Cindy’s Weekly Wisdom

I bet I’m not the only one who has had conversations like this:

• Doing laundry, husband says: “Look at these socks. I think I need to throw them away. In fact, I think I need to get rid a lot of my socks.”
• Me: “Looks like it.”
• “When you go to the mall, can you get me some new socks?”
• “What colors do you need?”
• “Oh, I don’t know. Just get some blue, black, tan, and brown. I’ll get rid of the ones that are getting holey later.”
• Not said: Hold it right there buddy! You’ll declutter after I buy new?
• Said instead: “Most of the socks are in the laundry. I can help you sort the holey ones right now. Then, when we see what you need, I’ll get you some new one.”

He grunted, and nothing more occurred.

I was pleased with the outcome of this conversation. Why? Because, quite honestly, I can’t image that my husband needs new socks. While it’s true that some are holey or getting thin, he seems to have more socks that any one man needs. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe he does need new socks, but buying new ones before he actually assesses his needs is foolishness. It’s purchasing randomly, and that’s how clutter occurs. In fact, once he culls, I’ll stall on that trip to the store because I want to see which colors of socks he really lacks and truly needs more of.

Another example:

I’m at the store with the girls. We like to paint our nails, and we have a couple dozen different colors of polish. Without assessing what we have, we buy several more bottles, two of which turn out to be almost exactly like colors we already had at home. (It’s amazing how many different variations on reddish-orange polish there are.) Where did we go wrong? Obviously, we purchased on impulse without assessing our needs before we bought.

The longer I declutter a thing (or more) a day, the more I understand that purchasing is the second, and equally important, part of the decluttering equation. True, you’ll never have a decluttered space unless you actually move items out of your house. But it’s just as true that you’ll never achieve or maintain a decluttered state if you continue to acquire items in excess to your needs. Shopping should be a way of acquiring needed goods not an expedition to overload your home with needless purchases that don’t satisfy you and don’t fulfill your needs, so assess before you add.

Today’s Declutter Item

I guess we have had this double adaptor for a long time. So long that the modern houses have a lot more power outlets so we don’t need it anymore. I think I might be showing my age here. Not to mention that fact that they now make power boards with four or more connections including power surge protection which makes this old thing more of a relic than a useful device

A double adaptor

Something I Am Grateful For Today

You know, doing kind deeds for others often has instant payback. That good feeling you get for doing the deed is as heartwarming to you as the deed was for them. I took a day trip to Sydney today for the sake of a friend helping another friend and what a lovely day we all had together.

“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

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

If you are looking for a

new year’s resolution

consider pledging to

declutter

an item a day from your home everyday

during 2012.

That’s 365 less things you will have cluttering up your home by 2013. Whether you think you are fairly organised and decluttered or you haven’t even begun decluttering yet this pledge is not difficult to adhere to. At the start of 2010 I know I was organised and thought I was reasonably decluttered but I set the challenge to decluttered a thing a day thinking I might run out of things before the year ended. Not only did I not run out but in 2011 I have declutter one thing five days a week and am still finding things to get rid of. So why not make the pledge, you have nothing to lose but a whole lot of space to gain. You may even recoup some money in the process.

But remember and this is very important don’t reclutter while you declutter.

* Happy New Year Banner credit ~ http://manysoft.in

Todays post from the Archives is also a guest post from one of my readers Donna Tressler. I hope you enjoy it. I have included a link to this post because Lena said in her email to me that she found the comment heartbreaking and I wanted to make it easy for you get to the comments should you wish to read them for yourself.  Lena said ~ “I didnt know that so many people are having chronic pain/illness. I am sooooo grateful, I never had serious health issues…“

What Illness Taught Me About Decluttering

Guest Post by – Donna Tressler The Sound Of My Own Wheels

Recently I watched the 2010 Messiest Home in the Country episode of Clean House, which featured a family of four living in a home filled with an incomprehensible amount of clutter. There was a lot of finger pointing in the episode – particularly at the father who “guilt shopped” while he traveled for work, but the thing that struck me as interesting was how illness (the mom was a thyroid cancer survivor) had played a roll in the accumulation of the family’s clutter. Serious illness has a profound affect on people and we all react differently. For this family buying more stuff was the answer to their pain. For me, it was just the opposite.

