A few reasons why you have too many clothes

December 13, 2021 by Leave a Comment

For those of us that have more clothes than space (and I count myself in that right now because when I unpacked my summer clothes out of rotation last month, I got a shock at how full my wardrobe suddenly was!), then it’s helpful to understand WHY, so that after a declutter, it doesn’t fill back up again.

So here we go – here are some reasons you have more clothes than space:

  1. You don’t have a style guide or curated colour palette. This means you buy things that don’t suit you or “feel like” you (they’re probably on special though, so enticed you anyway), OR they aren’t consistent with other styles in your wardrobe so you find them hard to match up and then don’t wear them. You need more clothes when things don’t match.
  2. You refuse to pay full price. When you shop with a discount in mind, that discount becomes the main reason for buying something. It is so enticing that regardless of the item and its suitability, you buy it anyway. By paying full price for something, however, you are more intentional and deliberate. You don’t compromise at all. You don’t think “well it’s a bit tight under the arms but I’m sure it will be okay” or “This will do for now”. You think “This has to match with several of my other clothes, shoes and accessories, fit perfectly and last me a long time”. And so you only buy it when it promises just that. Paying full price means ultimately buying less items overall.
  3. You don’t shop with a list. When you go shopping without a list, it’s easy to impulse-purchase. It’s easy to buy things you want, instead of things you need. Keep a list at all times (in your head, your phone, in a notebook, wherever!) so that when you’re shopping, you can refer to it when the impulse strikes. Update it regularly (when you are standing in front of your wardrobe thinking “I really need a black singlet for under these tops” or when something gets a hole in it that you can’t repair). Then make a rule for yourself – Only buy things that are on the list.
  4. You can’t let go. Hanging on to clothes we don’t wear anymore is a common behaviour. There are a lot of reasons we stop wearing clothes – we don’t fit into them anymore, they go out of fashion (as I’m getting older I am ignoring fashion more and more though!), they get “tatty” or worn and not suitable for public display. However a lot of the time, we keep them anyway. If you can’t let go, and you keep buying more, it’s only going to get more and more cramped in there.
  5. You follow fast fashion. In the fast fashion industry there are over 50 seasons in a year. That’s a new collection every week. If you strive to keep up with these seasons, you will invariably end up with an over-full wardrobe. The antidote is to be comfortable wearing clothes for many years, and creating a style for yourself that does not depend on trends. Also being selective on what trends you follow can help, too – that will reduce the influx a little.
  6. You haven’t set any boundaries. You buy what you want, when you want it. Your space expands (or compresses!) to fit the clothes, instead of the other way around. Your shoes are in five different locations, your clothes span more than one wardrobe, or have spilled over into tubs in the garage or spare rooms. Set some boundaries on how much space your clothes can take up, then stick to it.

So these are a few areas for you to address if you want to ultimately have a “just right” volume of clothing in your life – give them a go and see how well it works!

Filed Under: Decluttering, Featured, Shopping, Wardrobe Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Sell or donate? Here’s how to decide.

November 4, 2021 by Leave a Comment

You’ve done it. You’ve decided to de-own an item and say goodbye to it. What next?

Well, it’s another decision – sorry! You need to decide next on what you’re actually going to do with the stuff. There are a few options that can be simplified into:

  1. Sell
  2. Donate
  3. Recycle or landfill

If you’ve decided it’s too good to toss, you’re down to two options – give away or sell. Sometimes it’s an easy decision. If the item is worth thousands then yeah, you don’t have to agonise too much. But what if it’s maybe worth something but you aren’t completely sure and need to figure it out?

There are two things to consider when deciding whether to sell or donate. The first is how much time you have, the second is how much money you have (or need).

  1. If you have time but no money

    Selling stuff takes a lot of time and effort. There is research to be done, people to call, photographs to take, things to upload, people to message, space to find to put the stuff in the meantime … it’s a fair amount of work.

    However, if you have the time and need the money, selling privately via Facebook groups, special interest groups, specialty dealers etc WILL be worth it financially. You could also try a Garage Sale or a car-boot sale too.

  2. If you have money but no time

    Honestly – just donate it all. Call a charity and have them come and collect it in one go. It’s fast and it’s easy. Not to mention good for the charity that receives it!

  3. If you have money and time.

    Donate it, but go the extra mile and find small, specialty charities that the stuff goes directly to those in need. It’s very satisfying to know your stuff is going to be well used and appreciated. Ask your friends for their favourites and curate a list that suits you and your passions (and the stuff you have!).

