Over the next month or so, I'm going to take stock of my possessions - both personal and household - and decide which items are just taking up space and donate or discard them. This past spring, I used a great trick with my clothing to see what I don't wear. I turned all of the hangers backwards and, as I wore items, turned the hanger around. That way, last week when I went to move my clothes, I saw what I hadn't worn this year. Upon spotting backwards hangers, I immediately pulled those items out of the closet and placed them in a "to donate" bag that I will be taking to our local thrift shop.
Right now I'm focusing on editing my clothes and am trying to make decisions on each category of clothing. For example, with jeans I need to determine how many pair I truly need and stick to that number. Having more than you need leads to both physical and mental clutter. A packed closet reminds me of the saying that you can't see the forest for the trees. Having a closet full of clothing that is mostly not worn makes it easy to overlook the items that are actually worn. Removing all but the items you wear cuts down on frustration and makes it easier to get dressed in the morning. It also makes you keep up with doing the laundry, something else that can cause mental clutter when it starts to pile up.
As Thoreau said, "Simplify, simplify, simplify."
(Photo source: http://www.sxc.hu/photo/842486)
2 comments:
I am encouraging your editing from a bordering state. I came up with 3 pr. of jeans, 2 that fit so well that I would be a fool to give them up because good, well-fitting jeans are a treasure, and an additional pr. which are my grubby jeans. Of course with a farm, you probably have a few more.
I just dropped off another stack of DVDs for the library sale.
Shona, thanks for the encouragement! I'm thinking 5 pair might work for me: 3 around the house/work pair and 2 "dressy": 1 for flats and 1 for heels. :)
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