How many boxes does it take???

Purging in layers:

Linny, on her blog A place called Simplicity, has a post about this journey of simplifying our lives.

(I got a great idea about the laundry room from it....more on that later).

Like another reader posted, our home and lives are cluttered with things, stuff...just too much stuff.

Linny shared about looking at an item and asking do you really use it, how often and could you live with out it.

Well, this past weekend I started going through the garage and purging (took 5 boxes to the Hospice Thrift store today)... and am working on more.

But something I realized, as I was stuffing this and that in organized shelves in the garage....is that I still have not purged enough...and that purging is in layers and is a real letting go.

Layers: We purged when we moved from a big 5 bedroom house to this small 3-bedroom country house that we love. We sold or gave away furniture, had a huge garage sale and purged purged purged. So I thought.

3 months later, I still have unpacked boxes in my closet, bedrooms, hallway, laundry room and don't EVEN look in the garage. So, I have started sorting and purging, AGAIN. A layer deeper. Being proud of the 5 boxes I got rid of today...and knowing I probably had 5 or so more... I then read Linny's post, and those who commented and realized...I have just begun! It is going to take many more boxes...to unclutter. Let alone break the habit of cluttering back up, once I am done.

One poster talked about her families love of things, and how, with so much stuff, nothing is precious! That is so true so true...no special toy when you have 100. sigh....

So more purging to go to the next layer.

Letting go: Part of the challenge of simplifying from all the stuff is being able to let go. Sometimes we don't let go of stuff because if who gave it to us, or a memory around it...but often for me it is because of two things: 1) I MIGHT have a need for it SOME DAY. (ie..that school project 4 years from now that would need a green piece of paper with fake would trim and gold gilded edges!)... and 2) it cost me good money when I bought it to just get rid of it!

UGH. But the money is already spent and forgotten, so why eat up my time by having to pack it around, sort it, pick it up, organize it when I don't need it AND never be able to find it if and when that SOME DAY actually comes about.

So..I am going to finish up the current "purging layer" I am on, and like a good archeoligist, move on down to the next layer. I have an inkling I may NEVER be truly done....as I keep finding another layer below the other one, as well as the things put on top....but perhaps I can get to the point that my focus would move from getting rid of the clutter, to questioning new purchases as they are about to happen.

So that is my thoughts on simplicity, today...purge, layer by layer.