unclutter | Entries tagged with introductions

As we work through the clutter in our homes, I wonder... how has your view on material goods changed?

Let me back up.

Years ago, when Spouse and I were first married, we had disposable income for the first time ever. We'd combined our meager possessions and worked to get the necessary things, only that thing is fun and shiny! And ooh... we like that too. I bought mostly secondhand to get furniture and to fill the space. And it's just kind of kept going. We have all the furniture we need, and we're firmly in a "if we get a new dresser, then we get rid of a dresser" space. But pretty things to hang on the wall...

A few years ago, some friends and I started keeping each other accountable for our decluttering efforts. We did that method where on the first day of the month, you get rid of one thing, one the second day of the month, you get rid of two things, and so on, to the 30th day you get rid of 30 things. It was a fun task that kept me engaged and I started to reevaluate all the things we had as I cleaned up some paperwork here, some outgrown things there, and the never ending closets. Spouse encouraged, and occasionally participated. (some days I didn't meet the goal!)

Happily, since the decluttering has become habit in the past few years, and my donations secondhand stores keep us on track, and I don't go into the secondhand stores very often, and I send handmedowns along regularly, we've got possessions mostly under control. Now, when we see a shiny thing we like, we're able to ask "Where would we put it?" That question alone has kept things out of our carts.

The decrease in visual clutter has been great for my peace of mind. We still have piles, and landing zones, and too much stuff, but there's less of it. I feel better. Mentally clear. My stuff does not own me. I don't owe anything to these items. Accepting a gift does not make me beholding to that thing--I'll give it away if I don't need it.

What's your story?

nou

Hello unclutterers! Just a quick intro, as I plan to do Unclutter in 2014 and will be posting my progress here.

I originally got into uncluttering via unclutter_2009, with a final net total of 198 things out in 2009. Although I was originally aiming for the full 365, my house wasn't unmanageably cluttered to start with, so I decided it didn't really matter if I stopped early.

I've since moved house and it's time for another unclutter, so Unclutter 2014 it is. I'm going to see if I can manage the full 365, but if not, I'll be happy if I can beat my previous total.

lemon_tree_7

I've been fighting a battle with clutter for years, at snail's pace progress, and hope that joining this community will help me to free myself and let go of more 'stuff'.

My problem areas are books, piles of assorted papers/notes, clothes, and craft stuff for painting/drawing and for sewing/knitting. I tend to find it hard to get rid of things because it might come in handy , a kind of apoca-anxiety that civilisation may collapse and I'll be really glad I kept that old woollen jumper/copy of a classic novel etc. This, I know, is not very rational , and means that my house is full of stuff from the past which often doesn't serve me any more.

So, I don't know if I can manage one thing a day, but I really hope that in a weekly review I'll be able to report some progress here.

Recent decluttering to report now - last week, we cut down a walnut tree in front of our house. It hurt to do it, but it was necessary for practical reasons, and my goodness it lets more light into the place! This afternoon, I clear out lots of Stickies on my Mac, which will declutter the screen when I use it.

Current Mood: determined

panda

Hi, my name is Panda! I'm a college student who had to condense an entire apartment's worth of stuff back down into one room, because I moved back in with my parents. Most of my stuff is in storage, but my room is very full right now, especially my closet. I just have too much stuff in general. I have a problem hanging on to things that might be one day useful. I also have a problem hanging on to things people have given me as gifts that I will never actually use, but I'm keeping out of a sense of guilt. My book collection is also too large. I'm trying to limit it down to only books that I actually will reread, but it's hard.

I like the one in one out system, and I look forward to using this com. :)

kalloway

I adore the idea of this community and hope it'll be helpful. I've tried programs like FlyLady over the years, and found them... too naggy for lack of a better word.

( cut to save f-lists/sanity )

pinkadot89

Hello there! I've just recently been through a break-up (after nearly 5 years!) and I decided to get a blog as a place to vent, and post other random things. While searching for communities, I stumbled upon this one. Cleaning has never been my thing, but I think getting rid of one or a few items at a time is completely doable. My room is beginning to resemble my personal life, a mess! So I think this community will provide the support and motivation that I need to get things back on track.

