Too Much Stuff

Remember the Berenstain Bear books “Too Much TV”, “Too Much Junk Food, ” Too Much Birthday, and “Too Much Teasing”?  There should be one book geared for adults called “Too Much Stuff”.  When you get to be my age, the amount of stuff we assemble during the course of our lives just keeps piling on until we get quite bogged down by the weight of it all. It can be overwhelming just to think about it.

Why do we have all this stuff?  You start your adult life with very little and slowly build a home, a family and accumulating things along the way.   People my age have a good 30 years of shopping under our belt which leaves us with all this reside; garages with “must have” tools and workout gear, basements filled with holiday decorations, storage bins, and kids toys; homes filled with sets of dishes, wine glasses, tablecloths, napkins, paper goods; closets filled with clothes, shoes and coats; and sheds stuffed with outdoor gadgets, yard tools, household cleaners, and cans of paint.

At some point, this lifestyle of buying takes a trajectory of its own and we stop purchasing things we need and move on to getting things we want. We have a little bit more money to spend and we think we need it all.  And then it hits you – you have become a slave to all your possessions. There is more to clean, more to maintain, more to organize, more stuff to move from this pile to that pile and to this storage container.  There will be more stuff for your children to deal with after you go – trust me, I’ve done the legwork.  After my parents died, cleaning out the family homestead was a revelation. There was plenty that we divided among my six siblings, but there was also plenty that we gave away or simply took to the city landfill and tossed.

Why is it that our parents had just a many possessions as we do?  I think a lot of it has to do with formality and pomp and circumstance that once was in society.  My parents had fine china, silver sets, coffee service sets, tablecloths, and real napkins, all to use in their formal living rooms and large dining rooms for entertaining. These items identified adulthood.  I was raised in their world, so when I got married, I registered for fine china and crystal wine glasses and all the good fancy stuff that I felt was necessary to start a family.

The real issue now becomes that for those of us who have children, millennials don’t want any of what we want to unload on them.  They don’t want cardboard boxes full of photographs, silver candlestick holders or all the beanie babies and other collectibles they had as kids. They are not interested in the lifestyle trappings they were so lovingly raised with.

How to get out from under?  There is time and there is a way. There are many organizations who will take your stuff – Goodwill, American Veterans, international organizations, and recycling centers.  As we are about to enter a New Year, make it a goal to purge away. Living minimal can give you freedom to pursue what you want to do, and relieve the chokehold our possessions have on us.  I close with a few tips to help you get started:

1. Ease yourself into it and give yourself a deadline.  I prefer the one year rule. Box up all the various items you think you can live without and tuck them away in your basement or garage.  If after a year, you are not missing them – toss ’em.
2. Turn the hangers backwards in your closet.  Every time you wear an item, face the hanger forward.  If at the end of the year you have hangars still turn backwards – toss the item.  Goodwill or American Veterans will gladly take your discards.
3. CD’s and DVD’s – you don’t need these anymore. All the music and movies you want are on the internet now or can be stored on a hard drive. So – rip them and take to the recycling center.  Yes- they will take them.
4. Go through all your photo albums and toss those photos that don’t matter – I mean, how many pictures of a hotel do you need?  Take those photos that mean something and put in a small photo box.
5. Do you want to find a home for many of your items?  Try “The Freecycle Network”.  This is a grassroots and entirely nonprofit movement of people who are giving (and getting) stuff for free in their own towns. It’s all about reuse and keeping good stuff out of landfills.
6. The internet is your friend in this.  Educate yourself on how to unclutter, simplify and downsize.  There are hundreds of helpful hints just a click away.

Remember – if you make this a goal and purposeful, take your time. There will be a sense of satisfaction when you are out from under and you will find there is more joy in pursuing less than can be found in pursuing more.