power of the purge

I've been doing some spring cleaning around here. I maintain a fairly clean ship but not a very tight one, which is my shorthand for saying I don't go very deep in my weekly cleaning sessions. Jaren and I like to joke about me being the macro cleaner and he's the micro. I do broad strokes over all surfaces and he will take something like the blender apart with a screwdriver and wipe down every single surface. (True story!) I vacuum, I mop, I dust, I "bin" the toys, but the detritus in drawers and cabinets only gets sorted a couple times a year. This past week was one of those big sorting weeks. I tackled the tool shed and under the kitchen sink. I waded through drawers of cast off receipts, coupons, and old flyers for such and such. I think paper goods are my organizational weak point. I have never found the right system that lets me keep my desk or my kitchen counter free of paper clutter. More and more I'm finding the computer and the internet to be my savior in this department, just by signing up for paperless billing and autopay, and realizing that I can always look up necessary info via Google, has saved me from stacking another thousand sheets of loose paper! Amen. But I still have a long way to go.

While doing my big cleaning purge, I've been trying to be mindful of how to dispose of the unwanted stuff. In the interest of frugality I've been listing a lot of the useable stuff on Craig's List to attempt to resell, and what I don't sell I plan to donate to a thrift store. I oh so responsibly rid myself of 20 gallons of old, curdled paint that we inherited when we moved into our house by taking it to the hazardous waste recycling center at Murray City Public Works. Cleo and I went and got spring pedicures with an old spa certificate that I'd forgotten about in my bedside table drawer.

I really believe all the hype that having less clutter and stuff around you makes you feel lighter. It frees up not just physical space but mental space as well. Just knowing I was no longer holding a spot on the closet shelf for that old wedding present I will never learn to love or use makes me sleep a little deeper. Do I really need 3 red fleece blankets, and how did I get 3 red fleece blankets again?

Why do we hold on to things? Is it a throw back from some evolutionary edge that encourages species to stockpile against long, hard winters? Even this can't possibly explain the irrational need so many Americans have to store boxes of stuff in off-site storage that may never see the light of day again. Clearly anything you can safely put in storage and forget about is not something you need any longer. I read up on the self storage business recently and learned some very interesting facts: 1 in 11 American households now owns storage space, we now have 2 billion square feet of storage units for rent in this country, most storage space is upwards of $40 a month, turning the storage business into a $200 billion/year industry and making it the fastest growing sector of commercial real estate. All I can really say to that is Yikes! And it makes me want to pledge to never need an off site storage unit to house the things I own.

This week made me realize something very clearly. Purging makes me feel empowered. It makes me feel like I know what I have. And that is a goal I'm setting for myself. I want to know intimately what I own. I don't want to find myself surprised that I have 3 things of Elmer's Glue and 2 bags of tea lights and a gift certificate to a spa from 2 years ago....I want to know what I have in every nook and cranny and to make use of these things, not just have them to have them and let them gather dust. Are you with me?