I have so much stuff crammed into my room, and I'm sure I don't even need most of it. I've just been in the mindset of "What if I need this later?!" Well, after becoming recently single, and the end of the school year quickly approaching, I have plenty of things that I can either throw out or donate. Textbooks can be sold back or recycled, old clothes can be thrown out or donated, but I don't know what to do with this giant "Kiss Me" frog from my ex...

Well, here's to a year of uncluttering my living space as well as my life!

deifire

Decided to start this in March.

I was really worried how I was going to handle the sci-fi fundraising auction I went to last night, since things are sold in lots, and there's always a temptation to go home with a lot more than you donated, but I actually did pretty well. And not all the books I bought are staying. (Books are a bit of major clutter issue for me. Last time I moved, the book collection weighed more than everything else I owned combined.)

So far this month:

In:

1 large climbing tree for cats
10 books (8 from last night's auction)
1 giant praying mantis toy for cats

Out:

47 books
2 sci-fi toys
3 old phone books
1 pile of old catalogs, magazines and journals

Total so far: 41 down

Current Mood: accomplished

kate

Hi all.

I subscribed to this community because I love

beachlass and I've always been a huge supporter of uncluttering. Generally I do it in spurts, like I go through my clothes every 6 months and get rid of whatever I haven't worn, and I do a huge purge every time I move. Most of my books are still in storage, but I'm likely to get rid of most when I finally get them to my house-with-a-library because in general, I don't read much anymore, much less re-read, so I'll just keep the reference books (though there are a fair number of those).

I didn't join, though, because I have lots of communities to keep up with, and I didn't want to put more pressure on myself to post. That said, I've been keeping a mental tally of my items for a month and a half, and it's going to drive me crazy if I don't write it down. I figure I'll likely post once a month, I should be able to keep that amount of stuff in my head pretty easily (we're on a really tight budget right now, and luxury items are going out to the movies, so not a lot comes into the house that isn't consumables).

So anyway, HI! And here's my tally for January:

IN:
1/16
5 books
1/23
3 mixing bowls
1/28
1 dvd
1 playstation 2 console
1 game
3 books
1/29
1 chocolate mold

OUT:
1/10
1 book
1/3
4 pr socks (trash) new fluffy socks too - they all developed holes. :(
1/15
35 pieces of clothing (goodwill)

Tally
+31 days in January
+15 items
-40 items
+6 total for January

syntheid

So I suppose this is an introduction, since I haven't actually posted here at all yet, so hello. I'm trying to declutter as much as possible in preparation for a cross-country move in June. Organization is my big downfall-- I have decluttered quite a bit over the past couple years, but there always ends up the dregs that I'm not sure how to organize in a useful manner (I have ADD, and so it's a bit of a struggle sometimes between wanting things to look nice/clean/clear and knowing that if I put it out of sight, I won't remember I own it or where it is and this causes problems). One of my goals for this year is figuring out how to organize these things so I can keep my bathroom, computer desk, endtable, and dining table from getting overwhelmed.

The second issue I'm having is books. I love books, and I love having a physical library of them, but good lord they are a pain to move. And as I expect to be moving at least a couple more times before I settle into a place for a good length, I'd kind of like to travel as light as possible (plus the housing where I am planning to move is more expensive for less square footage than I have been used to where I am at, so I will need to make things space-effective anyhow). I've actually already been through my library several times and eliminated a lot, but I still have approximately three bookcases (small ones-- 3 shelves each) worth of books-- artbooks and language reference with fiction and a few odds and ends. The fiction is mostly what I am struggling to part with, since it's pretty much impossible to replace the reference and artbooks with digital copies, but the goal is to clear out at least one case to pare down to really essential things, so probably more fiction must go.

Third goal is that I actually need to go through and sort and toss most of what is being stored at my parents' place, because they may be moving in the relatively near future as well, and aren't happy with me leaving so much at their place. And if I leave them to deal with it, I'll end up with most of what is important being tossed, which is very not okay, so I will have to get that sorted before I leave.

