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DeCluttering: Inspiration, Success Stories, Tips
Hopalong:
I really do feel unhappy about my clutter.
I'm not talking about creativity debris or evidence of activity.
My clutter is more evidence of INactivity, not grasping my life, not taking care of self or space.
But I understand that it is affecting me this way because I'm me...and the same level of disorder might be a cheerful dynamic setting for someone else.
For me, it's not a happy thing. I have too much in my head, and paperwork in particular -- unsorted and undealt with -- feels like a hazard. It actually is.
I know the tricks and techniques and logics behind organization. I think NOT doing it, is my problem.
Part ADD, part overwhelment, working too hard, and partly...just checking out of my life instead of taking care of it.
Working too much, too much stress with D, etc, etc.
Hops
Meh:
--- Quote from: Hopalong on May 31, 2010, 12:19:21 PM ---I really do feel unhappy about my clutter.
I'm not talking about creativity debris or evidence of activity.
My clutter is more evidence of INactivity, not grasping my life, not taking care of self or space.
But I understand that it is affecting me this way because I'm me...and the same level of disorder might be a cheerful dynamic setting for someone else.
For me, it's not a happy thing. I have too much in my head, and paperwork in particular -- unsorted and undealt with -- feels like a hazard. It actually is.
I know the tricks and techniques and logics behind organization. I think NOT doing it, is my problem.
Part ADD, part overwhelment, working too hard, and partly...just checking out of my life instead of taking care of it.
Working too much, too much stress with D, etc, etc.
Hops
--- End quote ---
Hey, Hops,
Just look around and pick out one thing right now that does not enhance your life or isn't a vital record. Then throw it away.
I had an antique lamp that my mother gave me, a bolt of electricity came out of it and shocked me, a piece of the metal on the lamp exploded.
After I was shocked I thought: This is some piece of historical significance, how can I throw it away?
I struggled with throwing away an antique gift.
Then I took it out back with a written caution sign on it and it dissapeared.
I don't miss it.
I have six+ boxes of paper work that I'm working on. SLOWLY but I'm gonna get there!
I think I have thrown away 3 paper bags full of paper work and there is still more? It doesn't look like a dent but I know that eventually it will be improved.
The other thing is maybe it would help to go out to a lookout-vantage point of some beautiful view before doing some decluttering, this helps me!
The more time I spend with my clutter the harder it is for me to take action, my perspective becomes the same size as my apartment.
If I do something that changes my perspective, figuratively or literally- well that helps me a little at least!!
sKePTiKal:
Oh HOPS.... I know, I agonized about how my post might bounce off of you! (and wrote it 3 times)
I do know that feeling of the walls (and piles) crushing in on me - it's like I can't even breathe - and then I get angry (ok, it's not even that official; more like petty bitchy...) and then I kick myself for letting hubby distract me (again) by going out and having a bit of fun instead of creating "order" out of chaos.... I can't even blame him (tho' god knows, I try) deep down; it's all my fault, you know?
... it's almost like hearing my Nmom in my head, telling me: NO.... you can't go out and play - go to your room and don't come out until it's CLEAN and only I know when it's CLEAN... or then, because I did "sneak" out to play - adding more jobs to my "LIST TO DO"... as a punishment... or being tasked with picking up after my brother who "wouldn't do a good job" (injustice!! how's he going to learn??? and then the whining..................................it's not FAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIRRRRRRRR!)
And I so hate filing. We've tried everything - baskets of old bills to be entered into software and then "to be filed". A basket for shredding. House & furniture & recipes baskets of magazines & catalogs - ideas. M's magazines & papers that proliferate throughout the house on any flat surface - that he's looked at for 5 seconds and is saving for "someday"..... sigh. And his other "excuse" is that he prints out or saves things to share with me (bigger SIGH and how pass-aggress is that?!)... so I said, OK - put all that stuff you want me to look at HERE (which is right above where we recycle paper).
And NO.... there's not enough time. It comes in faster than I can get rid of it. So, I keep looking for compromises.... flat surfaces seem like territory I can claim or make "off limits" for stacks. Finding a place to put important things so that when I can finally address that stack - or unexpectedly "need it" - I can find it. And I'm slowly realizing that M simply doesn't have the ability to sort or group "likes" together.... to him, the cereal box cars are just as important and "neat" as his more valuable tiny trains... especially, when he adds in the pressure of a limited time-frame - the inner "ticking clock" causes some neural process to fall apart & cease to be able to cope with the task at hand.... and then he reaches out for something else to turn his attention to.... and that's usually me. And the expressed reason is that he's "lonely". He doesn't have anyone to talk to - he's more concerned with what I want; how I want a space to be organized or my help in sorting... he says he's afraid of "doing it wrong".