  4. If you have no money and no time

    Try an auction house – you just have to pack it all up and get it there, and they do the rest (they take commission for their trouble but you still get around 75% into your bank account). Or you could hire someone (a student, family member, someone on Airtasker) to sell the items on your behalf for a cut.

If you’re still on the fence, ask yourself if the stress is worth it. Is losing $50 of potential sales worth it for the shorter to-do list on the weekend? Look at it like it’s an investment in your mental health. That’s like spending $50 on therapy!

Filed Under: Decluttering, Downsizing, Estate Clearance Tagged With: , , , ,

How to declutter when you can’t access charities

April 25, 2020 by Leave a Comment

I was on the radio this week talking about this. Unfortunately the host decided to go off-topic and my list I had prepared didn’t get to be discussed!

Rather than waste it, I thought I’d do a blog post about it.

So, here are 10 ways to declutter and organise when the charities are closed:

  1. Create an “unwanted zone”. This temporary zone can house your unwanted items until you can get them to charity. Pick a place that’s out of the way, not blocking up any living spaces. If you have to use a living space like a toyroom or office, do some rearranging first so that there is a clear boundary between the wanted and unwanted items – you don’t want them getting mixed up. Think of them as two different coloured playdoh balls – don’t mix the colours because its really hard to undo that!


  2. Label large items with stickers and leave them in place. Applicances, jugs, vases, side tables etc. Just put a sticker on them and when everything is back to normal, do a treasure hunt in the house to find all the stickers


  3. Give things away on Gumtree or Facebook Marketplace. You can do this safely, cleaning items and leaving them at a safe distance for collection. Those collecting items can wear gloves and quarantine or wash the items when they get them home.


  4. Sell things on Gumtree, Marketplace or Ebay – most people on Ebay expect postage rather than pickup so you can then have contact-free disposal by mailing the items.


  5. Choose a recycler that you can mail items too. Manrags will take 10kg of your old clothing for resuse or recycling.


  6. You can engage companies that still have access to the charities. 1800 GOT JUNK can still access the charities they normally take re-usable stuff to, and here at Clear Space we also have access to charities that are closed to the public.


  7. If you have vintage clothing, and you’re in Adelaide, Dulcie’s Bus is still collecting – if you contact us I can arrange it for you. And summer clothing and shoes still being received at AussieGhana Relief at 1/518 Goodwood Road, Daw Park and 333 Marion Road, North Plympton.


  8. Focus on rubbish and recycling only for now. Skip companies are still operating, as are scrap metal recyclers and council hard rubbish collections.


  9. Donate your items to friends. I recently dropped off a few bags of kids’ clothes to a couple of friends. Make sure they need it first!


  10. Do organising projects that don’t require much decluttering. Organise your digital photos or your printed photos. Set up memory boxes, archive kids’ schoolwork, declutter paperwork (you can hire shredding bins – we recommend www.greenteam.com.au), re-organise your recipes, re-arrange the living room etc.

So if you’re looking to get some clearing and organising happening, it’s still possible!

 

Filed Under: Featured, Home, Maintenance Tagged With: , , , , , ,

The “zone” method of decluttering

February 2, 2018 by Leave a Comment

When we help clients downsize their homes, or help with an estate clearance, one method we advocate of cluttering and sorting the home is to use zones.

When it’s us that’s clearing the home, we help the client create an “unwanted” zone, where they put everything they don’t want.  Given that we are experienced at knowing what is sell-able, donate-able or just recyclable, we encourage them to not throw anything away, but just to put it in the Unwanted Zone. Then we go through it and sort it into where it will ultimately end up.

But you don’t need us to do this. If you have a large clearance to do, you, too, can also use the zone method. When your Unwanted Zone is full, you then ferry things off to the charities, or the auction house, or other family members and then you go back and start filling it again.

If you work systematically through each room in the home, leaving the wanted items where they are and putting the unwanted items into the Unwanted Zone, you also eliminate a lot of double-handling that can come from shifting items from room to room, or re-sorting something you’ve already gone through.

 

 

Filed Under: Decluttering, Downsizing, Estate Clearance Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

The need for a “good home” – is it holding you back?

January 29, 2018 by Leave a Comment

Why do we tend to NEED our unwanted belongings to “go to a good home”? What is the rationale behind that?

I think this is something we need to unpack, because it holds us back from achieving our goals.

Why does it matter what happens to belongings that we no longer need or want? What is it that makes us care? Is it something to do with our sense of self? That by discarding something in a “careless” way challenges our sense of who we are?

Or is it because we project our history into items? Or because we personalise our belongings and treat them as though they have feelings?

All of the above?

Are these valid beliefs? Are they truths or are they fabrications? Are we creating an obstacle?

