Lately, I have been enlightened by the Voluntary Simplicity movement. Voluntary simplicity is the act of consciously minimizing the pursuit of consumption in favor of spirituality, health, stress reduction, and conservation. In essence, after reading up on the subject, my goal is to reduce the accumulation of ‘stuff’ in my life.
For the first time since moving into my 1950s home I see the positive side of limited closet space. Lacking the room to store items is as good a reason as any not to buy new ones. The closets in my home are remarkably small. Over the years I have learned to make due with limited space, using the dormers and crawl spaces in my home to store various items. For example, in one dormer I store Christmas decorations and gift wrapping supplies, while another stores suitcases and childhood toys.
Recently I began converting a 70” by 73” room, (that I’m assuming used to be a sewing room), into a closet by purchasing shelves from the Container Store and IKEA. Eventually I’d like to find a way to move all of the miscellaneous items, currently crammed into dormers and closets into this tiny room.
I started by donating a lot of my clothes, (who knew I had so many), and selling a few practically new items on eBay. I donated books to the local library and recycled a whole bunch of unwanted items. Although I’ve been purging items for weeks I’m amazed to find there are more and more items that I no longer want or need. I have a long way to go to get everything into one room, and I’m honestly not certain I’ll accomplish the task, but it does feel good to purge our home of so many unwanted and unneeded items. I can’t quite explain the change, but each time we donate a bag to charity, my soul feels a little bit lighter.
You’re doing a fantastic job clearing out all the unecessary items. I’m going through my closet and trying to do the same.
Just read your wonderful post.
I retired two years ago. I also decided to make a dramatic lifestyle change as well. I gave away everything I owned (except six boxes of photos and books I could not live with out).
I love the freedom and no stress of few material posessions and no corporate life.
Thanks Green Panda.
Anonymous — It made me so happy to read your comment. In the short time that I have been purging my house I’ve already started to feel less stressful. If nothing else there’s certainly much less to clean.