Category: Minimalism

Minimalism

On the Plane of a Summit

Beth DeFriesLeave a comment

Confronting your clutter and minimizing your belongings does not just clear physical space in your home/office/car, etc. The space that your clutter demands from your time, attention, peace of mind, and health is also important to acknowledge. Allow me to provide an example from my personal experience of how my excess stuff created excess stress.

Back when I owned 27+ handbags/wallets, I sometimes used to switch which handbag I was using on a daily basis to feel less guilty that I had purchased all of them. I would take out “all” of the things from my previous “handbag of the day” and transfer it in a hurry to “today’s news” in the morning as part of my calming daily routine of chugging through our railroad style apartment like a runaway train on a destructive path, rolling through the stations of last minute costume changes, grab and go breakfast, and panicked hair brushing, bobby pins clutched in my teeth and jewelry in my hand as I fumbled my hair into a neatly pinned swirl to deceive the world into believing that I was super put-together.

On more than two occasions, one time during a snow storm, I came home from work and got to the front door of my apartment building only to dig around in the inside of my handbag in desperate search of my house keys which I begrudgingly realized were in yesterday’s handbag on the back of the chair in the kitchen upstairs, conveniently located behind two locked doors. I’d then have to travel forty minutes each way, fighting back tears of frustration and hindsight self-deprecation, on the NYC subway and packed, Midtown sidewalks to meet Mike at his office to borrow his keys so I could enter the apartment and wind down for the day… like I had been ready to do an hour and twenty minutes earlier.

When clutter gets in the way of your time and ability to relax, it creates unhealthy patterns that build stress. I should have learned from the first time that I forgot to pack my keys (or phone, or wallet- what a mess!), but bad habits often take many attempts to break. My excess had gotten in my way so many frustrating times and, still, it took me years to find Minimalism, to let go of the excess, and to simplify my life for good.

How about you? Does any of this sound familiar or resonate with you?

Have you ever experienced a time (or many) where your excess (or the habits that bore it) got in the way of doing something you wanted to do? The activity can be anything, for example:

  • Wanting to watch a DVD that you frequently search for and can’t find
  • Wanting to play a board game that is buried at the bottom of a Jenga stack of boxes
  • Wanting to pack for vacation with the suitcase that you swore you saw in the garage the other day but that has since been camouflaged by the surrounding clutter
  • Wanting to look through photographs that are in a box somewhere in the… attic?
  • Wanting to pinpoint your house/car/office keys
  • Wanting/needing to wear your glasses (check the top of your head first)

Now, imagine a home where all of your DVDs are in one easily accessible place near the DVD player (and TV), where your board games fit on easy-to-reach shelves in the hall closet, where your suitcase fits in your bedroom closet and you know exactly what you have so packing can go smoothly, where your photos are stored on a digital picture frame or in albums stored on a bookcase in the living room, where your keys have a home on hooks or a tray by the front door, and where even if you leave your glasses goodness knows where, you won’t hurt yourself stumbling around to find them.

Finding things does not have to be a struggle. Why do so many of us make it one? If you have to dig through a mountain of clutter to access the things you want to do, you will be discouraged from actually doing those things because of the monumental effort required. Those activities get exiled to the realm of “someday”. Well, someday could be sooner than you think with a little determination, courage, and elbow grease.

Block off some time, whether it be 30 minutes in the evening or an entire weekend afternoon. Get the donation bags, trash bags, snacks, water, and tissues ready and start with something easy. The rest of the process will follow and the mountain will get smaller. You may not realize it yet, but you are already standing on the summit.

Minimalism · Nostalgic Posts

“Today is Pizza Day…”

Beth DeFries4 Comments

Our power came back early yesterday morning and our lives have been returned to a state of illuminated, plugged-in normalcy. Over the past couple of days, I had a chance to thoroughly go through the things that I brought home from my room at my parents’ house on Wednesday.

It was very helpful to refresh those items by bringing them to a different location so I could shed some clarity on my level of attachment to each of them with a logical, focused approach. While I did not grow up in the house that my parents currently live in, it is still a place of sacred sentimentality and therefore, provides added difficulty in approaching the minimizing process with a critical eye.

I have sentimental memories of packing my things up from the apartment that I did grow up in prior to the move, and of staying at the house during holiday breaks from college in my senior year and spending many a pleasant weekend and holiday there ever since I moved in with Mike. It is a cozy place, abundant with conversation, music, movies, laughter, haunted only by the savory ghost of holiday meals past, the scent of pine needles, pot roast, and pie easy to recall with a quick thought and a smile. It is a place where you notice happy memories in the making and drink in the sentimentality like sips of hot coffee and spiced, pumpkin beer on a crisp, fall day.

