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Started 5 months ago by sleepykitten
Latest reply from Jude2004
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sleepykitten
Member

OK, I'm in a good news bad news situation.

Good news: We are renting a car for the holidays, so I can drop off a bunch of donations. Yay!

Bad news: As I'm bringing the donations back up from the basement, there are a couple of items I am actually *taking back out* and putting back into my life. This is obviously a bad idea, but the pull is really strong. Of course, three or four things out of five boxes of stuff isn't too bad - but I am frustrated more by the emotions that are churning up and leading me to hang onto things that I felt ambivalent about when I put them in the donation pile..

My uncluttering efforts seem to ebb and flow, and I am somewhat close to maintenance phase - so I'm not too surprised, I guess, that I have reached a slow spot. But still.

I also think some of it is stemming from some anxiety over money. Our situation has changed a bit, and so our budget in 2012 is going to be much stricter than the budget we've been working with in the past several years. Not that we are poor by any means. But I can no longer say, "oh, if I REALLY miss this item, I can buy it back." Because I can't. I never really have missed items I've uncluttered (at least not to any great degree), but the knowledge that I could purchase another if needed was a good crutch to get me through the emotional work of uncluttering, and it is a crutch I no longer have.

Anyway, just needed to talk it out a bit - and any suggestions or words of encouragement are, of course, welcome.

Posted 5 months ago #
irishbell
Member

SK- sounds like you've done a great job already.
My thoughts are: 5 items out of 5 boxes is nothing to feel bad about.
The reason behind uncluttering is to rid yourself of things, you don't want, need, love or use
anymore. Not to just toss things willy nilly, to gain more space. I feel it's better to hold onto
something (not everything)so you don't have to buy it again later when you really NEED it and
when your $ will be tight. That's just cutting off your nose in spite of your face!
Some folks may feel this is enabling clutter to build up again, but when it's only 2 or 3 items, I do not.
You can always decide in another few months whether or not you've actually used it enough
to justify keeping an item. I say cut yourself a break!

Posted 5 months ago #
lottielot
Member

1. You're allowed to change your mind, don't beat yourself up over a few things...
2. In future, could you not bag or box up those donations before they're put in the basement? By the time I drop off donations, I have no memory of what's in there :) And like you say, you haven't missed anything so far...
3. Could you do a search on eBay and find out the going rate for these items second hand? I'm sure it'll be a fraction of the price new, in which case you can continue to tell yourself that same story 'I can buy it back'
4. You can always give those few items a stay of execution, leave them in the basement another few months, by which time it may be easier to get rid of them. All those other items are still significant progress, focus on the good stuff.
5. Honestly, you seem to have a good grip on why you're feeling this stuff, you'll be fine!

Posted 5 months ago #
ninakk
Member

Don't stress about this. The end outcome is either one of two options; you'll donate the item in the end or you'll be the happy keeper of it. If you'll end up donating it after a second round of decluttering where it will have sat in a thinking-of-it-outbox once more, you can congratulate yourself of having been able to let go.

Also remember you definitely are not the first declutterer on this planet to have done the yoyo action and that's why we create a space for items taking the two-minute break of ice hockey games; sometimes we're not ready to make a decision and once we are, out it goes or in it comes (possibly for more yoyo'ing, but that's okay).

There's no good answer to why we are ready one day, but until we are, there's no way we can fast forward time, meaning any stress at all is completely wasted.

Posted 5 months ago #
sleepykitten
Member

Thank you all for the encouragement! I think I will indeed end up giving these couple items a "stay of execution" until we are either (a) in a better place financially or (b) I feel confident in my decision to let them go.

Whew! It is good to know that my fellow unclutterers don't think this is something to lose too much sleep over. And it is true, ninakk, that any stress is wasted energy. (I tend to be a stress/worry person in all aspects of life, so the idea of stress being wasted energy is one I constantly have to remind myself of.)

Posted 5 months ago #
candy
Member

Don't worry about it. I do that all the time. I just removed a jacket from the goodwill bag that I'm going to try to get out of my house tomorrow. I'm not 100% sure that I will not use it again, so it can stay. It's a summer/spring jacket so if I haven't used it by next fall, out it goes. Doing the "hangers backwards" thing with it.

Posted 5 months ago #
lucy1965
Member

@SK, don't feel bad about this! Last night I went downstairs and pulled three recycled glass candleholders out of the box. It had the effect of making me take a look at everything else in there, and today I'm ready to get the lot out of the house: it's been sitting down there for a couple of months, now, and those three things were the only ones that inspired the ". . . no, not yet" feeling.

As someone who's entirely too familiar with that sort of financial worry, may I offer a bit of advice? Wait. If fear of not being able to replace something is adding to your stress levels, just wait. Work through your filing. Deal with family photos. Clean out your e-mail box, or the cleaning supplies. It doesn't have to happen today.

Posted 5 months ago #
themusiclivez
Member

I have done this many times the morning before a Goodwill pickup. I race furiously to my front door and pull out a few items that I just couldn't part with yet. Those items I pulled out? They ALWAYS end up in the next Goodwill pickup. Sometimes we just need to be sure we want to unclutter them. I say hold on to these items, keep them in a box, and the next time you do a donation see if you're ready to let go of them then.

Posted 5 months ago #
chacha1
Member

sk - +1 on don't let it worry you. There is no unclutterer's law that says you may not take things out of the donation bag/box. :-) (And it's a good thing, too.) Especially when you are feeling insecurity about other things, that's not the time to push yourself to decisions.

When the time is right to let things go, you'll know. In the meantime, best wishes for a more-prosperous-than-expected New Year.

Posted 5 months ago #
bandicoot
Member

you are allowed to change your mind as often as you need to.
it is your stuff, your life, your home and you are in charge.
if you make a decision today and a different decision next week, that is perfectly fine.
we are all changing, all the time.
we all have different needs and those needs are always changing too.

Posted 5 months ago #
Jude2004
Member

Just now, I asked my 30-year-old daughter about a doll. "Rose?" she said. "Definitely get rid of her." I said, "Okay. I just wanted to check since your grandma gave her to you." "Grandma?" She hesitated for a moment because she loved her great-grandmother a lot(she died when my daughter was 8), but then she said, "Maybe I'll take a photo and we can still get rid of it." She doesn't even read minimalist blogs or unclutterer forums, but she came to a logical conclusion, so after the photo is taken, the doll will end up in the donation hamper. Ebb and flo is the way to go. My best friend's apartment displays almost no personality beyond a couple of concert posters. All his stuff is packed in cardboard boxes, except what's he using right now. The boxes look like clutter to me. For example, somewhere in his apartment there are a couple of boxes with my name on them which contain stuff I've lent him and want back. His life isn't balanced; mine still has too much clutter, but every day I get closer to freedom.

Posted 5 months ago #

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