“Owning less is far more beneficial than organizing more.” – Twitter / Facebook
We are a culture drowning in our possessions. We take in more and more (holiday, birthdays, sales, needs), but rarely find opportunity to discard of it. As a result, our homes fill up with so much stuff. And because we believe the best solution is to find organizational tools to manage all of it, we seek out bigger containers or more efficient organizational tips and tricks. But simply organizing our stuff (without removing it) is always only a temporary solution. By definition, organizing our possessions is an action that must be repeated over and over and over again.
At its heart, organizing is simply rearranging. And though we may find storage solutions today, we are quickly forced to find new ones as early as tomorrow. Additionally, organizing (without getting rid of our stuff and decluttering) has some other major shortcomings that are rarely considered:
- It doesn’t benefit anyone else. The possessions we rarely use sit on shelves in our basements, attics, and garages… even while some of our closest friends desperately need them.
- It doesn’t solve our debt problems. It never addresses the underlying issue that we just buy too much stuff. In fact, many times, the act of rearranging our stuff even costs us more as we purchase containers, storage units, or larger homes to house it.
- It doesn’t turn back our desire for more. The simple act of organizing our things into boxes, plastic bins, or extra closets doesn’t turn back our desire to purchase more things. The culture-driven inclination to find happiness in our possessions is rarely thwarted in any way through the process.
- It doesn’t force us to evaluate our lives. While rearranging our stuff may cause us to look at each of our possessions, it does not force us to evaluate them—especially if we are just putting them in boxes and closing the lids. On the other hand, removing possessions from our home forces questions of passion, values, and what’s truly most important to us.
- It accomplishes little in paving the way for other changes. Organizing may provide a temporary lift to our attitude. It clears a room and subsequently clears our mind, but rarely paves the way for healthy, major lifestyle changes. Our house is too small, our income is too little, and we still can’t find enough time in the day. We may have rearranged our stuff… but not our lives.
On the other hand, the act of getting rid of stuff from our home accomplishes many of those purposes. It is not a temporary solution that must be repeated. It is an action of permanence—once an item has been removed, it is removed completely. Whether we re-sell our possessions, donate them to charity, or give them to a friend, they are immediately put to use by those who need them.
Removing possessions begins to turn back our desire for more as we find freedom, happiness, and abundance in owning less. And removing ourselves from the all-consuming desire to own more creates opportunity for significant life change to take place.
If you’re struggling with how to get rid of stuff, you can:
1. Challenge yourself to remove the unneeded things in your home.
2. Rid yourself of the extra weight in a permanent manner.
3. Carry a trash bag from room-to-room.
4. See how big of a donation pile you can make.
5. Eliminate debt by selling what you no longer need.
It doesn’t matter so much how you remove them, as long as you do. For it is far better to de-own than to always be decluttering.
Katie says
I love this post! My husband and I have been trying to purge for a while now. We have had some success with it, but we seem to be at a stand-still right now. Hoping this post will be that little encouragement we needed to press on!
loretta Humble says
I love your book, and the concept. I’ve aimed at this for years, sort of: collection of simplify books on my shelf, have moved to the country into a very small house. Sometimes de-own things. But I have continued to bring too many things in, to save too many things “for hard times.”
I’m 73 years old, but consider myself still capable of making big changes. Let’s see what I do with your encouragement.
We have an excellent organization called Faith in Action in my town, that can place my de-owned “stuff” in the hands of folks who need it right here locally. That will help me be willing to part with my “stuff.”
I write a little column in my local weekly. I think I’ll be using it to keep myself accountable, and maybe get somebody else to thinking simple.
Teresa says
When we were getting ready to move from our first home our pipes burst in the upstairs bathroom flooding most of our house. The area where we had our packed boxes stored was the worst damaged so most of our boxes ended up in the dumpster; whatever survived was put away in a storage locker for about 4 yrs. We have since moved and the contents of the storage locker came with us. For the past 1 1/2 yrs I have been digging through these boxes (most of the contents going to Value Village and friends). Why did we keep 80% of this “stuff” because that is all that it is? For 4 yrs we lived in a small space and used just what we needed and it was great (while the storage locker sucked up our hard earned cash!) Heading back to the basement today with a garbage bag and box (over the holidays we emptied 4 large storage bins and 4 boxes….I think we kept maybe 5%) because I still feel like we are drowning in stuff.