Just think. If you didn’t care what happened to your stuff once it left your house, how much more free would you feel? If you didn’t need it to go to a “good home” (what does that mean anyway?), then how much clearer would your home be?

I’m not saying it’s a wrong belief or feeling (there are no such things – we feel what we feel), but I’m saying it’s well worth unpacking and looking at it from a different perspective. Because although it might not be wrong, it certainly can be unhelpful.

Oh, and on the “good home” thing. Is it currently IN a “good home”? Is it being lovingly stored, used, admired? Or is it shoved in the back of a cupboard or under a pile of clothes? So if you don’t give it a good home, why is it so important that it goes to one?

Filed Under: Anxiety, Decluttering, Psychology Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Letting go without context

September 26, 2016 by Leave a Comment

Some people struggle to declutter because they need context. Without it, they feel they can’t let go.

By context I mean that someone is decluttering their study and they find an egg-flip. The person doesn’t know if they have any other egg-flips, or how many they have, so they can’t make a decision to discard that egg-flip. They keep it, and then weeks later have the same dilemma when they find another egg-flip somewhere else. Was it the same one? Do I only have one? Or do I h…ave more, and can I safely donate this one? Usually the uncertainty is too high so they choose to keep it.

There is one obvious solution to this – declutter by category. Grab all your egg-flips, put them in one place and then declutter. Marie Kondo has borrowed this method for her book and it can be very helpful.

Unfortunately, it’s only helpful for people with low-to-medium levels of clutter or for relatively organised homes (ie, all your items are contained to one to three rooms per category, like clothes or toys). It’s completely useless for people with high or hoarding levels. I mean, how on earth do you find all of your batteries in the whole house when you can’t even open the cupboards or see the floor?

So my poor clients are stuck between a rock and a hard place. They can’t discard because they fear discarding too many or the wrong ones, and they can’t find the rest to help facilitate the decision-making.

The solution I recommend (understanding how hard it is) is to just forget the context. Forget the others, forget the maybes, just declutter as much as you possibly can, knowing that if you make a mistake, you’ll still be okay and your main goal of being in control of your belongings is more important than trying to avoid having to buy a $3 egg-flip from KMart.

That’s the key – knowing you’ll still be okay no matter what choice you make. Because you will, I promise.

Filed Under: Anxiety, Culling, Decluttering, Hoarding, Psychology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Decluttering affirmations

September 20, 2016 by 1 Comment

Some decluttering affirmations for you to use when things get tough:

 

I am enough. I don’t need stuff to define me.

I have enough. I am blessed with all I have.

If I make a mistake and cull something I regret, I’ll still be okay.

I am safe.

People are more important than stuff.

Culling is not wasteful. Keeping things without using them is wasteful.

I’ll be okay. Everything will be okay, no matter what I do.

 

These are useful things to remind yourself of when you’re trying to reduce your belonging and finding it a bit difficult.
Filed Under: Culling, Decluttering, Psychology Tagged With: , , , ,

Post-Declutter Stress Disorder

November 16, 2015 by 2 Comments

Okay, I made that title up. But it isn’t too far from reality!

Most people get a sense of euphoria after decluttering. Some, however, do not. In fact, they feel horrible. They are anxious and miserable, dwelling on decisions made and wondering if they made mistakes. If you’re one of those people, you may be wondering why you don’t get as excited by the results as others do.

Here’s a few reasons why you might feel that way after decluttering:

1) Attachment happens in your mind. Physically removing something does just that; it’s physically gone. If you are still attached in your mind, the fact that it’s gone is not a relief.

2) You haven’t trained your brain to stop panicking yet. Every time our brain gets a reinforcement, it is told to continue that behaviour. So when you try to throw something away, then panic, then keep the item to make the panic go away, you’re telling your brain that panic is the appropriate response when attempting to discard something.

3) The future is more unknown with less stuff. No longer can you safely predict what might happen (ie right now you can predict you will have 2 spare can-openers to grab should you lose your favourite one). Instead, if you only have one can opener, you can’t predict the outcome of losing or breaking it. Unknown stuff can be scary if we allow ourselves to think of the negative consequences.

4) You worry that you’ve made a mistake. Your brain predicts a total catastrophe should it become apparent you’ve thrown out something that later becomes needed. This fear of the catastrophe has you dwelling on what mistakes you may have made when culling.

5) You feel you are losing a part of your identity or your past. Your past and your stuff are related. We store patterns in our neo-cortex of things we see, hear, smell and feel. Our brain cross-references these patterns and therefore creates an association. If you part with one of those “pointers” and it’s outside of your control and exists only in your mind, perhaps you’ll end up with memories in your brain that can’t ever be retrieved again.

