Yesterday I remembered that I forgot to include the window fan I haven’t used in 3 years with my last round of thrift store donations. When I opened the closet to grab the fan, staring me in the face was the yoga mat and the foam roller that I haven’t used in 5 years. Seeing these, I immediately thought, “Why the f*** am I keeping these? If I haven’t used them in 5 years, I’m never going to use them.”
In this round, I included my “rain sneakers”. Why bother keeping these? I can wear any of my sneakers in the rain. I also replaced the old Merrell boots I keep in my car for errands with my pristine condition Merrell Mocs that have been sitting in my closet for 5 years.
All of this getting rid of stuff activity over the past few weeks has had the added benefit of paying attention to things I have been doing every single day because I fell into a routine.
Things like:
- Pushing my raincoat out of the way every time I hang up my swim bag in the closet. FIX: I moved the raincoat to my coat closet with all of my other coats.
- Shuffling the 7 pairs of sneakers on my shelf twice a day as I rotate through them. I bought too many pairs but won’t get rid of them because I consider sneakers to be consumables. I wear all of them and eventually they will all wear out. FIX: I moved the newest 3 pairs into my upstairs storage closet. I’ll rotate through the other 4 pairs and replace them as needed with the upstairs ones.
- I have a few dozen paintings mounted on foam backing board that is so light that whenever I vacuum, the updraft from the vacuum cleaner blows them off the wall and I have to hunt for the nail that pulled out and remount them. I am constantly frustrated by this every week that I vacuum. FIX: I removed all of the foam board paintings, trimmed them down and am in the process of remounting them onto heavier backing board that isn’t blown off the wall by the vacuum. (Why didn’t I think of this 150 vacuums ago? Ugh.)
For me, having enough means owning only items I use and love, with very few exceptions. (eg. I don’t particularly love my broom and dustpan, but I use them.)
I feel like my life has been made “just right” by going through this process. In fact, it’s been so enlightening that I am going to make a habit of doing a purge sweep every quarter to identify what needs to go.
