I have definitely noticed a trend in my area. People are plain and simple moving out of homes that are large, expensive to maintain and into tiny homes, cottages, cabins, modulars and trailers. The large multi million dollar homes are sitting on the market and seeing deep discounts of tens of thousands of dollars at a time. A home is not an investment. You’ve been lied to. Well, hopefully by now if you are on my mailing list or take my classes or come to my live events, then you know that.

My point is, being “minimal” is now cool. Marie Konda started a trend with “Sparking Joy” which is a good place to start to get rid of your junk and begin to see what really matters to you. I don’t think she goes far enough when she films and helps people. To me, they still have way too much “stuff”. So, I’ve recently moved and paid a moving company to help me. It still took me two months (partially because I have my adult and teenage children’s junk) to get everything out of that house and into my poor garage. I’ve been whittling away on it for 3 months now and Goodwill and I are on a first name basis.

I get fairly depressed everytime I walk in my garage but I digress. Now, the point of me writing this. So my mom and dad haved downsized which is a whole ‘nother series of articles and my mom thinks its fabulous to give everything back to the person who gave it to her in the first place. Well, you guessed it, when I was 16, I thought these Hummel candlestick holder angels were the sweetest thing. so for the next 40 years or so my mom faithfully put candles in, let them sit in their hutch (don’t get me started on my feelings about hutches) until finally after their last “last” house that they built. (sigh) My mom snuck them into a box of “family” heirlooms to me.

So I unwrapped these angels and thought. Wow. what a waste of money. I tried for 3 weeks on let it go (app), ebay and the horrific Mecari (app) (they have supposedly lost in the mail everything I ever sold on there). They are “crystal” (so?). FINALLY (I can be slow) I realized the time/value cost of trying to sell these 9.97 on EBAY angels was burning way more time than it was worth. So I wrapped them up and into the plastic bin for Goodwill (which is not truly a charity organization) it goes.

The moral of this story is. Just stop. Stop holding on to things. If you can’t remember your great Uncle or great grandmother etc, maybe you shouldn’t be holding onto their stuff. All stuff comes with a time and money cost. It comes with an energy cost. All “stuff” has energy. It can be good, but since I clear houses for a living, I find that rare. It reminds me of yesterday when I unpacked two ugly sweaters which I’m not sure why I bought in the first place and in the average temp of 60 degrees here in winter, I don’t wear many sweaters. Still I only gave one away.

Examine why you hold onto your stuff. Why do you need a big, or bigger house? Do you need more stuff? Are you happy working 40 plus hours to pay for your stuff? I JUST got rid of a storage unit I had for 2 years. Only a couple times did I pull anything out of that unit and use it.

Here’s a few ideas of what you can do if you have too much “stuff”.

1. Don’t bring stuff in unless stuff goes out.
2. Institute a waiting hold. I make a list and if in 2 weeks I’m still hot for it, I usually get it.
3. Go through all the stuff you have. Commit to touching every item. How many pens are you keeping with no ink?
4. Don’t play the “someday” the big white ape might come and I might need the crossbow game. You know what I mean. The disaster scenario that conspiracy youtubers and fear porn MSM shoves down our throat. Just dump it or sell it.
5. Enjoy your new space and freedom. Maybe you can even downsize!

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