that is proving difficult for you to declutter. Whether that be for sentimental reasons, practical reasons, because the task is laborious or simply unpleasant, or because the items removal requires the cooperation of another person. That last category may mean that the item belongs to someone else who has to give their approval, it could also mean there is a joint decision to be made or it could mean that the task of removing it requires assistance from someone else. There is no need to act on this contemplation immediately, it is more about formulating a plan to act upon or simply making a decision one way or another.

Good luck and happy decluttering

Eco Tip for the Day

Tips on avoiding false eco friendly labelling from www.greenbeings.com.au/

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

I have made some great progress with my decluttering, but a lovely chat I had with Colleen recently prompted a decision by which I want to improve my decluttering and help me evaluate better the real value of my objects and why I keep them.

As I was talking to Colleen she started to ask about things I don’t even want to talk about decluttering, let alone actually declutter them. They are in my bedroom in the lovely box. It is a 31 square centimetre box, covered in fabric with a lid.

I made a mistake with my decluttering. Instead of focusing on all the “easy” stuff I want to and am willing to declutter I kept focusing on the box. Talking to Colleen made me realize that I was willing to declutter a lot more, except that box.

Every time I thought of my overall decluttering I thought how painful it will be when I have to declutter this box. This line of thinking  literally puts a stop to the happy decluttering I have been doing (apart from the odd whining on the blog). I now realise what thinking about decluttering this box and its contents is doing to me emotionally. So I have decided to establish the untouchable box. This one box, in full sight, is small enough as to not constitute a burden in my bedroom or my life. It is nice looking and I am allowing myself the luxury of keeping it and never having to contemplating decluttering it if I don’t want to. No decluttering that box.

However, such a big compensation warrants some big sacrifice. So, as I have nominated that box and its contents “untouchable”, that means that everything else in my house can be contemplated for decluttering. If an item is not in use or if it does not agree with our lifestyles it is now fair game. So I set myself a rigid rule: no more keeping for sentimental reasons unless it fits in “the box”. If I want to fit it in “the box” because I feel it has emotional value, and there isn’t enough room, something else in “the box” will have to go. If it is too big and doesn’t fit in “the box” then it is too big to be kept only for sentimental reasons. Also, I can’t buy other boxes and I can’t cram things in there a mile high to keep them. The box must be able to close.

I can tell that my decision has already made me feel a lot better. My treasures are all safe, no one is going to touch them and I can declutter anything I want, because if I ever ran out of things to declutter I don’t have to touch my box. With this thought I feel like I freed myself from a burden. By allowing myself the freedom to keep my one small treasure box I gave myself a lot more freedom to declutter other stuff that I do not see as treasures, but are just there and I will look at them a lot more rationally. I can be more purposeful when I look at objects and with that, be more efficient when decluttering.

What I tried to say here is that we can allow ourselves to have our little treasures, but they have to be that, little. We have to be able to enjoy them when we want and, as it happens to me, keep them in sight and feel good having them there. I don’t know if I will ever declutter that box, I might, but for now. I have a 100 square meter house to declutter and only a 31 square centimeter of it that I am not touching.

The Weekend’s Mini Missions

Saturday – Clear the clutter from your kitchen workspace and keep it that way. Cooking is a big enough job without having to clear away before you can get started.

Sunday - Sunday is reserved for contemplating one particular item, of your choice, that is proving difficult for you to declutter. Whether that be for sentimental reasons, practical reasons, because the task is laborious or simply unpleasant, or because the items removal requires the cooperation of another person. That last category may mean that the item belongs to someone else who has to give their approval, it could also mean there is a joint decision to be made or it could mean that the task of removing it requires assistance from someone else. There is no need to act on this contemplation immediately, it is more about formulating a plan to act upon or simply making a decision one way or another.

“In daily life we must see that it is not happiness that makes us grateful, but gratefulness that makes us happy.” Brother David Steindl-Rast