I came to your blog via Jessica Duquette’s post today, 4/23. For several weeks now I have been freeing my home of unnecessary items. It began with a neighbor’s garage sale - “Hey, we’re having a garage sale next Saturday if you want to put some stuff out…” Boy, did I want to put some stuff out! My husband is a packrat of the first order, and our home was overrun with items that he refused to part with. I’ve been nagging him (yes, nagging is the appropriate term here) for years to get rid of the bike he hasn’t ridden since before our son was born (the child turns 8 next month), the lawn mower that our gardener refuses to use, the old motor oil that needs to be recycled at Pep Boys but doesn’t walk there on it’s own. Unknowingly, I hit upon your concept of ‘creating space’ that became the motivation for my hubby to part with a lot of his stuff. He’s been wedging his car into our 2-car garage for years, but now can actually park it comfortably AND get all 4 doors open simultaneously. It was a revelation to him that he has the power to create space in his environment. For me, this is both amusing and scary, because the man is an architect!

I applied the same idea, create space, to myself and my own stash of stuff, and was amazed at how much I was able to part with. Several weeks later, I’m still amazed that I don’t really miss the stuff I got rid of, and I haven’t yet refilled the spaces I created. And it seems that I remember another nook or cranny every day that I can ‘lighten up’. It gives me joy to let things go, because I firmly believe that I am making space for the good things the future will bring. It can’t come in if there’s no room!

One further point that I’d like to make: I don’t fully understand the concept of “stuff” being the representation of deeper issues, but I do realize that especially in my husband’s case he had strong emotional attachments to many of the objects that he was hoarding. My solution to this was to point out that we have pictures of him using the “stuff” in the many scrapbooks I’ve created for our family, so he doesn’t have to worry about losing the memories of the fun times and significant events. He just no longer needs to hang on to the physical object. Although he didn’t say it out loud, I could tell that addressed his fear, because he continued to add stuff to the garage sale pile (or more aptly, the garage sale mountain!)

So creating space has been a tremendous motivator in my household, not to mention being profitable. We cleared several hundred dollars on that garage sale (enough to set aside for a special weekend trip that we will remember via pictures and probably a few refrigerator magnets!) We revel in the comfort and peace of the space around us. We may have to go through this again in a couple of years, because it’s so easy to backslide into the comfort zone where our stuff distracts us from the issues of everyday living, but at least if and when that time comes, we can remember that we did it once, and we can do it again.

Your shift from decluttering to creating space is, to me, profound. I have run a cleaning group on yahoo for years and I have never heard this concept or even thought of it on my own. I’m sure I will carry that with me forever. Thank you, I needed a perception shift.

I think I would only add one thing: watch your energy levels, pace yourself. You don’t win a marathon by sprinting out of the gate. Many times, in the beginning fervor, people use up all their energetic resources in the first burst of decluttering mania and lose it about halfway through, when things are still in the chaos stage. They get discouraged, stash what’s left in the nearest location and don’t even think about it for another two years.

If you can just do the slightest bit of planning (no overplanning!) at the beginning, setting a reasonable daily or weekly time limit for yourself, you will have much more stamina for the long run.

Just my two cents!

all the best and I think we need some visuals, my friend!

warmly,

Jessica from It’s Not About Your Stuff