16: Decluttering Sentimental Items

Clutter is something we all have to deal with at times. The biggest problem with clutter is not the item itself, but it’s in the emotional attachment we feel. This episode comes in response to a recent question I received: “Do you have any advice for going through boxes of stuff I’m emotionally attached to?” Let’s take a closer look at this important part in your functional space journey.

Show Highlights:

• The only reason to declutter

• How to identify what you can do with items you don’t plan to keep

• Why your decluttering goals are important–and may differ from someone else’s

• The steps to decluttering by categories:

• Is it broken, expired, incomplete, or unusable?

• What do I want to keep?

• When it comes to keeping or getting rid of items, which is more important to me–the freedom of having it gone or the security in knowing it’s there?

• For sentimental items:

• Will this person know I’ve gotten rid of this item?

• If I get rid of this item, will I feel guilty momentarily or for a long time?

• Is the guilt I feel for getting rid of this item heavier than the weight I feel from having it around?

• Why you have to honor your emotional context while aiming for functionalism

• When you might need extra support in decluttering

• Why it’s better to keep sentimental items out of joy–not guilt

• Workable solutions for excessive sentimental items

• What I’ve learned about getting rid of clothes

Resources:

 Connect with KC: TikTok, Instagram, and Website (Click the “Hygiene” tab under “Resources” for more information about teeth brushing!)

Get KC’s book, How to Keep House While Drowning

• Transcript

  KC Davis 0:05

  Hello, you sentient ball of stardust. Welcome to Struggle Care, the podcast about for today about decluttering, and your emotional attachment to items. So I want to talk a minute about this. And I got a question recently where somebody said, Do you have any advice for going through boxes of stuff that I'm emotionally attached to. So I was talking on a an online video about sort of going through what I refer to as Doom boxes, I heard that somewhere and it stands for didn't organize, only moved. So these are just those boxes of things that we started chucking things in because they had nowhere to go. And eventually, we try to get ourselves to go through them and to organize the things. And organizing often goes hand in hand with decluttering. And so when we're talking about getting rid of things, that's typically what we mean when we talk about decluttering. And so I kind of wanted to hone in on decluttering, about how to get rid of things, because it's not as simple as, Do I need it? Or do I want it, we often have some really valid emotional context to look at there. And so I want to sort of talk about why you would want to declutter, that's important to start. And the only purpose of decluttering is because you feel as though your space would be more functional, if you had fewer things in it. I am not someone that believes that minimalism is some sort of morally superior state, I think that you should not get rid of things just because you feel pressured to live a certain way because of a certain aesthetic. But for some people, they feel like minimalism is going to help them for other people, they are maybe what I call functional maximalists, I always find that the best thing to do before I start is to identify what I am going to do with things that I don't want. And so I will sit down and make a list of things, sorry, of places that I can donate to places that I can sell. And so I'll just sort of sit down and go, Okay, well, obviously, I can sell stuff on Facebook marketplace, there are buy nothing, sell nothing groups on Facebook, I have a goodwill drop off near me. There's a I'll write down the number of a junk hauling company for big things. The Salvation Army in my neighborhood does donation pickup, there is a foster family closet, in my neighborhood that takes gently use toys, secondhand clothing stores, there are half price bookstores, it can really help to sit down and just write down ideas about where these things could go when you decide that you don't want them and being realistic about, you know, I tend to rely on things that will come to my house and get them. And then I also find it handy to have like a pad or paper with me for project ideas. Because as I'm going through and taking stuff out, and deciding how to declutter, like it really trips me up to be like emptying out a closet and then seeing like some sewing stuff, and then be like, Oh, how cool would it be to create a little sewing caddy? And I could get this and I could get that and then I'll get totally diverted by a project idea and leave the whole mess there. So I just jot those projects down, knowing that I can come back to them. But that's not what I'm doing now. And then make some goals about, kind of why am I doing this, maybe I just want my home to feel less overwhelming. Maybe I want it to be quicker to tidy, whatever. And as we go through these categories of things, and we try to declutter, I, there's lots of different methods, you can go room by room, you can go space by space, you can go category by category. And what I mean by that is you can say, Okay, I'm going to declutter my kitchen, or you can say, I'm going to declutter my dishes. And then like, you would get all your dishes together, even if they weren't all in the kitchen. And I find it helpful to kind of put everything out. So like, when I decided to declutter, really anything, let's say children's Tylenol, I had some downstairs, I had some upstairs, I had some in a bin, I had some in a basket, I had some on a shelf. And once I got all of and really just anything like medications, I realized I had so many medications and we put them together, and then you can sort of pare down from there. And there's really no right or wrong way to go about deciding what to get rid of everybody's goals are different. Remember that any amount of excess that you can declutter will make your life more functional. So we're aiming for progress rather than perfection. But let's get down to brass tacks about what how do we actually decide how to get rid of things. So when looking at we're going to pick sort of a category and I have a download online if you want to go look at this that'll take you through categories, where it'll just tell you like Okay, number one medicines, let's get all of our medicines and look at them. Number two cups, all the cups number three, all the silverware. And it takes you through there several categories, right, but how do we make those decisions? And I think the first easy step for me because I am someone who's executive functioning, sometimes struggles, I have to take big projects and break them into small simple one. Question steps. So my first question I always ask myself when I'm looking at something is, is it broken? So I remove everything that's broken, expired, anything that's missing pieces, anything that is unusable, for example, you know, you don't need nine contact lenses cases if you only have caps for three of them. Right? And then the next thing is that I find that it's really difficult for me to choose what to get rid of. So try flipping that question around. And