6) You’re grieving lost opportunities. There are now things you may never see again, do again, think about again.

7) You did it for someone else. When you declutter to keep someone else happy, you’re less likely to enjoy the results. It’s not unlikely, just a little less likely.

8) You’ve forgotten about your goals. You’re thinking about what you’ve “lost”, not what you’ve gained. You have either not focused on your goals, or you have forgotten about them.

9) You just love your stuff too much. Whether you have hoarding disorder, or another mental health condition that fosters a very strong bond with physical belongings, your brain simply won’t let you let go.

This is why there is so much more to decluttering than just getting rid of stuff. It actually requires changes in mindset that without them, you won’t be able to be completely happy with the result.

Declutter your fears first, then your stuff.

Filed Under: Anxiety, Culling, Disorganised, Psychology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

Churning (or: Why You’re Getting Nowhere)

September 13, 2015 by Leave a Comment

Sometimes you think you’re working really hard at trying to gain control of your clutter, but you find you make no progress.

deck-chairs-on-TitanicYou are constantly sorting and organising, tidying and moving things around in an effort to gain order and be able to find your stuff when you want it, and have clear surfaces, but you don’t get anywhere.

No sooner do you clear a spot than you turn around and it’s full again.

“Whhhyyyyy??!??!!?” I hear you wail….

Here’s why – you’re just churning, or as my best friend puts it, “moving deck chairs on the Titanic”

Churning is the act of sorting, categorising, grouping into piles or sections and then having to do it again when the piles all merge together after a few days or weeks.

You need to stop churning and face the reality that the only way you’re going to gain control is to reduce the volume of your possessions. That means letting go of things you don’t need, use or love – and even some things you do.

Unless things actually leave the house, it’s just churning and you’re going to get nowhere.

Filed Under: Anxiety, Culling, Decluttering, Disorganised Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Tipping points

September 6, 2015 by Leave a Comment

I’m going to preface this article by saying I don’t like to tell people how much stuff is the right amount of stuff; I think everyone should be able to have whatever volume of belongings they are happy and healthy with. This article isn’t to specify a “right” or “wrong” but it may perhaps give some people a guide to go by when decluttering or maintaining their home’s “stuff levels”.

My house isn’t overly minimalist. It’s not overly tidy all the time, either. But it does have one thing going for it – we have only as much stuff as we can comfortably store. That means that when I do want it tidy to my satisfaction, it doesn’t take long because all the stuff that’s laying about annoying me has a home to go to.

What that also means is that I can easily see where things are going awry. I have “trigger points” that show me I need to declutter (not tidy, as I have kids and pets and a life I pretty much need to tidy constantly, as I’m sure you do too!).

Here’s some of my “It’s time to declutter” trigger points:

1) There’s stuff staying an extended time on tables and benches because it won’t fit in the cupboard or doesn’t have a home. That’s a huge alarm bell for me. Right now I have a big pack of Rice Bubbles on the kitchen counter because it won’t fit in the pantry – it’s been there a week. Silly me bought when we already had a full pack in there. I need to do something about that. I think I need to remove a container. Or just eat a LOT of Rice Bubbles very quickly ;). It’s not bothering me too much because I know it will get eaten eventually, but if it’s not a consumable like that I quickly resolve it. If you leave it, the table just attracts more stuff and then it grows to an unmanageable level.

2) I have to rifle through a pile on my desk to find something. When I notice myself doing that, I make sure I put aside 5 minutes as soon as I can to go through it and file stuff. And get some stuff done, too, as lots of it will be important actions to take. Also, when my files are getting fat that’s a warning flag too – time to prune.

3) I have things on the floor. As far as I’m concerned, the floor in my house isn’t storage. It should store furniture and half-finished Lego constructions only. And maybe the odd train track development project ;). So if I’m seeing stuff persisting on the floor, I need to declutter a cupboard somewhere that that stuff should be going into. Or get rid of said stuff.

4) I can’t find stuff or get to things easily. If I’m having to rummage through a storage container/shelf/cupboard then I add a declutter to my to-do list for that week. I can’t stand not being able to find things!

5) I feel cramped. This one is a slow-burner but it’s responsible for a whole bookcase leaving our house recently. I just wanted more empty wall space so the room felt bigger. It worked well too 🙂

 

Here’s some other posts that might help you declutter:

Declutter first, organise second

The “No Brainers” declutter list

Will it stay or will it go? How to make declutter decisions

 

 

 

Filed Under: Culling, Decluttering, Maintenance, Organised Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,