Cindy’s Weekly Wisdom

As I mentioned back in January, I recently read The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. It’s full of rules, suggestions, tips, and research on making yourself, and by extension everyone around you, happier. In the very first month of her year-long undertaking, Ms. Rubin cleans and declutters, and she keeps it up throughout the year – helping out friends when she gets desperate for a tidying fix.

One tip I got from her was the One Minute Rule. I doubt this is something she made up; it sounds like something nearly everyone’s parent said to them as they were growing up in some way or another. Basically: if it only takes a minute to do it, then do it. (A couple variations I can think of are “Don’t put off to tomorrow what you can do today” and “A stitch in time saves nine.”)

Here at 365lessthings, when we talk about clutter, we usually are referring to items in excess of your needs and desires. But clutter also can be the stuff that you use frequently but fail to put away. It’s always out, it’s where it doesn’t belong, and it creates visual clutter. Plus, anything left out draws other things to it. That’s how black holes develop.

Recently I walked into my bedroom and threw my sweater on the bed. As I turned to leave, the rule popped into my head. I walked back into the bedroom, picked up my sweater, and in far less than a minute, I had hung it where it belonged.  I prevented clutter.  One of them sitting on the bed will surely attract another one, likely my husband’s jacket perhaps or maybe his bags from work.

Here are some common clutter pitfalls that can be avoided with the use of the one-minute rule:

• Lost keys: They belong on your dresser, desk, in your purse, or hanging from a hook. Same place every time.
• Sweaters, jackets, and coats thrown on a chair or the floor: Hang up your items in the closet or buy a set of hook for near the door.
• Needed receipts lost, useless receipts found: If you’re going to keep them, find a home for them and put them there every time, as soon as you get home. (Right after you put your keys away, of course.)
• A messy bedroom: Make the bed in the morning as soon as you get out of bed. This might take 2 minutes, but it sure makes your bedroom look nicer.
• A visual mess and possibly smacked heads or knees: Close the cabinet doors behind you. It amazes me that there are people who leave the cabinets open and walk away, but I’ve heard it enough times to know it’s true.
• Mental clutter: Have a place for your notes and reminders, either on paper or electronically. Remembering that there’s something you have to do and what it is takes as much time and mental energy as doing the thing itself. Write it down and free your mind.

Decluttering and organization expert Peter Walsh gave this wise advice that dovetails nicely: Complete the cycle. “If you use it, put it away. If you dirty it, wash it, etc. When a family thinks this way, there no longer is a trail of clutter left throughout the house.”

If it only takes a minute, do it now, do it right.

Today’s Declutter Item

I am not really a flipflop kinda gal but I continued to wear these because it would have been wasteful not to. Now they are beyond repair and I feel quite justified in throwing them away.

My Gratitude List

• Something that made be laugh ~ There is an advertisement on television here for a clothing store called Rivers. The lastest promotion is for women’s shoes and I swear the legs in the ad are hairy and I am not even sure they are a woman’s legs. I find this oddly amusing even though I wouldn’t want anyone to see my legs right now either. 😆
• Something Awesome ~ Homemade chocolate chip muffins warmed up and served with cream. Yumm!
• Something to be grateful for ~ The Liam’s motorbike only had an air bubble in the fuel line and decided to start after all. He was not a happy boy when it wouldn’t start.
• Something that made me happy ~ Even though it would be great to wave a magic wand and have the house clean itself I always feel satisfied with a job well done when I am finished the task. I love a clean house.
• Something I found fascinating ~ Chemistry, alchemy and the elements and the discovery there of.

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

1. Start with the easy stuff then graduate emotionally into the things you may find harder to part with. The enthusiasm gained from purging the easy stuff should spur you on.
2. Don’t reclutter while you declutter.
3. Learn from your clutter. Don’t just get rid of it learn from you previous mistakes of acquiring stuff. If you don’t take the time to analyse your mistakes in this area you will soon have a repeat performance and be back to square one.
4. KISS ~ Keep it simple stupid. There is no need to disrupt your entire house during the process of decluttering. Just select one small area at a time and then move on to another. There is nothing like a trail of disaster to put you off the task altogether. Don’t even think of it as one big mammoth task just think of it as a bunch of little tasks and only concentrate on one at a time.
5. Do your research and have your strategy planned for how you are going to dispose of your items.
   • Where or how you can donate. (Drop off, pick up, other)
   • Your options for selling (eBay, garage sale, flea market etc)
   • The how, what and where of recycling in your area.
   • Your options for large trash that won’t fit in your curb side bin.
6. Decide ahead of time where your departure points are going to be so you can quickly transfer the things you are decluttering to these areas and get them out of the way. The more organised the area is that you are working in the less likely you are to get stress out, throw your hands in the air and give up.
7. Don’t feel obligated to keep things just because someone gave them to you either as a gift, in remembrance or an heirloom. It is your home and you have the right to decide what stays and what goes.
8. If you can spend hours watching TV, logged on to your computer reading blogs etc, talking on the phone, reading book, magazines or newspapers… then you can surely put aside at least 1 ten minutes a day to declutter. Find a space in your day for that ten minutes and make it a routine.
9. Have an open mind. If you even think an item may need decluttering it is worth consideration. Sometimes an item appears in our declutter radar but we reject the idea because of one reason or another. Maybe this is because the item has been very useful over the years, maybe because at one point you loved this item, maybe because it holds sentimental value. There is usually a reason it appeared in your radar in the first place so give it some second thought, maybe the time has past when it was useful, loved or held sentiment and now you are just keeping it out of habit.
10. Unless you have true hoarding tendencies and need to enlist outside help to assist you in making the decision about what is a reasonable level of stuff I would suggest that you decide for yourself what level of possessions is right for you. The only guide you should use to decided when enough decluttering is enough is your own comfort level. There are many variables at play here and only you know what is right for you and you shouldn’t be railroaded into what is reasonable and what isn’t by someone else’s standards.