I don't really do well with the one-in-one-out method, because it's hard for me to really keep track (and make sure I actually do get the "out" thing out of my house and don't just set it aside) at this point since it ends up stressing me out more than it helps. Hoping as I get things cleared more, it'll be easier to do a literal 1-to-1 thing, but for now my mentality is mostly "Get rid of as much as possible and buy as little as possible" until I get to a manageable state, and I'm not going to worry too much about a solid tally.

( On that note, here's my approximate tally for the month thus far: )

And a question for you all: What do you do to get rid of hangers? Apparently the thrift stores won't take them, but I have two of those pant-rack hangers that I find I never use, and I'm not sure what to do with them. Would rather not put them in the trash, but I don't think I can put them in the recycle bin either?

rmc28

Hello, I'm Rachel and I keep failing to quite finish decluttering. I've been aware of the concept since about 2000, and I feel like I've been recycling and freecycling and donating stuff ever since, except I still have oodles of stuff. One thing I learned from the unclutter_2009 community on LJ is that this is because I haven't stopped buying up bargains as though I were a poor student, long after I stopped being so.

Last year I tried again but fell out of the habit of tracking about halfway through the year. I'm working on my ability to resist "bargains" and I find just tracking my ins and outs really helps: if I measure it I can manage it, or at least it feels that way.

So apart from just tracking and trying to get down by at least one thing a day, I think I have three goals for this year:

The first is to finally clear my half of the horrible "junk room" which I dream of making into a little study/music room with a single futon as an emergency spare bed. (My jobseeking brother's overflow stuff temporarily occupies the other half, but he knows that it has to be gone by the time I finish my half; so far he's decluttering faster than I am!)

The second is to empty and remove at least one set of floor-to-ceiling shelves in my living/dining room, to make the room feel a little less crowded. Some stuff could go elsewhere in the house, but I think we could usefully get rid of quite a lot, one thing at a time.

The third goal is to get my four-year-old son's room sorted out by the time he starts school in September. We need to clear out all the stuff of ours that ended up dumped in there on high shelves; move all the remaining children's stuff from our room in there; tidy up and cull the books and toys; try to arrange the bookshelves so the stuff for under fives is low down and the stuff for ten-year-olds is accessible at roughly a ten-year-old's height.

One really useful thing happened last summer: a new charity shop opened around the corner, and they take nearly everything. My brother J volunteers there regularly, and they have deals with local waste collectors/processors who pay them by the kilo for unsellable stuff (especially textiles and electricals). I no longer worry about ebaying or freecycling stuff: if it's salable the shop will sell it (and they are very busy), and if it's not they'll generally still get some money for it, and I don't have to take it to the tip myself. We're lucky enough not to need the money and it's a cause I'm happy to support.

helenorvana

I lived with roommates for about three years before moving back in with my parents, and accumulated quite a bit of stuff that I haven't seen for a year as it's been sitting in a storage unit since I moved back. But my sister's getting married on Saturday, which means she's moving out and clearing all of her stuff out of the storage unit. Which consequently means my parents want to clean everything out of the unit and get rid of it.

I've not very organized and rarely pick up after myself in my own room, and thus two or three times a year will end up cleaning, reorganizing, and tossing/donating a ton of stuff that I never remember I had in the first place. I finished this most recent "spring" cleaning last week and have a ton of stuff to donate/recycle, but wasn't anticipating needing to clear out room for more stuff coming in. *pouts*

As far as the pens are concerned, every time I "spring" clean I go through my pen-holders with every intention of clearing them out, but I always end up testing the pens to see if they write, and keep all of the ones with ink left that still work. I have pens that I acquired through some fashion ten years ago that I just can't manage to justify getting rid of to myself. :S

So, my total last week, Out: Three bags of clothing, two black bags of trash, a laundry basket each of recycling and items-to-be-shredded, a bag of bags (purses, backpacks, etc), two jewelry boxes, a variety of smaller boxes/containers, a large container, I think a lamp, and a number of other smaller items that various siblings walked off with in the process.