In 2001 I was diagnosed with Crohn’s Disease. Initially I was euphoric to have an answer to all the health issues that had plagued me for months, then the reality of living with an incurable (but manageable) illness set in, and I went into denial. I didn’t take care of myself as well as I should, and eventually I went into a flair up of the disease that lasted 16 months.

It was a horrible time in my life and by the time I came out of the flair up, I was physically and mentally exhausted from trying to maintain my job, my house, my marriage, and my relationships with family and friends. It took nearly two years to completely regain my former self, and during that time I began looking for way to improve the quality of my life. In addition to taking better care of myself and managing stress (which is a huge factor in my illness), I looked for ways to simplify my life in the event that I suffered another flair up.

Eventually I realized that the less stuff I have, the less I would have to maintain if I did get that sick again. I’d like to say I had an epiphany and instantly went on a decluttering mission that got rid of every unnecessary item in one fell swoop, but life is rarely that way. Instead it has been a continuous journey of looking at each area of my life with fresh eyes. I began by getting rid of things I didn’t use, clothes I didn’t wear, books I would never read again, and have continued on from there. I’m constantly revisiting a cabinet, a closet, a shelf, and asking what can go from this area?

As I have pared down, I have found that there are several methods that have been most effective for me in getting on, and more importantly staying on, the declutter path. My methods work for existing items in my house and items that I contemplate buying.

• I ask myself if I got “that sick” again, would I want to deal with this item
• I ask myself the questions on the Declutter Decision Making Guide here on 365lessthings
• I ask myself how many hours of working/commuting it would take to pay for the item

Someone once said “life is what happens while you are making other plans.” For me that’s a whole other blog post, but by sticking with my trifecta of clutter busting methods, I have managed to mostly stick to the trail and continue on the decluttering path, which in turn simplifies my life, helps manage my stress and thereby my overall health. It’s a win-win situation.

Click here for the link to the post so you can read the comments if you wish.

Today’s Declutter Item

I used this old album to store card craft samples. I have now used up or recycled those samples because I never really refer back to them preferring to design new stuff  each time. The album went to the thrift store.

Old Photo Album

Cindy’s Weekly Wisdom

Cindy

I love New year’s resolutions, don’t you? Ok, most people really don’t love them, but I do. Because of them, I have (finally!) learned how to use chopsticks, and I (finally!) had a charity party that I’d been intending to have for 4 or 5 years.

And I have one for you this year: Less trash.

It makes me crazy to drive through my neighborhood and see people’s trash cans literally bursting out the top with trash. The City of Austin provides a choice of 3 cart sizes: 32 gallons, 64 gallons, and 96 gallons; each is more expensive than the size before it, although even the largest can is only $30 a month. Trash pick up is weekly. Most people have the middle size can. This is the one I often see stuffed to the top and more.

(For full disclosure: Everyone also has a 96 gallon recycling bin, which is picked up every two weeks. Any amount of yard waste can be put out weekly as long as it is in large paper sacks or trash cans that can be dumped. Yard waste may not be set out in plastic bags. The city has a fantastic program for recycling solid sewage waste and yard trimmings to produce compost, which is used at city-own buildings and parks and is also sold to the public.)

My family of four people and five animals produces a single bag of trash a week. One. Even when the children were little and wore disposable diapers, we only had two bags of trash a week.

How do we do this when others are brimming over? Frankly, I often ask myself how they could possibly have that much trash. It seems impossible to me, although obviously it’s not.

Here’s how I mange it: a place for everything and everything in its place.

I have a trash can in the kitchen, plus a little one in Dan’s office, each girls’ room, and in all four bathrooms. Except for the kitchen trash, the other ones only need to be emptied once a month or so. I have two recycling bins in the kitchen, one in Dan’s office, and one at the end of the hallway by all our bedrooms. I have a tiny compost bucket in the kitchen. I have a plastic bag recycling area in the pantry; metal recycling tub (small) under the kitchen sink; and a box for Styrofoam in the garage.

Yes, that’s a lot of containers, and yes, I do live in a fairly large house, but I did the same when I lived in smaller places.