Unconventional Notions says
Fantastic post! Completely captures the essence of an incredibly important distinction.
Gip @ So Much More Life says
Absolutely. Everything we own takes a little piece of our time and energy that we could be using to be productive, useful, interesting people. Great post.
Gip
ErgoOrgo says
I agree with Robert – de-cluttering for me involves getting rid of things, but de-owned is a great phrase! I probably obsess about this too much, as I try to regularly go through different drawers to de-own further – almost every time I find some item that I haven’t used in months, and can no longer see a need for. However:
– 1) I wonder if decluttering takes up more of my mental time than when I just had the stuff I had and didn’t worry about it. I definitely spend less time thinking about acquiring new things, but is that just being replaced with worrying about getting rid of old things?
– 2) one thing I declutter by cheating is media (documents, photos, music, videos) – I have very few hard, physical copies anymore, but I declutter by going digital. I.e. I still have the stuff, just all on a small hard drive. This can still save money, reduce need for space in my apartment etc, but doesn’t necessarily hit your other criteria.
Robert Wall says
Ergo, two things….
1) Decluttering should be a low-worry process. This isn’t a race, and nobody’s keeping score. If you feel like you need to get rid of some stuff, go do it. If you don’t, don’t stress over it for the time being. Any progress is good progress!
2) I personally don’t consider a hard drive with copies of old photos and such to be clutter. Unless those files are so disorganized or otherwise “in the way” that they create a problem, I wouldn’t worry about it. Digital clutter can be an issue, but this is one of the situations where organization (rather than disposal) is a very valid methodology.
Relax and enjoy the process. There’s no cosmic reward for having the fewest things; declutter the obvious problem spots and re-evaluate everything else maybe a couple times a year. Take the time you save and enjoy life!
ErgoOrgo says
Thanks for the advice – it is well taken: I should not let my enthusiasm for decluttering cause stress. We are however about to move overseas, so there will be a rather large cost to shipping things, which has been a motivator, but I know we are in good shape.
Thanks again.
Robert Wall says
Personally I don’t consider it decluttering *unless* stuff is also being de-owned. I might have to steal your phrase though….I like it!
Cliff says
I am new to de-cluttering, de-owning and releasing. I recently got fed up with all my STUFF and bills. I started on Dec 30th getting rid of stuff/crap. As I cleared a room or an area, I felt so free and liberated that words could not expresss. Today I called over a friend and gave him a bunch of clothes for church and a couple really nice winter coats. He was so appreciative that he almost cried. Today was also the first day that I intentionally did not watch TV. I am on a new journey for 2012 and i’m so excited about the freedom i’m experiencing. Thank you for your blog. I enjoy all he comments!
Dee McNamee says
Really like your comments – Good for you, Cliff!
All my ” stuff” is in my living room.. I did not start it YET but will do a little each week..culminating bringing bits weekly to charity, or as you say over there Goodwill.
Really liked your comment about intentionally not watching TV… I unplugged mine and have stored it in the Garage – where there are no plugs!
Hey, I am so thankful to Karen for this webite.. we are all in this together!
Dee x
Alice says
I spent yesterday reorganizing my art area and filled two bags with empty containers. When I moved recently, my friend who helped me said that she has never seen someone with so many storage containers. I think releasing things I no longer (or never) use is in the cards for me now. The first thing I de-owned this year was my goal list. I went from 25 down to one goal that means a lot to me and I feel passionate about- making one art project every week.
Thanks for your inspiration!
Jonathan @ punchlifeintheface says
What a fantastic sentiment. For me decluttering and de-owning go hand in hand, but I definitely know some folks who just declutter in order to be able to fit in new stuff.