| Days | 18 |
| Items | 108 |
That’s right – 108 items have been sent packing!!!
The seemingly hairy challenge of purging 150 things is now basically in the bag. The scary thing is, I still haven’t progressed out of the one corner of the living room I vowed to tackle. How on Earth could so much stuff be hiding in 5m2???
I hurt my b
ack last week and was feeling a bit on the sorry side. In typical fashion, I launched myself into each day at full speed, only to collapse on the couch by early afternoon. My mood wasn’t exactly lifted by the continued sight of a messy desk, and I have to admit to beating myself up a bit for not progressing as planned. Nevertheless, I decided to let the project go for a few days as putting undue pressure on myself only served to make me feel worse.
Taking a break also gave me time to think about how to avoid the inevitable ‘recluttering’. One of the reasons my desk is always piled high is that I have neither system nor desire for dealing with paperwork. Therefore it all gets deposited in the vainglorious hope that one magic day it will take care of itself. (haha, who am I kidding?!)
So I started by setting myself up a sweet little file for collecting those stray papers, with one tab for ‘action’ and one for ‘file’, ever hopeful that these actions would actually be performed rather than simply creating an orderly way to stash paperwork out of sight, out of mind.
But the problem is that I don’t file. So what I really needed was a creative and compelling reason not to let papers congregate into mountains.
In a stroke of genius, I decided to make my filing system my vision board. I had been dragging my feet about doing a new one for 2013 – in hindsight with good reason!
First, I set myself up with the base ingredients, including an audience (optional) and refreshments (optional, but highly recommended):
A few quality hours on the floor later, meet the finished product:
I love this file so much, I wanna hug and take it to bed with me!
Funnily enough, with a creative element thrown into the mix, my decluttering efforts regained momentum.
First stop – clean desk:
BEFORE
AFTER
Second stop – bagging the bags:
BEFORE 
AFTER 
I thought this area would be pretty hard as I love (used to love?) my handbags, and I had some pretty sweet brands hidden in there. But then I remembered my money mentor saying that
The things you don’t use have no value, no matter how much you once paid for them.
Incidentally, this downgraded most of my beloved bags from invaluable to valueless, and they were duly put up for adoption at the local dress agency/consignment shop. After all, you don’t really need a Mulberry or Gucci adorning your arm on the playground. Well, you might do in Hampstead Heath, but in my humble part of London, I can still pull off ‘yummy’ without a Hindmarch to accessorize my Hunters.
Technically, this concluded last week’s goals but seeing that I had diddled, I went straight into the next challenge – clearing a closet full of dresses, skirts, suits and coats that had escaped previous culling stints. I dutifully dragged its contents to the bed before both two and four-legged life reclaimed my attention so on the bed they remained – for two days and two nights. The bedroom is home to our only full length mirror, so trying anything on ‘after hours’ (aka Lilly’s bedtime) was out. Equally, I couldn’t face shifting the pile back onto the sofa to have it stare me down all evening. Instead I shifted myself to sleeping on Rob’s side of the bed.
The man’s impending return propelled me back into action; aided by a bit of soulful Norah Jones, a cup of tea, a sneaky chocolate biscuit (mercifully undetected by my hawk-eyed attaché) and another guiding mantra by the lovely Sarah Phipp, who coincidentally inspired this project:
Only put in your wardrobe what is worthy of you.
Well, according to this, my wardrobe may have shrunk in size, whilst considerable going up in value.
This now leaves to me shift discarded clothes, and tackle the rest of the living room.
Although with all this newly created breathing space, where oh where is that poor Easter bunny going to hide his eggs?
Happy Easter everyone!
Images: pedestriantype.blogspot.com, author's own