All the food cans and bottles go into one of the bins in the kitchen. Paper recycling goes into the bin in the office. The basket at the end of the hall is for miscellaneous recycling generated in the bathrooms and bedrooms. The metal bin under the sink is for aluminum foil or any recyclable but non-can metal. Food scraps are dealt with in a number of ways: the compost bin is that last option. I feed leftovers from our plate to the dogs. The guinea pig gets vegetable and fruit trimmings. Fruit that the guinea pig doesn’t eat goes outside to feed the squirrels. (My 9 year old especially loves squirrels, so ours are well cared for.) In the end, only things like egg shells, banana peels, and tea bags end up in the compost bin. Even the cats’ litter is composted: I buy compressed pine pellets for their box and put the used litter in with the yard waste when it needs to be emptied. Since I know this waste will be mixed with sewage and yard trimmings, I don’t worry that there may be some cat feces remaining. The guinea pig’s pine shavings are dumped directly into the garden as mulch.

In addition, things you’re decluttering need a place to go so that they launch into their new life in the best way possible – a gift to a friend, a trip to the thrift store, sold on Ebay. One of the advantages of thing-a-day decluttering is that you have time to make wise choices. Reader Annabelle just packed up from Germany to come back to the US and said it was a breeze due to decluttering in advance, even though the movers came early. Like her, you don’t want to be in a panic at the last minute. That’s when waste occurs.

And remember, I’ve only talked about ways of diminimishing your trash by recycling. There’s a whole other side to this coin: Bringing less into your home. But you already knew that, didn’t you?

With anything you want to succeed with, you have to 1) have a plan and 2) a way of executing that plan. If you don’t have a convenient place to put your recycling, then it won’t get recycled. If you’ve got some recycling that has to be taken to the recycling center and can’t be put in your curb-side bin, then you need a place to store it. This is my New Year’s challenge to you: Can you cut down on your trash by 1/3? By 1/2? I bet you can. Let’s all take a deep breath and say our 2012 mantra together: Less.

Today’s Declutter Item

This is a classic example of if you keep stretchy things for too long unused they will perish. This piece of elastic tubing was something I had to exercise with when I was having back spasms which in turned caused me neck problems. Fortunately I haven’t suffered from that problem for some time now so it is now only good for the trash.

Elastic tubing for physiotherapy

Something I Am Grateful For Today

The pest man has been, the car is serviced, dinner dates are sorted, towels are washed. Things are coming together nicely around here. Hopefully that means that by Sunday all I will have to do is cook, eat, drink and be merry.

“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

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

The Overspent American: Upscaling, Downshifting, and the New Consumer by Juliet B. Schor was published in 1998, but the information seems as relevant today as it did more than a decade ago. The book is geared toward middle and upper-income families, who seem to be caught up in a never-ending cycle of keeping up with the Joneses, no matter who the Joneses are.

“The Joneses” are our first error, according to Dr. Schor. In the past, our Joneses (or reference group) would be our neighbors, who all lived in houses about like ours, drove cars similar to ours, and likely had two adults and only one income. However, Dr. Schor asserts that today, our reference group is no longer our neighbors, many of whom we do not even know. For many people, the new reference groups are our colleagues and coworkers, who may hold financially very dissimilar jobs to our own, and our media “friends” that is, the fictional people we see on TV and relate to. It’s not uncommon for someone making $50,000 to compare their financial prowess to someone making well over half a million.

Dr. Schor also discusses the brands and types of items we buy as a way that we identify ourselves and show our “place” in the complex world. In my peer group, nearly all my friends have iPhones (“regular” cell phones are no longer good enough for us) despite the fact that they cost a minimum of $70 per phone per month, in addition to the purchase price. Everyone has a laptop, including the kids, many of whom have their own iPhones, as well. (Often the model that their parents have already upgraded from.) Plenty of our friends go on overseas vacations regularly. Frankly, it’s a lot to think about keeping up with. I’ve had several conversations with my daughters reminding them that because they attend a private school, they are automatically surrounded by people with more money than is typical, and that a trip to Africa or Denmark is not something that most families take on an annual basis. (In fact, I dismissed one expensive private school, which really was out of my financial league, in part because a European school trip is mandatory for all high school students. I didn’t go to Europe until I was 33, and I’ve only been a two overseas trips total. I don’t want my child going to school where it’s thought that such an experience is a must for teens.)

Finally, Dr. Schor talks about “The Downshifter Next Door.” This chapter focuses on telling the stories of various individuals who have moved away fromconstant pressures to spend – from people are embracing voluntary simplicity to people who have made commitments to stop buying so many material goods and services. I think this is the group that most 365 Less Things readers are trying to become a member of.