Today’s Declutter Item

Once again today’s declutter item is in line with the mini missions set for this week. I made this bracelet but have only worn it once or twice.

My Gratitude List

• Something that made be laugh ~ My husbands silly jokes.
• Something Awesome ~ Miniscule
• Something to be grateful for ~ My balcony is finally repaired so no more tradesmen waltzing through my house.
• Something that made me happy ~ Taking it easy today. It only means I will have to do more tomorrow but I am satisfied with that.
• Something I found fascinating ~ My friend’s grandson’s Lego creations.

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

A guest post by Katharine

The Mysterious Case of the Tottering Stalagmites

Photo Credit Simply Placed Blog

In the magic land that is our home we have an enchanted forest. Trouble is the wicked clutter goblin chopped it down and made into paper that breeds when we are not looking.

So I needed a plan of action for breaking the curse of paper clutter.

This is what I felt mattered

I can only get ruthless with the stuff I own, no one else’s, so focus on my stuff first. Everything needs a home so I can put away ‘like with like’ easily. No more malevolent life forms spreading homelessly over our living space. I don’t want to keep what doesn’t enhance my life now. I want to let go of ‘aspirational’ clutter: it’s contributing too much to an undercurrent of failure to achieve. I saw one way of eventually tackling the tottering stalagmites was to create more shelf space for their contents by getting rid of mine.

This is the variety of paperwork I had to deal with

the official that needs to be kept (finances/tax records, car records, pension info, health info, employment and qualification records) the practical (warranties/instruction manuals & a hoard of receipts; house maintenance records/rent/purchase contracts the sentimental including aspirational clutter and ‘information that might come in useful one day’.

This is how I did it

I discovered with quick research online that the 10 years of paperwork in the attic, including legal documents relating to flats I sold 9 and 12 yrs ago, all phone bills, utilities and bank statements was O.V.E.R.K.I.L.L. I weeded my official and practical paperwork from the systems already set up on my filing shelves and stored in the attic and shredded everything apart from specific tax related details for the last 3 years. The shreddings filled 4 dustbin bags and what is left fills two A4 envelopes. Please note I am in the UK. How long and what you need to keep for tax purposes may vary depending where you live. My banking is all online. I have now gone paperless for these accounts and my phone. For now, I wish to keep one year’s hardcopy of utility bills as I find it easier to monitor our usage that way.

BIG HELPS

A very good shredder, set up at waist height that is easy to access immediately (including waist height wall plug switch). Have a filing system that is easy to access and use. Be ruthless with mail as soon as it enters the house. Over the last year, we have actually got very good at this: the envelopes and inserts and marketing go straight in the recycle bin; bills are filed in my A4 ‘Bills’ folder . The official and practical felt like the easy bit. Much more difficult was the homeless mess of sentimental flotsam and jetsam.

This is how I did the difficult stuff

I tackled one small pile of mess one at a time, gradually ‘joining the dots’ with many small clearances, keeping in the forefront of my mind the release I wanted to feel by it leaving my home and setting me free to live now. I remember the high from getting rid of the most difficult thing for me ever, last year, my flute: nothing was going to be as difficult as my struggle over that one and it has felt great ever since. I took each single piece or scrap of paper and put like with like in piles on the floor, weeding ruthlessly as I went. At the end of each mini clearance, I put each group in designated box files/folders. It helped that I have been decluttering for 3 months now: I’ve build my ruthless muscles up in that time.

The piles roughly divided into these

Papers related to hobbies (unfinished writing project with lots of research notes & articles, clock & mosaic making and a titchy bit of selling.) Family history research written on scraps of paper Cards I have bought because they would be ‘lovely to frame’ (dating back years) Cards I have been sent. Cards bought to send to people but I didn’t don’t get round to ‘yet’. Entertaining articles cut out from papers. Useful ideas and quotes written on scraps of paper. Sentimental bits of paper; including doodles I liked or quotes, or half filled notebooks. Memorabilia; tickets, pamphlets (many of places we ‘should’ go to…) Information; magazine articles with a good quote in them or interesting picture Course notes from numerous evening classes Articles that might come in useful one day

Nearly all the cards went,(plus a number of unused frames bought 2nd hand for these cards and the two never met); the quotes; the scraps; loads of excess envelopes and writing paper we will never get through if we live to 110; the university brochure I appeared in; the badly written poetry; the half filled notebooks; the course notes I hadn’t looked at since finishing the courses over 5 years ago.