  instead asking yourself, what do you want to keep? If you're looking at a pile of things, whether it's your medicines, or your coffee cups, or your clothes, I like to start by picking out the items that are currently serving a functional role in my life. So what are the things that I'm using at least once a month, and then decide on how many of those items you need? Right? So if I say, Okay, I use my spatula daily, then I can decide, okay, so having two or three of them is great in case one of them gets dirty, but I might, if I decide that I have 10 of them, I might not want 10. I also use my Beauty Blender every day. But I really only need one beauty blender. Okay, then we're going to pick out items from that category that are seasonally used. So in my kitchen, it might be like my turkey roasting pan, or in your medicine cabinet, your flu medicine, for me like my cat carriers, because my cats go to the vet like once a year, and then just pull anything out of that pile that makes you really happy. And then your pile now contains either things that you almost never use, or things that you don't want. And this is where a lot of people have trouble because there are things that you might use in that pile. And there are things that you feel anxious, getting rid of things that you don't want, but you feel guilty of getting rid of. And this is kind of getting into this question that I was asked. And so before we get to getting rid of sentimental things, or things we feel really attached to I want to give a couple of other questions that are really helpful, which I heard an organizer say one time, can this thing be replaced in 20 minutes, or $20. And that's like her threshold for whether she gets rid of something, and you can pick your own threshold, maybe it's $50 or an hour, maybe it's five minutes, or $5. And when it comes to that item, is the bigger benefit to me the freedom of having it gone or the security of knowing it's there. So what is going to be a bigger benefit to me the freedom of having it gone, or the security of knowing it's there. So put another way like is the frustration of having this item contributing to clutter all the time better than the frustration I might experience once a year, if I don't need it and have to go buy it or borrow it. Because we're really just picking which inconvenient experience is going to be more functional for us mentally. And there's no wrong answer for things that we don't want. But we feel really getting rid of, here's some questions that I asked myself. Number one, will this person know that I have gotten rid of this, that matters? Because sometimes they will sometimes that you know, cousin or mother in law or neighbor is going to come and be like, where's that thing I gave you? But a lot of times the answer is no. So am I really thinking about something that impacts my social dynamics? Or someone else's feelings? Or is this purely a discomfort within myself that I'm struggling with? Sometimes that helps make the call. Okay. So like in this person's example, she's looking at these things. And there may be some guilt of getting rid of something, but her parents aren't gonna know. It's really just a discomfort she's experiencing. And here's another really great one. If I get rid of this, will I feel guilty momentarily? Or will I feel guilty for a long time? And then the next question is the guilt I will feel getting rid of this heavier than the weight I feel having it around. And remember, there are no wrong answers to these. No wrongs, no rights, especially for this listener who's asking about the box of things that her parents had. That was the context of this question that she asked a bunch of boxes of things from her parents who have now passed and she had complicated relationships with them is the weight of getting is the guilt she will feel getting rid of them heavier than the weight she'll feel with that being around. I think that's kind of interesting. So let's talk about that emotional context. It's really important to honor your own emotional context. I know that it is the trendy thing to talk about minimalism. I know that it is put out there as though being minimalist is somehow emotionally more healthy. But the reality is, if you have experienced resource scarcity in your life, you're just not going to be as comfortable with getting rid of tons of things as somebody else. That's okay. Minimalism is not morally superior to functional maximalism. As long as your home is functioning, keeping extra stuff around because it helps you feel less anxious is totally fine. Just like getting rid of stuff so that you can feel less anxious is totally fine. We're just aiming for functioning. If you feel too anxious to get rid of anything, and your home isn't functioning because of it. That's the point at which you may want to reach out for support. You may want to reach out to a mental health provider for some extra support when you're trying to declutter if you really been struggling on creating a functional home I think that giving yourself permission to not sell and donate things, is really important to just put them on the curb to just throw them away. Just pick whatever avenue gets you decluttered the fastest. If the amount of clutter in your home is impacting your daily functioning, you need to pick whatever avenue gets you decluttered the fastest, there isn't any point and decluttering only four bags and boxes of things to sit around for six months, because you can't get around to donating them or selling them. And if you'd like you can give yourself a timeframe, you can say, Okay, I'm giving myself a week to donate these things. And if I don't get it done that I'm gonna throw it away. And at the end of the day, if you're just not ready to get rid of something, keep it there's no should there's nothing to feel guilty about any progress and making your homeless overwhelming to live in to clean to function is progress. And I think when it comes to something that you feel emotionally attached to, I always like to say that I want to keep sentimental items out of joy, not out of guilt. If I had a special relationship with someone, I don't think that that relationship is honored. By adding those feelings of burden and guilt, I want to honor the relationship with joy. And so keep the things that make you happy. However, sometimes we do want to get rid of