The last chapter contains nine points to help turn this financial, emotional, and environmental quagmire around. They are:

1. Controlling Desire – Stay away from places where you’ll spend.
2. Creating a New Consumer Symbolism: Making Exclusivity Uncool
3. Controlling Ourselves: Voluntary Restraints on Competitive Consumption
4. Learning to Share: Both a Borrower and a Lender Be – Love this one and definitely practice it.
5. Deconstruct the Commercial System: Becoming an Educated Consumer
6. Avoid “Retail Therapy”: Spending is Addictive
7. Decommercialize the Rituals – Christmas is a religious and family holiday. Don’t let the mall tell you how it should be.
8. Making Time: Is Work and Spend Working? Cut back on your spending and maybe you can change how and where you work.
9. The Need for a Coordinated Intervention

Lastly, I’ll leave you with this discouraging thought - which to me especially embodies the politics of the state that I live in – although remember that knowledge is power:

“The intensification of competitive spending has affected more than family finances. There is also a boomerang effect on the public purse and collective consumption. As the pressures on private spending  have escalated, support for public goods, and for paying taxes, has eroded. Education, social services, public safety, recreation, and culture are being squeezed. The deterioration of public goods then adds even more pressure to spend privately. People respond to inadequate public services by enrolling their children in private schools, buying security systems, and spending their time at Discovery Zone rather than the local playgrounds. ” (p. 21)

By Cindy

Have you ever got to a point where you think I really must go on a diet, my weight is getting out of control. So you follow the latest trendy crash diet for a month and the pounds are falling off. By week five you are pretty happy with your appearance and figure you don’t need to be so hard on yourself. The odd treat starts sneaking its way back in but what harm does that do, right? A few more months down the track you have returned to all your old habits and have regained the pounds that you lost and are back to square one.

After repeating this cycle a couple of times it becomes apparent that this method of weight loss does not work in the long run. What is required to maintain a healthy weight is a lifestyle change not a crash diet. The difference is that you change the way you eat on a permanent basis. Cut back on unhealthily foods, create a meal plan that is enjoyable yet healthy that leaves a little wriggle room for a treat occasionally that makes you feel like you aren’t depriving yourself.

My husband has done this and gradually lost about 15kg (about 33 lbs) and has kept it off for eight months without feeling like he is depriving himself. He sure feels and looks great.

What has this got to do with decluttering you might ask. Well that’s simple. People often perform this same futile cycle on their homes as well. They get to a point where they are frustrated with all the clutter build up, put their homes on a crash diet by having a mass declutter then return to their old ways of shopping and bringing stuff in until they are back to square one. Then repeat the process again and again.

What is required to maintain a more minimalist household and enjoy the freedom from clutter buildup is to change your lifestyle. Firstly change your shopping habits by being more selective about what you bring into your home. Then slowly but surely release the clutter that is already there. Like I said in Tuesday’s post, pay attention to what you are decluttering so you learn the lessons you need to learn in order to resist the temptation to full back into old habits. When you do need to make a purchase you will enjoy it all the more because you know that it will be something that you will get value for money from because you have chosen wisely.

Now you have broken the declutter, reclutter cycle and you can enjoy your new lifestyle.

One last thing. About the only thing I know of where crash diets actually work on is your bank account. Waste all the money in your bank account buying stuff you don’t need then try putting weight back on in a hurry there and you will soon see how difficult that is. This won’t be a problem for you now because with your new conscious consumer lifestyle you should have more dollars in the bank than you ever did.

Today’s Declutter Item

I had never considered these caps for decluttering before because they were in a box in the bottom of the linen closet and I didn’t know they were inside. I knew the box had hats in it but I thought they were all my husbands. So they are not only an impulsive declutter but they were an easy declutter because I knew instantly that I didn’t want them.

My old softball uniform caps

Something I Am Grateful For Today

Watching the pieces of jewellery sell that I repair for the thrift store. It is gratifying that little repairs that costs me next to nothing not only brings money into the thrift store but rescues the items from the bin in the first place.

“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

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

Cindy’s Weekly Wisdom

We all want to succeed. We all want  a clutter-free, clean, and peaceful home. Yet sometimes we struggle. What are some of the stumbling blocks to success?