IT FELT FANTASTIC

Anything just too difficult to chuck now, is now is a single box file and I can go through that whenever I am ready to. It’s ok to do this in stages. Results I was able to get rid of half a dozen boxes/files that were now empty, choosing to keep the ones I liked best. The attic is no longer haunted by the paper ghoul. I know I will do a further purge one day. My ‘creative desk space is clutter free and the sofa seat beside me empty. My total paperwork reduced to 1 ½ shelves. I have created 7 ½ ft of empty shelf space and one empty filing drawer for the tottering stalagmites. I converted 4 shelves down to 3 much more useful ones by raising them two inches so it takes the right size for OH’s files etc. So what next My next job is to “facilitate the organised & supportive demolition of the aforementioned tottering stalagmites, on to the shelves in a like with like labelled basis. Sounds so easy put like that…

Decide

Because of the way I have chosen to declutter ~ slowly and steadily ~ the decision making process is gradual and so far painless. Once I set myself on this path to declutter an average of one thing a day I, by design, have given myself permission to take my time to make informed and considered decisions. Hasty decision making can be a recipe for disaster and an invitation for regrets further down the line.

When I first began my mission there were plenty of items in my home that I knew I no longer wanted to take up space. I began my decluttering process with these items, which was carried out with ease. All the while I was examining my space to identify other items that weren’t really in my radar to begin with. While taking care of the easy stuff my mind was contemplating whether or not I was prepared to part with those items that I considered to be on a higher level of attachment.

Divide

Once I made the decision that something had to go, which now turns out to be easier than I first imagined, I then have to divide it from the herd. That is, remove it from its usual position in the house and place it in its point of departure. I have the following departure points located around my home…

1. The bin ~ to which very few items have actually gone so far. Oddly enough this ratio doesn’t change much over time because bin items for me are usually natural declutter items that wear out or break over time and are no longer useful to anyone. Being that my clutter situation was never a case of being littered with useless items, this category of items has been limited and sporadic. I am pleased about this because it feels a lot less wasteful to me but at the same time ashamed of the fact that I had so much stuff that was sitting here unused yet useful to someone else.
2. The recycling bin ~ Items that have gone there are usually paperwork that has long needed clearing or an overabundance of paper keepsakes that I weeded through and thinned down. Sometimes there have been metal and recyclable plastic objects put there as well.
3. The selling departure point ~ this is generally on top of my sewing cabinet in our office space. Sometimes these item sit there for much longer than I would like because we can get a little lazy about actually listing them. Sometimes my husband has already listed them and they didn’t sell and I don’t realise it. Then they sit there until one day I say to him ~ “What is happening with these items.” The answer is often “They didn’t sell and are just waiting for you to do what you want with them.” Too bad I’m not a mind reader, 🙄 the process may go a lot quicker.
4. The donation pile ~ This area for me is in the garage right next to the door. I deliberately position it where I will see it often as a constant reminder to take it to the thrift store when there is enough to make the trip worth the effort. This generally happens when my husband goes out of town on business because I have open access to the car. I also put Freecycle items near this area until the appointed collection day.

I have never been tempted to bring anything back into the house because I have given myself ample opportunity to consider my decisions and am satisfied with them. If you struggle with this at all I would suggest getting the items out of the house as quickly as possible. Any items I am not sure about, can’t be bothered immediately selling or I feel I want to document before decluttering I just leave in place until I am good and ready. There is always other items that can be dealt with in the meantime.

Conquer

Finally having the clutter completely out of my home is what I consider conquering the clutter. The feeling of satisfaction and freedom that comes with every load I deliver to the thrift store, every eBay auction item I post, every Freecycle pick up completed, every “use it up” item whose remnants go in the trash or recycling is like heaven to me. It is a great relief to have decided what can be decluttered, it feels even better when they are separated from the keepers and moved to their departure point but it feels wonderful when they are actually gone.

Excess Coat Hangers

Today’s declutter item

I gave these coat hangers to my mum and dad when the came to visit. They took them home in their suitcase. I meant to give them more but I forgot to get them out of the box in the garage. Hopefully my friend Amber will take the rest from me today.

Grateful List

• Something awesome ~ Sitting on my back patio enjoying my lunch the temperature in 24ºC, the sun is shining and the birds are singing.
• Something that made me laugh ~ Liam making fun of me for saying something silly. Nothing new about that.
• Something to be grateful for ~ Pest control. That cockroach that interrupted my nice lunch on the patio won’t last long after crawling all over the insect spray the pest man laid down a month or so ago.
• Something that made me happy ~ Finally clearing all the photos on my camera’s memory card.
• Something I found fascinating ~ That I think my MacBook Pro automatically adjusts its brightness setting for different light. When I came in from being out on the patio the screen was quite dark. Perhaps I should have waited to see if it adjusted again but I didn’t. I will have to experiment with it when I am not so busy. It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow.