Decluttering is a daunting task. You have to overcome the letting go part. The common challenges are for sentimental attachment, procrastination (cause there is always tomorrow) and lack of time. Here are some practical solutions:
Why are we so attached to items? Cause those items have sentimental values often with deep emotional connecting to our families. Even if an item is not worth much in monetary values, it anchor us to our roots.
First you need to acknowledge your emotional attachment to the items and understand that your memories are not tied to physical items. One way is to take photos of the items before letting them go. For example, your children’s artworks from kindergarten, you do not have to keep the physical forms of all their artworks. You may keep 3 to 5 pieces that you love and make a memory box and take photo of the rest and let them go or if your children wants their arts, give them back.
Why do we procrastinate when it comes to decluttering? Often, we are faced with what we think is an impossible tasks and we feel paralyzed by our indecisiveness and unsure of where to start.
The best way to start decluttering is to breakdown projects into manageable chunks. Let say you want to declutter your bedroom, start with one drawer and declutter that one drawer and call it a day. Remember to set your timer for 5 minutes and commit to 5 minutes of decluttering. Here is a basic break down of decluttering your bedside table drawer.
We always tell ourselves that we do not have the time. We all live busy lives and we have to make time for decluttering even though we think it isn’t a priority. Decluttering is about responsibility of your possessions.
We encourage you to look at your stuff and assess what you use the most and what you don’t use at all. And start prioritizing your stuff by simplifying from there on. For example, the amount time you have already invested looking for lost items because of clutter. The Monday morning blues start with where are your keys and they are actually under the pile of mails from the weekend that you bought them in but you didn’t sort your mails. It is a domino effect as you turned your house upside down, creating more mess just to find your keys. On top of that you are adding stress cause you are late for work. You get the point.
Another way to look at decluttering from a different perspective is Swedish Death Cleaning. It is not just about getting rid of clutter, but reflecting on if your stuff has any true value and usefulness. Even if the very item is a family heirloom. You have to leave the guilt behind and ask yourself if that heirloom item is serving you or putting stress on you. At the end, it will also make it easier for your loved ones to handle your affairs in the event of your death.
We hope this gives you some insight on why you should declutter and the time is now, not tomorrow.