And this coming week, In: Whatever I have left in the storage unit, including but not limited to a drawing desk, a 20- or 30-pound stuffed English Bulldog I've had since I was fourteen, possibly a bookshelf?, and boxes of more books, DVDs/CDs, and potentially clothes.

holyschist

Hi, I'm a packrat with too many hobbies...and I might be moving temporarily for work soon and am hence trying to clean/organize/sort through/declutter ALL the things ASAP so a) I will be able to easily and efficiently pack for a year in another town, b) leave my partner in a tidy, organized apartment not covered with my stuff. It is sort of daunting, although I am making pretty good headway (I am afraid I may not be able to work fast enough, though).

My biggest long-term problems are books (which I am getting better about--I got rid of 20 or so books the other day for store credit which will only buy 2 books, and have generally become much pickier about buying books--there is empty space on some of our bookshelves now!) and craft supplies, so once I finish the marathon my goal for this year will be to destash--primarily by sewing a lot, because the fabric takes up more net space than anything but books.

I'm not really aiming for minimalism, but I would like to craft more with what I have, buy fewer supplies, and I would like to have only stuff I love and use regularly, and not too much stuff for our living space.

I'm pretty good at getting rid of stuff, except for all kinds of weird sticking points. I absolutely hate throwing things away--recycling or donating is fine--but then I run into stuff like the entire office box of half-used notebooks I accumulated through college and grad school. Should I just toss most of them and start over, now that I no longer buy four pristine notebooks a semester and can probably do fine with three total notebooks? What do y'all think?

ETA: I actually ripped out the used pages a while back, so what I have is a giant stack of blank half-notebooks, which could probably be more productively replaced by three new notebooks...I guess I'd better suck it up and recycle the collection. Erk. Thanks for the moral support!

littlebutfierce

Hi everyone. I'm excited to be here & look forward to being inspired by everyone's uncluttering to keep up with my own!

Here are the things I'm struggling w/: I'm a US American who moved to the UK 2 years ago with my partner & our 3 cats. By necessity we did a ton of decluttering when we moved, & because money has been fairly tight since then, we were doing fairly well at not filling up our new place w/stuff.

However, things do creep in! Our city has a really vibrant freecycling/general swapping things around culture, as well as a ton of charity shops. In addition, our library system sucks, which means if I want to read something, chances are I'll have to buy it. And... I like a house that has a fair number of comforting objects in it: things that remind me of my friends or a show that is my comfort re-watch. Something to brighten the walls or a cozy blanket.

Over the holidays, while visiting my parents, my mom's said that she wants to go shopping w/me, b/c everyone else gets to go shopping w/their daughters but she doesn't, since I live in a different country. Letting her buy me something means a lot to her -- I recognize this is a way problematic attitude, but there are so many ways in which I'm a bad daughter & this is a relatively easy way to be a good one, so it's easy for me to cave. That & I tend to run my work clothes into the ground & really do need, say, new work socks & new black trousers.

All that to say, this will be a real challenge for me!

Items out: 4 (a shirt I brought w/me to wear that turned out to have a big stain on it; 3 books I don't need to bring back w/me)

Items in: I can't even count. :/

phi

Hello, my name is Saira, and I'm a hoarder.

I never used to think of myself as a hoarder, because my family moved every one to two years. The longest we stayed in one place was four years, and that was kind of mindblowing for everyone. And of course, with every move, the kids were allowed two boxes for clothes and two boxes for toys and books and other sundries. Now that I'm all grown and not living in a dorm anymore, boy howdy do I collect all kinds of crap. My parents are hoarders too -- it just wasn't obvious until they retired and stopped moving around so much. Without being limited by how much they could afford to move they just collect and collect and the piles of stuff everywhere are scary.

I'm going to try to follow the one-in one-out principle, and also get rid of one additional item each day. I'm not, however, going to count the spouse's belongings in either the "in" or the "out" column.