Making Excuses Instead Starting

“I’d like to start.” “I’ll get around to it soon.” “When things settle down, I’ll declutter.” Those are excuses, and if you’re using them, they’re getting in the way of your success. One of the beauties of one-thing-a-day decluttering is that it hardly takes any time, especially in the beginning. In the beginning (which is when excuses are their strongest) nearly anything you touch or see is a candidate for decluttering. Even people who have been steadily decluttering as long as Colleen and me rarely need more than 5 minutes to find something else that needs a new home – outside of our home. Stop making excuses and just start.

An Attack of Negative Thinking

“One thing a day? I’ll be decluttering for the rest of my life?” “What’s the use? There’s too much stuff.” “It probably won’t help anyway.” Stop! No more negative thinking! If you never get started, it won’t ever change, and even one thing less is better than one thing more. We all know that every journey begins with a single step and that a giant tree began as a tiny seedling. Your decluttering journey is no different. Stop thinking and start acting.

Stuck in Your Comfort Zone

You say you want a decluttered home, but really, you like being surrounded by all that extra stuff. Besides, what if you need it some day? Being comfortable is comfortable and wanting to change can be hard and scary. I used to work with a psychiatrist who said, “People don’t change until they’re sick and tired of being sick and tired.” How true. But if you’re here, searching the Internet for inspiration in your decluttering journey, I’m going to believe that you’re sick and tired of being sick and tired and that today is the day you’re going to make your first change. You’ll be leaving your comfort zone one step at a time, one day at a time. Don’t be afraid to take the first, small step. You may be amazed at how many steps come next.

A Second Attack of Negative Thinking

“I’m not getting anywhere.” “This isn’t working.” “It’s too slow, maybe I should just quit.” We’re not running a sprint in our decluttering, not even a marathon. This is a long, sometimes meandering journey on foot, and you won’t get from point A to point B in a single day. That’s okay. Your house didn’t get cluttered in a single day, and it’s not going to get uncluttered in a single day. Write down everything you do get rid of. You’ll be amazed at how quickly the numbers add up.

Input and Output

And if you truly, sincerely feel that you’re getting no where, start writing down the number of non-disposable items (not food, toiletries, etc.) that you purchase. If your incoming goods almost match your outgoing goods, that’s going to slow you down significantly. Purchasing excess to your needs and not purging is how we all got cluttered in the  first place (or inheriting a boatload of stuff from someone who purchased in excess to their needs and never purged). You’ve got to stem the inflow, too. As a bonus, your bank account will thank you.

Get a Goal

Maybe “to have a decluttered house” is too vague for you. How about setting a specific goal? “To have company over at any time without feeling embarassed.” “To sell my excess and use the money for XX (mortgage, vacation, private school, credit card debt).”To reduce my china until all of it fits in the china cabinet.” All these are specific, quantifiable goals that may make it easier to get on track and stay on track.

A Final Attack of Negative Thinking

“Stinkin’ thinkin’ ” is what I called this when I was a therapist. This is any thinking about yourself as a person that holds you back. “I’m not worthy” or “I made my bed, now I have to lie in it.” This type of negative thinking is hardest to detect and most insideous, because rarely do we say right out loud to ourselves, “I am not worthy.” Of course you’re worthy! We’re all worthy. Maybe you did make this bed, but you darn sure don’t have to keeping lying in it. Get up! You’re never too far off course that you can’t start to make a change, and it can start today. Say it with me “I am worthy. I can correct any mistakes I have made. I can change what does not work for me and make it better. All of these things are fully within my power. I AM worthy and I CAN do this.”

Today’s Declutter Item

Rather than waste time and effort trying to sell these last few records on ebay it is time to set them free the quick, easy way and more generous way, off to the thrift store they go.

The last of out record collection

Something I Am Grateful For Today

I think I have finally found just the right sandals. Being a conscientious consumer is hard work sometimes. I needed sandals but I wasn’t going to settle for second best, I needed them to be comfortable, versatile and cute and after trying on just about every sandal in town I think I have found a winner. Now all they have to do is pass the husband test.

“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

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

How did you do with Buy Nothing New October?