Prior to this round of minimizing, the items that I stored in my room at my parents’ house were kept out of sight and very out of mind. While it was pleasantly surprising to come across some of the items again during this recent clean-out, I knew that if I were to leave them in that room, I’d forget about them once again… and again and again and again, over and over.

As I got reacquainted with my old belongings, I reunited with memories from my elementary, middle, and high school days as well as those from college. For a few hours across two days, I sifted through old photo books, stuffed animals, costume jewelry, writing, and every old school assignment including each written page of all of the composition notebooks I’d brought home with me. Some people might view that as a bit excessive, but being a self-identified “writer” since childhood, these notebooks were very sentimental items and the girl who wrote the content really deserved my time and attention, above all people.

The seven and eight year old girl who I once was would have been furious if the older version of herself did not read the entirety of her 3rd grade class journal which, among other topics, noted every single “pizza day” that occurred in the 1999/2000 school year lunch schedule. The thirteen year old girl who wrote the poetry in the maroon composition notebook probably would have rather shoved the entire book through a shredder before the older version of herself read it, but the versions of me in between kept it for some reason and so I read her writing with a wary eye, some of the words or rhymes playing like an audio book track in my head from memory as I read along.

Some assignments really held no attachment for me at all and were easy to part with, but I did end up keeping a full, multi-compartment, accordion folder of old schoolwork , birthday cards and letters, and writing as well as composition notebooks from my 11th grade Creative Writing class, my 3rd Grade school year, and my personal poetry journal from ages 12-13 each of which sparked either happy or important memories.

After sorting through all of the other items, we brought three bags full of old clothes, costume jewelry, stuffed animals, art supplies, and miscellaneous items to our local Goodwill donation drop off and shed the excess, feeling lighter as we got in the car and drove home.

While the process of letting go is difficult in the beginning of the minimizing process, it becomes a regular, familiar part of a Minimalist’s routine. The letting go allows you to really cherish the items that you choose to keep and makes those items more accessible and easy to find and look through when you need to revisit those memories. With the time that you do not have to spend searching for those memories, you gain so many more opportunities to enjoy them without the burden of feeling like you’d be able to do so more easily if only you cleared out the clutter.

Minimalism

After the Storm: Tidying the Scattered Pieces

Beth DeFries1 Comment

During yesterday’s Tropical Storm, Isaias, our condo lost power three times and only regained it twice.

Our power has been out since around 12:30pm eastern time yesterday. Throughout the day, we darted many a subconscious glance at where the stove and microwave clocks usually passed the time, but found the digital displays dark.  We slept unsoundly in sweltering stickiness and have since resigned ourselves to the reality that our perishables have long since perished after many hours of being uncool.

Having no power, internet, or cell service makes it very difficult to work and stay in the loop about what’s going on so today we drove about an hour and thirty minutes to mooch off of my parents’ still functioning electricity and internet supply for the day. (Thank you, Mom and Dad!)

Coming to my parents’ house, I had a personal goal in mind to minimize some of my belongings that I have been storing here for many years. I didn’t know exactly what I’d find, but knew that whatever was in my room lacked my TLC and the ruthless practicality of my tidying eye. I also decided to bring home any hidden treasures that could be stored with better preservation measures.

The key spaces that require attention are the underbed storage drawers (two twin beds-four drawers), closet, bookcase, and dresser top and drawers.

I began with the dresser drawers and packed up my old childhood and college sheets for recycling. They were pilled and had gotten many years of use. I started a clothing donation bag and a keep bag for clothing items to bring home.

The dresser clean-out actually went pretty quickly. It was mostly full of mementos which I plan to keep and store at home and the top held my old jewelry box, mostly full of costume jewelry from Claire’s and Icing (oh yeah- all the preteen sparkles!). I will keep some of the handmade items and items gifted for important life milestones, but plan to donate the stuff I have outgrown, am allergic to, or do not wear.

I emptied four out of five of the dresser drawers, but ended up using the dresser to store some other sentimental items that I rediscovered throughout the rest of today’s tidying process. I will deal with my sentimental items another time and may even keep a lot of them, but need to think of a better way to store them or document them to be able to enjoy those memories in a more accessible way.

Next, I tackled items I was storing in the closet. My parents store some clothes in my closet, but unless an item belongs to me, I do not touch it, so the closet was only partially mine to tackle. I collected my rolled-up acrylic canvases from college, my middle school clarinet, miscellaneous art supplies, old video camera and carry bag, and my old Casio piano keyboard and stand (not a full set of keys). I am bringing these items home as some of them I’ll keep and some I will try to sell or donate.

Having made some room in the closet, I turned my attention to the bookcase, which I partially cleared off just about a week ago, taking most of the books home, some of which I kept and many of which I have since donated. Earlier today, the bookshelf still held my elementary, middle, and high school yearbooks. I have now moved these items to the shelf in the closet since today’s tidying spree created ample storage there. Earlier today, the bookcase also held my old TV from college, which we never use and which, since Mike is working from home for the foreseeable future, we figure he can use at home as an additional monitor for work.

