Every monday I make sure to watch “Hoarders” on A&E. Every time I watch it I am reminded of the Stalker, because I firmly believe that he (and likely his ex girlfriend and most likely his son) was a horder, and every time I see something like that I know that I am happier without that in my life.
The last few years I have been bothered by clutter in my home. I don’t like the huge amount of things that are coming into my home, and I constantly worry about things becoming bad enough to turn into hoarding. I know that I have no issue getting rid of things, I don’t really attach a lot of sentimental value to OBJECTS… and yet things are building up in my home and I need to declutter a LOT.
Right now I have an opportunity, while I get ready to move to the new house, to declutter — donate, dump and recycle — things that I no longer need in my life. This is a new space, a new life, and I can let go of the things that no one needs anymore and that have no value for me or my kids.
My house is cluttered, but it hasn’t gotten to the point of hoarder level. I don’t want it to get to that point, I want to live a minimalist life with things I love and value and need.
I’m feeling a bit cluttered this year myself. My only excuse for not cleaning the basement is that it’s cold down there, and that’s not going to hold water too much longer with spring on its way. With a move to a new house you do have a great opportunity to really get things in order. If you’ve got the time you might like the book Simple Abundance, A Daybook of Comfort and Joy by Sarah Ban Breathnach. I’ve been reading it every year for the past 10 years. She advocates 6 principles for a simply abundant life: Gratitude, Order, Simplicity, Harmony, Beauty, and Joy. Each leading into the next. Notice Order leading to Simplicity leading to Harmony. Good luck. You’ll feel much better and even a bit lighter mentally when you declutter and get everything in order.
YES! It feels SO good to de-clutter! We’ve had the opportunity to do that now that we are moving back into the basement. We’ve gone through EVERYTHING that was brought back from storage after renovations and ANYTHING that we don’t need is going to goodwill or friends who need that stuff. Anything that we are keeping but don’t need around us is going into nice big plastic bins instead of ratty old boxes and they are being LABELED! I am so excited to get rid of all our junk this week!
Then in the spring will come the garage cleaning and de-cluttering. Ugh!