a formerly sentimental item and realize that it's not the living with it. That's hard it but the actual act of getting rid of it. So for example, let's say that you have 100 Love Letters that your grandparents wrote to each other, your grandparents aren't around anymore, they're not going to know whether you have them or don't have them. But it just feels wrong to throw them in the trash. And so first we're going to take a an approach that's not black or white, what have you decided to keep a few select letters and frame them, put them in a box where they can be displayed, or in a scrapbook? That's a place where you know because you're not going to be looking at these letters if there's 100 of them in a box somewhere. But you can take pieces of them samples of them and display them or honor them in some way. And now Okay, now, you know, you don't need or want the other 88. But how do you bring yourself to throw them in the trash. And I want to share with you something that helped me, I ran into this issue when I was getting rid of some items and letters that I still had from my first boyfriend as a teenager. And this relationship still had and has a very special place in my heart. But I was getting ready to get married. And I needed to get rid of some things. And it just, I no longer felt the need for it to have a special place in my house. But I could not bring myself to put those items in the trash. So what I did was I set up a time with a good friend of mine. And I asked her if I could sit with her and bring my box. And if I could tell her about all of these items. And we sat together and I opened the box. And I told her all the stories Hall of these letters and items and things that really represented the story of our relationship. And I told her all of the beautiful memories and all of the tragedies that that relationship held and the impact that it had had on my younger self. And when it was finished, I gave her the box. And she took it with her. And while I intellectually know that she probably threw in the trash, I mean, she's not going to keep my old love letters and sentimental items. It just felt right with my spirit that I was not the one doing so it felt very honoring, it felt very sacred, to honor the memory of that relationship. And then to hand over the box. And to have that moment of this will always have a special place in my heart. But it doesn't need to have a special place in my house. And so I want to encourage you to think about honoring those things from your parents in those boxes. You don't have to go through any of those boxes if you don't want to. It doesn't have to be sacred. It's just stuff. If you don't want it to be sacred, it's not. And if you do it is and so you can put those boxes on the curb without looking at them ever again. And you're fine. Or you can open them up and go through them and invite a trusted friend over and tell them the memories and the tragedies and allow them to take those things from there. So that would be my recommendation. And before I let you go, let me just tell you some things that I've learned about getting rid of clothes because that is a hard one. Okay, there's no right or wrong way. Remember, but I want to tell you what has happened with me for clothes. First step, I remove all clothes that are torn, stained, or unwearable. Number two, I removed all of the clothes that did not fit. You might be someone that experiences weight fluctuations that go up and down and you may legitimately need a couple of sizes on hand. But we all know the difference between the functional need for a few sizes. And when we are holding on to something for aspirational purposes. You deserve to have a closet that dresses the body that you have not the body that you wish you had or the body you used to have. Your body is not supposed to fit into Clothes, clothes are supposed to fit on your body. So after we get rid of the things that don't fit us holding on to any functional needs for weight fluctuations, then I like to move on to removing clothes that are not my style. If you remove the clothes that are not your style, but just set them aside in their own pile, because this is where we're going to be removing gifts styles that we've outgrown, and most importantly, anything that you bought to cover your body just because you believed that you did not deserve to look trendy or cute, or sexy or handsome because of the size or shape of your body. This is the step where I finally pitched all the oversized matronly shirts that I was using to hide my belly. And then then next, we're gonna look at our closet and decide how many clothes we would like to have, you can decide, you might want to pare things down, so you're not as overwhelmed by laundry or paralyzed by decisions. When it comes to getting ready in the morning, you might decide that you love having tons of options and that a big wardrobe is functional for you, you might decide that you have so much trouble with laundry, that you need to have three weeks worth of underwear on hand in case you don't do laundry for that long. When you have a sense of how big of a wardrobe you want first pare down your duplicates as needed. For example, if you have seven pairs of jeans, you might decide that you really only wear three of them regularly, so you can get rid of four of them. You might also decide that having three blue sweaters is not necessary. However, you might decide that jeans and blue sweaters are your favorite comfort outfit and decided to keep all of them and get rid of other clothes instead, because you just want to wear jeans and blue sweaters every day. And if you find that after steps one through three, you don't have enough comfortable clothes for a functional wardrobe. Or you don't have the budget to invest in more clothes. Now you can add back in some of those clothes that fit but just maybe aren't your style or not your favorite because you can take a long term approach to you know, when you buy something that you like that fits you well sort of swapping it out for that old thing that's really just existing in your closet. And that's how I deal with clothes. So I hope that that is helpful. Again, if you want a checklist of those categories and some tips, you can download those on my website struggle care.com But I hope that that has helped you with your functional space journey. Until next time.