I've also got an enormous stash of fiber and yarn that I'd like to either work through or give away. I'm going to try to stick to no net increase in stash, so no buying new yarn until I either knit or give away a ball of yarn, and no new fiber until I completely spin & ply an equivalent quantity of stash fiber. I tried this last year, and it kind of worked. The obvious flaw is that the total amount of yarn keeps increasing as I spin fiber into yarn.

So far for the year:

( Read more... )

Total so far this year:
In: 11
Out: 7
Net: +4

Not doing so great, but I plan to keep on keeping on.

angelbabe_cj

Hi, I'm angelbabe_cj and I'm definitely in need of this project! I'm currently living with my parents, but I spent 5 years living elsewhere thanks to Uni, a year out, and a master's degree. I managed to accumulate quite a bit of stuff to go with the stuff that was already here. I made a start on uncluttering last year, mostly in great swathes, this year I'll be doing some of that later on, plus the project.

Yesterday: Got rid of two items of clothing not suitable for charity shop, plus put two more on the pile to take to the charity shop.

Total: Minus 4

Today: Two items (not technically mine) sent for church draw. Plus I'm going to get the ancient water bottle down from the top shelf where it's accumulated too much dust to be cleanable and throw that out.

ETA: Plus an eggcup I managed to break whilst getting bottle down. This 'accidentally broken stuff' category will probably be a recurring theme.

Total: Minus 34 (or 1 2 depending on how you look at it)

Nothing in so far, although I have some books on order which will appear soon.

Year's Running total: Minus 78 (or 56)

peaceful_sands

Hi and Happy New Year!

I'm peaceful_sands in these parts and I'm hoping this comm is going to help me discipline myself into clearing out my clutter. I've lived in the same place for the last . . . hmmm I think it's 16 years and if I move it will be a drastic move and so I will be able to take very little with me, but in all likelihood I'll be staying here for the next few years at least.

I've wanted to declutter for a while and I make half-hearted attempts from time to time - I love the minimalism but just seem to accumulate 'stuff' and I always feel bad about getting rid of things that aren't worn out and as I tend to be quite careful it takes me a long time to do that.

( How I'm going to do this (optimistically) and where I'm at today )

Current Mood: optimistic

haruka

Ever since we got the idea to move, my wife and I have thrown out a ton of stuff already (starting with eight garbage bags, a sink, a toilet seat, two gerbil cages, two hanging file holders, and God knows how much else.) We're also lucky to have a local freecycle mailing list, and managed to give away over 600 videotapes. However, there is still more to come!

For a while, we'll be getting rid of more than one thing a day, as is the nature of moving, but once we get into our new place, I'll try to keep up the habit of throwing something out every day.

miss_s_b

I am baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad at keeping my house tidy, so this comm is perfect for me, and I want you all to nag me lots. Also, I think the one in one out rule is a good one to implement, and I'm going to start today. As soon as I have walked the dogs...

Current Mood: hopeful

beachlass

For the last couple of years on LJ, I participated in uncluttering comms where we tried to each get rid of one thing per day, and one more thing for each new one we brought home.

For me, it was such a simple, and more importantly, achievable way of working away at the too many things cluttering our house (even though I never managed to stick with the challenge and the postings for the whole year). And even more than the less cluttered rooms, I appreciated the new focus I brought to shopping, because I found myself far more attentive to the question "Do I really need this?"

I encourage you to find method of counting/recording that works for you, maybe with daily posts, or running totals. I'd suggest using tags too, ~~including a user tag, so you can find your own posts easily~~. EDIT: A helpful hint fromafuna - We don't need individual users tags, and instead can filter to a particular member using this URL: http://unclutter.dreamwidth.org/?poster=beachlass

Happy New Year, and Good Luck!

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uncluttering one day and one thing at a time

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uncluttering one day and one thing at a time

Entries tagged with introductions

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Unclutter 2014

Hi there!

introduction

Packrats...

Intro...

Getting started

Uh, hi?

probably need to pare down my post too...

Introduction & goals for the year

Hey, I'm Helen, and I have a tendency to collect pens more than anything

Aiiiie.

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Hi, and daily report.

Hello waves

Moving means throwing stuff out

Hello!

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