When I point out that I've never criticized "how" he's done something (which is one of my inner "buttons") - that it's someone else he's still fearing... it goes nowhere. It doesn't connect to anything... we're still working on it and making slow progress. The ironic (semi-serious??) joke is that he's afraid I'll divorce him because of all his "junk"... right. I have always told him that there are worse things that his "junk" - and I know what they are; he ISN'T that! (again - the false "stuff" = "me" equation).
And yet - on the flip side of that - when MIL was showing me her lovingly handmade baby clothes, wedding dress, quilt - it was pretty smack-upside-the head clear to me that this "stuff" WAS a part of her. But in a good way, you know? That's the best I can describe that paradox... how DO "THINGS" assume value? Does having the experience of serious loss in one's life affect that? Is there any value in preserving and passing on "things"??? (she asks, sitting on a handmade oak chair that came via boat to the US from Switzerland in the late 1800s.....).
Maybe if we can see this whole clutter issue more objectively - less personally, in my case - we'll pick up some more clues about how this paradox works and where facing it & taking action and time to address it can make an impact and generate momentum..... I am pretty sure that there is some emotional core "nut" to crack about this, after being on a lot of different sides of this "problem". I have my own clutter; my own "stuff" that only means something to me and has no inherent value; other people's "stuff" totally gets on my nerves - I truly do feel as if it's some kind of boundary violation, suffocating me, at it's worst; and I've taken on my Nmom's 3 floors of floor to ceiling stuffed hoarded stuff... been the unasked for recipient of boxes of her "stuff" that she thinks I want...and have gleefully taken it right to the curb immediately... I swear there's some power trip hidden in all our different perspectives of "stuff", you know?????
Portia:
I found this article gave some perspective about what clutter means:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/apr/17/diana-athill-move-old-peoples-home
and i find that considering death and impermanence can help.
As for other people's stuff, if I don't like where it is, I say so, then move it, but I have very little to 'put up with' in that sense. I guess my saving factor is that I know what all the 'stuff' is and it can stay where it is - it doesn't impact my day to day life. And as for the important day to day stuff - I don't put it 'away for later' - I deal with it.
I try not to touch any incoming post more than once. It's a good habit to get into I found.
Meh:
Last night, I laid on the dusty wooden floor, let out a bone tired moan, looked up at the ceiling and gazed at the bald light bulb way up there thinking about the stars on the other side, the expansive feeling. With all six of my boxes surrounding sprawled-out-me on the floor, I laughed a crazy one in the middle of the night, didn't sleep, stayed up through dawn. DUSTY boxes, with HORIZONTAL layers of employee benefits that are no longer available to me, yet they all have my personal info on them so the INDIVIDUAL sheets one-by-one require scrutiny. Tax documents sandwiched between furniture manuals, bags of receipts containing odd shaped screws. Unrequited travel plans meticulously scrawled out on yellow sheets that I want to hold to my heart.
Names of "pals" I wish I would accidentally run into but dare not contact so many years later. It's an excavation. Two year old "new age" advice that apparently hasn't permeated that delineation between thought and actualization. Lists of prescriptions I should remember to fill but haven't since I don't have the money and I seem to be surviving without them, the damage is done. I emerged with one half sack of non-confidential throwaway stuff from my boxes then I grabbed drawings and color experiments folded them neatly japanese-like to fill the rest of the sack.
'Art Supplies - Fart Supplies"
I evaluate each sheet by some undefined rules EACH and EVERY SHEET EVALUATED as if it actually matters..but possibly it doesn't matter. Then I clarify in my mind the rules of paper disposal, I wonder if my new rules are too harsh. I eye a gift cook book, sitting on a shelf across the room with a grudge. My papers tell me I can be captain of my own ship if only I concentrated my intention as if the intention is a wind in the corporeal world that will blow the sails. A vague and windy world. Strategic action plans made 2 and 4 years ago, no matter how I splice the words it wasn't the fate.
I see a spider on that guys hoodie, I think about telling him, I think about throwing paper wads at him but no the spider is not a spider.
I still have 5.5 boxes to audit. I am the assessor. I will find all documentation deficiencies in all critical areas. I will dominate these boxes, I will dominate these stratifications of hardcopy memory. I will ruthlessly update my records.
If my paperworks could speak they would say "I was going to say something important but I can't remember what it was."
PS: Hops, Guess what? I found a $20 bill folded up in some filed receipts! There's some motivation for you! There could be money in that paper pile!!!
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