I know I've mentioned several times over the past few months how I've been trying to purge mountains of stuff that has taken over our house. Crap that we've moved with us from house to house as well as all the stuff that we're bogged down with since we sold my folks' house and moved my Pop up here with us.
Last year, I read an article Peter Walsh wrote in Woman's Day magazine, titled Mind Over Matter (July 10, 2007) and it hit home for me like no other 'get organized' article I've ever read. He talked about the 'stuff epidemic' and how "we live in a culture that tells us, 'You are what you own'." "As soon as those items become more important than living a fulfilling life, we no longer own our possessions. They own us."
After I read this article I was so motivated I could hardly wait to get started on cleaning and organizing. Something that really resonated with me were these three questions to ask myself when I'm trying to declutter/purge:
*What do I want from this room?
*What feeling do I want when I walk into this space?
*What kind of life do I want to live in this house?
these questions have helped me see beyond the emotional stuff and focus on what I want my end result to be.
There is so much good stuff in this article I actually saved it so I could refer back to it because it just makes so much sense. There are tips on downsizing, an outline for a 'plan of action' as well as some eye opening philosophies on why we hang onto things as well as reasons to let the stuff go. Seriously, a great article.
More organizational tips from Woman's Day
Pssst! Does this clutter make my butt look fat? LOL! Gotta love the title of his latest book, don't ya? I never really thought about it until I saw this book but there are definitely some interesting parallels between overindulging/overeating and hoarding/collecting clutter. Not sure I'm ready to delve into this one just yet, but I find the psychology behind all of this fascinating.
3 comments:
I "LOVE" the name of the second book!
Smiles,
Wendy
You can do it! I cleaned majorly when we moved here to Germany. You wouldn't believe how much stuff we got rid of. And the thing is....we need to do it again.
LOVE the title of that second book. The author is GOOD at what he does. LOVE him on "Clean House" or "Clean Sweep" or whatever show it is that he's on.
I purged a lot before I moved 18 months ago, and I'm about to do it again. I LOVE to purge junk!
Good luck with yours!!!
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