Change and Detox

This act of tidying not only brings about change in your living area, but also brings change to the rest of your life.  Change is sometimes difficult to go through so you may actually experience a detox reaction as you tidy.  I did.  I pushed through it tho and kept tidying until I had completed the task I set out to do. 

I am so glad I am now able to experience the benefits of this hard work.  I feel lighter and more focused, more able to get things done. 

As we wrap up this blog series, I hope you will share with me what positive benefits you have received from the information.  Are you inspired to tidy?  Or at least inspired to read the book?

Fear for the Future?

What if you begin to tidy and you find you are having a hard time letting go of something, even though it doesn’t bring you joy.  Marie suggests asking yourself a three part question:

Am I having trouble getting rid of this because of an attachment to the past? A fear for the future? Or a combination of both? Whoa.  This brought me up short as I read it.  I immediately identified my problem.  I held onto things because I thought I might need them some day – a desire for stability in the future is what that is.  That was a life-changing realization.  If I needed something in the future and I had gotten rid of it, would that be bad?  No.  I could just go buy a new one!  There are stores around here!  I bet you have stores where you live, too! I hope this helps you look at your things and make a decision as to what to do with it just like it did for me.

A Designated Spot

Another pearl of wisdom I had brought home to me was how everything needs a place to be.  That is their spot where they rest after you use them.  My shoes now rest in their designated spot.  I no longer kick them off in my closet and then have a hard time finding a matching pair.  Time saver!! 

When I come home from a class or vendor event, I have an easy put away time.  I just return the items to their resting place.  Then we are both happy!

Marie says to put all like things together.  That means books go in one place, and pictures you hang on the wall go all in one place.  My daughter was home trying to find a cookbook and she remembered me telling her this tip.  She knew where to find it – with all the other books! Sure makes things easier to find!

Oh No!! It's the Office!!

I went thru our kitchen, our suitcases, our coat closet, and our cabinets over the washer and dryer.  I was beginning to feel better, lighter. 

Now came the hard part – the office. The author recommends throwing away all paper.  If you really need that something you’ve been holding onto, you can call someone and have them help you locate a copy.  Wow.  I never thought of that!  I was able to empty an entire drawer in our filing cabinet and now what was left was not all jam packed together!  Woohoo!

All the office supplies were next.  Out went all the things we hadn’t used in years that didn’t bring me joy.  I can’t tell you how wonderful it is to walk into the closet and see everything standing in its perfect resting place, ready to be of service.  It is so peaceful!

Marie recommends tidying all in one day!  I tried to do that, but the process spilled into a few days.  It’s a good goal to strive for though.  See if you can set aside a day and bust it out!

Books - It's a Love Let Go Thing

Books were next on my list to purge.  Marie says to hold each book in your hands.   Use the same gauge you used for your clothes and shoes.  How does the book make you feel, regardless of whether you have read it or not?  

I have never been able to get rid of books before because I love books!  I love to learn.  I love to travel to faraway places by immersing myself in a book.  Books are wonderful.  However, I found as I held each book, I had a feeling when I held it.  This was getting easier for me.  Good feeling – keep.  Bad feeling – discard.  My bulging bookshelves were now much happier.  Each book now has space to breathe.  Each book has a place.  Ahhhhh.

Shoes and Spider Webs

What about my shoes?  There were those pumps gathering dust and spider webs in the back corner.  Did they bring me joy when I held them?  Nooooo.  Time to go!  When I held a few pair, I could see that their days of service were over.  They had stains and were cracked.  Poor shoes!  They had been tucked away in my closet waiting to go to their grave.  I felt good about releasing them so they could begin their next life as parts of the atmosphere, floating around, free and happy.

The cool thing about this process is the next time I am offered clothing or go shopping, I will know not to accept anything into my balanced, harmonic, happy closet that doesn’t bring me joy.  Just today I put on a skirt.  I like the way it feels and I like the color.  I do Not like the way it fits.  Out it goes!  There is so much freedom in that!

Let the Tidying Begin!

Everything we own makes us feel a certain way.  Some things make us happy. Some things don’t.  Some things we hold on to out of obligation.  Maybe we inherited it from a lost parent or it was a gift.  Regardless of how it came into our lives, our possessions make us feel something. 

I started this tidying process in my closet.  Marie recommends taking everything out.  You have to be able to hold each item in your hand and see how it makes you feel.  Happy and good?  That goes in the Keep Pile.  Sad or yucky or repulsed? That goes in the Trash Pile.  Very simple concept, right? 

What about the things you don’t like or haven’t ever worn that make you feel sort of guilty for getting rid of them?  Clothes, shoes, possessions feel good only if they are used.  They are sad if they just hang or sit day after day and never get to see the light of day.  If you hold something and you have no love for it, but you feel a little guilty for letting it go – thank it for its service to you and tell it you are releasing it.  Ahhhh.  That felt good.  Those blue jean jumpers in the back of my closet – gone!  They were released to be of service to someone else.  That suit coat I got and never wore – gone – off to be of service to someone else.  My bulging closet already felt better!

After you have sorted into your Keep and Trash piles, the next thing to do is put all your clothes away.  The author says to stand everything up on end.  Our clothes don’t like to be stacked because they are all squished, can’t breathe, and the likelihood of being chosen to be worn when on the bottom of the stack is slim.  I like this, too.  My socks and workout clothes are much happier now because I can easily see each item and choose what I’m going to wear.  It makes me happy to know my clothes are happy.