I feel a wave of accomplishment looking at the now empty bookshelf. Little wins!

Okay what’s next?

Oh right, the underbed storage drawers-eek!

I emptied two clear plastic storage drawers under one of the beds which mostly held CDs and electronics to be recycled properly. One of the plastic drawers held my pared down collection of Beanie Babies. I am considering these as sentimental items for now and stored them in the dresser to allow myself more time to figure out how to store, sell, or donate them in the future.

The two wooden drawers under my other bed were FULL of artwork, art paper, and my old schoolwork from through the years. Welcome to sentimental city!

I sat on the floor for a while, smiling, laughing, and demanding Mike’s attention as I thumbed through writing assignments from the first and second grade. We shared a hearty laugh when I showed him a “self-portrait” I made in the second grade that depicted me as a very stern-looking flower with stubby braids glued to the sides of my very two-dimensional face. I told him he married a delicate flower.

I made it through one of the two drawers-victory! I kept all of the schoolwork for now which I plan to photograph at home so it lasts and tossed some empty notebooks and sketch pads that were in poor shape or that have fulfilled their purpose and value to me.

I stumbled upon my old collection of Broadway Playbills (which is probably better classified as a hoard since I do not preserve them well.) They were strewn all around inside the drawer and were incredibly dusty. Maybe I’ll save those for another post, so back in the drawer they are going for now.

I did not go through the artwork drawer today as it is difficult to open since the nightstand is currently blocking it. Next time, I’ll rearrange some furniture to really dig in and “unpack” that drawer.

I feel a sense of calm and success having gone through these belongings and taken the time to really sort through them today.  The room feels a little larger and brighter. There is still more to do to complete the tidying process in here, as well as for the belongings I am removing from the house today, but I will save that for another day.

Minimalism

Hard Learned Lessons: Clothing & Accessories

Beth DeFries2 Comments

When I took the first step to removing my clutter in order to make room for the important things in my life, the most overwhelming question confronted me right from the get go as I looked around my seemingly never-ending, hopeless collection of things. Where do I start? As I have since learned that many new to the process of decluttering do, I began with my clothes and accessories.

I’ll try to draw up an image of my clothing and accessory collection prior to starting this journey. This is going to be a bit cringe-worthy for me, but it is important to lay it all out for this post, so here we go!

In our Williamsburg apartment, my husband and I shared a closet. The closet had a small organization system of racks and shelves built into it, though organized was far from how I would describe it. Mike had one neatly organized bar for his work clothes and I had two… and the shelves… for my closet collection. The weight capacity of each of my hangers was tested, some to the breaking point, almost each one holding two items (or more-yikes!).

My Hemnes dresser from Ikea (not a plug- just want to convey how large of a dresser it is) was packed, each drawer brimming over the top such that I had to squish down the contents to close the drawers. Countless shirts, sweaters, skirts, pants, jeans, leggings, scarves, hats, gloves, swimsuits, sweatshirts- some items folded, but most haplessly crumpled due to my having tried on multiple outfits in the morning to find something acceptable to put on my body.

Draped on the chair by my sewing table were usually the clean parts of my outfits from the previous few days along with other pieces from “tired frenzy – the morning collection” that didn’t make the cut.

In the corner of the room lurked my large storage bin filled with seasonal items and clothes that didn’t fit or that I did not enjoy wearing but had paid good money for and so needed to be kept (but kept hidden and unused), right? On top of the bin, as mentioned in my first post, Finding Minimalism, lived my extensive collection of handbags, totes, backpacks, and soft-sided luggage, an addiction born from working in the NYC Midtown sales world of handbags for nearly two years. Just now I tried to think of all the bags I used to own and came up with the list below and I know this is likely not even all of them…

5 totes: 1x leather, 3x faux leather, 1xcanvas/leather

6 backpacks: 2x nylon, 2x canvas, 1x faux leather, 1x cotton twill

8 crossbodies: 2x leather, 2x nylon, 3x faux leather, 1x suede

3 evening bags: blue, black, gray

5 wallets: 4x faux leather, 1x leather

That’s 27 handbags / wallets. Twenty-seven. Ugh. I did not even include grocery totes and canvas tote bags or the main bags that I use today which I purchased in my early days of minimalism, a black canvas and leather crossbody, and my black “ebags” travel backpack.

I’m a monster.

Okay, moving on.