Colleen ~ I was hoping to say that I bought nothing new this October and personally I feel that I have done that. I have bought nothing that I wanted to buy that’s for sure. Unfortunately though the air conditioner in my car failed on me, and I had to have the compressor and the condenser replaced. I feel rather bitter and twisted about this for a number of reasons that I won’t bore you with. Technically the compressor was replace under warranty but who’s quibbling: it’s new, and it’s now mine.

Although it doesn’t count because it isn’t new, I did buy one secondhand item, a denim skirt that I paid $1 for, which will be donated back to the thrift shop because it did not suit my needs well enough to keep.

I did discover that it is easy enough to postpone a purchase until the next month to fulfil such a pledge. Now that I have proved my shower repair from last month was a success I need a new bathmat which I have put off buying until November. I suppose though that the resistance to instant gratification is a good lesson if nothing else. I think that pledging to buy nothing new for a whole year would be a far more dedicated venture.

In total I bought acquired two new items and one secondhand one. The air-con repair isn’t added clutter because the old parts were instantly decluttered, and the secondhand item and 21 other items will have been decluttered by month’s end. So I have made good strides in decluttering, that’s for sure.

Cindy ~ I’d say I did so so. Besides, food, medicine, and household disposables, I believe I probably bought about as much as usual. I purchased eight new items:

• 5 books (3 novels, all of which have been read, and 2 writing reference books, mostly for the use of the girls)
• 1 set of “bowl bonnets,” elasticized plastic covers for putting over bowls and plates. They’re an alternative to plastic wrap. (I purchased these at this time in order to get free shipping from Amazon.)
• collar and tag for the cat, who lost his other set

Also during the month, I purchased 17 used items, more than I normally would have, because our church had a gigantic garage sale. In addition, I decluttered 36 items. 36 items out, but 25 in. That’s not as good of a ratio as I would like. Definitely something to think about.

For those of you who participated in But Nothing New October, how did you do? And remember, a bunch of you dedicated yourself to Buy Nothing November. We look forward to hearing about your successes.

And one last acticle to leave you with on the Buy Nothing New initiative.From the Sydney Morning Herald

Cindy’s Weekly Wisdom

I took a hiatus of a couple weeks from my decluttering. When I started back up, I found this comment on my Facebook page, “How can you have MORE to declutter?” Three other friends “liked” this comment, which means that probably even more people than those four are wondering why I’m not sitting around on the floor with no clothes on by now, like this fellow. (I’ll wait while you check it out.)

How can I have more to declutter? Easy. According to the TED video featuring Graham Hill that Colleen posted on Saturday, the average American house is now three times larger than it was 50 years ago, yet in that time, off-site storage units have become a multi-billion dollar industry. A New York Times article  from 2009 states that “…by the early ’90s, American families had, on average, twice as many possessions as they did 25 years earlier.” Twice as many possessions? Oh my, I have to declutter something right now just thinking about that!

I think the key is to recognize that there’s no “done.” There may be “done” with the big bulk of the decluttering, but like other types of housework, it needs attending to. Interests change. Hobbies come and go. Children grow up, graduate, leave, and maybe come back. There can be the addition of grandchildren or aging relatives. Plus, we apparently have twice as many belongings as our parents did 25 years ago!

In my case, Dan’s office is largely untouched. I have some boxes up in the closet in Audra’s bedroom that have never been investigated. The garage is virgin territory. The girls are always maturing and changing, so the belongings in their room need continual attention. The attic is in pretty good shape but surely can stand another culling. Maybe someday I’ll be able to get rid of my Christmas china.

In addition, it’s important to be realistic about what’s entering your house. If new things are purchased and nothing is purged, the amount of stuff grows and grows. I had a lighter decluttering month than ususal in October and predict that I will only declutter about 38 things by the end of the month. I have tracked every purchase, and 25 new things have entered my life. Eight of them are brand new, and the rest are second hand goods, so I can feel virtuous from a fiscal and environmental point of view, but it’s still only a net loss of only a dozen items for the whole month. That’s two steps forward and one step back!

I’ve written on this topic before and compared the process of decluttering with editing, a past profession of mine. You have to clear off the first layer before you can see the second layer to deal with it. Once you delve into the second layer, there will be a third, and maybe a fourth or fifth. Hard decisions that you put off the first time around need to be addressed again later. The process is a lifestyle change, not a one-time burst of cleaning.

That, my dear friends, is how I can have more to declutter.

Today’s Declutter Item

If you get an accessory with something but you don’t use it there is no point in keeping it. Dah! So these camera straps when off the the thrift shop. Goodness knows how long they have been lingering unused in the bottom of the camera bag.

Camera Straps

Something I Am Grateful For Today

I am grateful for the extended warranty on my car. The airconditioner compressor has failed which would have cost me $1400 to replace. Luckily for me it is covered under this warranty. 

“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

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

Cindy’s Weekly Wisdom

When Colleen wrote Have Storage Will Clutter, I assumed it would be about storage units, which exist all over the US, some row after row of garages, and others (literally) high rise buildings with full heating and air conditioning services. Some people’s junk in the US lives better than many citizens.

Recently I was  at a class with my eldest daughter and was telling one of the fathers about the blog. He immediately told me that his chore for that day was cleaning out the garage. The coach then approached and asked if we were talking about cleaning out a storage unit. The man said, “No, but we have one of those that needs to be emptied too.” Then the coach shared that she has three storage units. She is going on a trip to Europe soon and noted that the units cost about a European trip per year. She claimed that she intends to clean out one unit when she returns (although I have to say, her commitment to this seemed very half baked, like one of those things that you just get used to saying like “I’m going to start exercising”). I challenged her to empty all three units. Bizarrely, she then said, “Oh no, I’m a minimalist” but had to return to coaching before I could find out how in the world having three storage units and being a minimalist could possibly be related. (Ok, truthfully, I was too busy trying not to snort loudly and rudely to find out more.)

I asked the father why he had a storage unit. He said that they intend to turn half of their garage into an exercise room. In order to work toward this goal, they’d cleaned out part of the garage and put it in storage. At least some of the stuff in the storage unit are items that will be in the exercise room. He told me that the unit was about a cheap as they come at $110 per month (about the same AUD, 81 Euro) and that he’d spent over $1000 (741 Euro) on the unit so far. One thousand dollars and no exercise room yet. The gym closest to my house is $70 a month for a family membership. They could have been working out for the past 14 months for the money that’s gone into this storage unit.

The last example of Have Storage, Will Clutter is a couple I know. Their adult children live in Texas. The parents thought that they would move from California, more than 1000 miles away, to Texas. When one of the children got a long-term overseas assignment, the parents packed up their belongings, sold their condominium, and move into their son’s house. Because the son’s house was fully furnished, they kept some of their personal items, and the rest of their belongings went into storage. This makes sense to me. Having their items in storage was cheaper than continuing to pay for a whole condominium for them, and they knew that their living arrangements were temporary. Eighteen months later, their son returned, and the parents moved back to California, leaving their stored items behind. For a while it was unclear what would happen next, but now more than five years have passed. The parents definitely aren’t moving to Texas, and their belongings are still here, still in storage. They don’t seem to have any intention of repossessing their items, which include furniture, clothing, household items, and collectibles, nor do they seem to have any intention of paying to have these items moved to California. Every year when they visit Austin for two or three days, they visit the storage unit – presumably to get something out of it, but I really don’t know. (Maybe to put something in!!) If the average unit is $100 a month, five years of storage comes to $6600 (4890 Euros). In the meantime, they’ve purchased replacement furniture and electronics for their home in California. My estimate is that this folly has cost them at least $10,000. I don’t really know what to say about this story. It truly mystifies me, but I do know that if storage units weren’t so convenient, something else would have been done with these belongings, rather than just having them sit in climate-controlled comfort year after year.

If you have a storage unit, my first advice to you is to leave the house alone and declutter the storage. You’re throwing money away when what you need to do is make some hard choices and probably many easy choices and live within the space you have available to you. All those “valuable” items you may find hard to part with because “they cost good money” are getting more and more costly each day that you pay to store them. Have storage, will clutter, indeed!

Today’s Declutter Item

I bought this carry file about 15 years ago when working as a teacher’s aide in my children’s first school. That was seven schools ago and it has hardly been used for its intended purpose since. I think it is well past time I let it go.

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File Folder Bag

Something I Am Grateful For Today

I had a wonderful day today giving a friend a belated birthday treat. We had a coffee, went to the Hunter Valley Gardens (first time for both of us) and had our favour Tom Yum soup for lunch. Everything was perfect including the weather. See photos below.

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