In front of the bin were at least two white kitchen trash bags stretching at the seams with clothes I was silly enough to think I could sell at Buffalo Exchange, a trendy consignment store in my neighborhood. After my first humiliating attempt to sell my items at Buffalo Exchange, I learned that they only take really nice or really unique stuff and you stand there as the in-store buyer sorts through your prized junk that you paid good money for. It was lucky if they took one thing for a pittance of a price but usually they just pushed most of the hoard back across the counter for me to awkwardly stuff back into the trash bags in front of the line of hopeful fashionistas waiting behind me to sell their last-season designer items.

After lugging my un-sellable stuff to and from Buffalo Exchange and Beacon’s Closet (another consignment shop in Williamsburg) countless times, I always felt drained and a little embarrassed. After donating to Salvation Army and Goodwill or dropping off my textile recyclables in H&M’s recycling bins, I always felt lighter- a weight off my shoulders- the cycle complete.

This lesson was one that, oddly enough, took a couple of years for me to learn and one that led to me donating many of my clothes and recycling the worse for wear ones instead of trying to sell them because it made me feel happier to do it that way. My clothes no longer had the same value to me as the price I paid for them, but I wanted to send them off in a way that was positive for my own mental health.

The hard lesson was learning that getting rid of my clothing items did not mean that those items never provided me value. The value of those items was in the distraction from stress or impulsive joy of the shopping experience, even if those items hung in my closet for years with the tags on. Their value lay in teaching me what does not work with my body shape or the type of fabrics and cuts that make me self-conscious, itchy, or feel just generally uncomfortable in. You don’t need those uncomfortable reminders in your closet staring you in the face everyday as you go to choose an outfit. You are enough whether that skirt makes you look a little chubsy or whether that dress caused someone to offer you their seat on the subway (cough- just chubby-not pregnant- oh the shame).

I wish I had written down how I initially approached deciding what to part with from my clothing hoard as I am having trouble remembering. I definitely did not know at that time about the KonMari method of putting all of your clothing items on the bed and holding each item one by one to see if it sparked joy (though experimented with this sometime later). I know that however I did it, it was little by little, two plastic grocery bags at a time, and I know that if you want to and put your brave face on, you can do it too.

Minimalism

Finding Minimalism

Beth DeFries3 Comments

Before delving into posts on cozy minimalism, I thought it might be good to start with an introduction to how I began my own cozy minimalist journey. For the past three years, I have been captivated and influenced by the concept and practice of Minimalism. Originally introduced to the movement via the film “Minimalism: a documentary about the important things”, I have slowly been paring down my belongings and simplifying ever since.

I used to be a frequent shopper who had anxiety over parting with things I had paid “good money” for (or gotten for free or super cheap at estate sales or flea markets). I was also a “serial returner”, happy to spend loads of under-valued time waiting in winding cashier lines at TJMaxx and Marshalls or walking to the UPS store with my arms full of Amazon boxes to get my “good money” back from impulse purchases I had made as a stress coping or celebratory mechanism.

I remember a time when a corner of the bedroom in my and my husband’s 700 square foot Williamsburg, Brooklyn apartment was cluttered with storage bins piled with hand bags packed full of other handbags and barricaded with trash bags full of clothes to donate or sell “someday”. That “someday” never seemed to come and the visual clutter that surrounded me daily seeped into my peace of mind, wearing me down slowly. My clutter would give me nightmares about unannounced visits and creepy crawlies and leave me waking up feeling tired and grimy with the unrelenting task looming overhead to vigorously clean, a chore that always left me exhausted and irritable at the end of the day because it involved rearranging so much stuff throughout the process and also piling all the stuff back where it started before the vigorous cleaning.

Minimalism presented a lifestyle without clutter, one of reduced stress, more clarity, and more space. It presented room for possibility, self-growth, and creativity. I was so attracted to the idea of a living space free of so much stuff and of distractions that continuously drained me of energy. I was tired of moving piles of stuff around whenever I needed to get to something. I was fed up with frequently misplacing my belongings that seemed to somehow get swallowed and digested by all of the existing clutter. I was done with wasting my time, my life, and my money with my shopping addiction. It had to go. I needed to change to find the things that are truly important. And change I did – slowly.

My journey into the world of Minimalism helped me to reconnect with former versions of myself, ones that cared less about how people perceive me on the outside, and helped drive me to reflect more introspectively. I learned that the things I enjoy most are not for sale at TJMaxx, Marshalls, H&M, Target, Zara, or any store for that matter. The things I enjoy most do not email me advertisements for “our biggest sale of the season!” and they certainly do not enter my life with just a few clicks of the mouse and entering my credit card info.

No, the things I enjoy most are not consumer things at all, but rather are people, practices, and activities that make me a more mindful, loving, thankful, and present human being.

With that, I thank you for joining me on this new adventure on which I am embarking. It is exciting, thrilling, and a little bit scary and will prove to be a little (or a lot) soul bearing, but I am glad to have company along for the ride.