Sentimental attachments: The Libra test

Blogging is an interesting way to occupy one’s time. In fact, I have a PhD colleague who did her dissertation on the occupation of blogging. Her study was fascinating, as she explored the meanings that blogging takes for different people. The thing that I have noted about blogging is that I write something, send it out into the ether, and then have relatively little sense of where it goes. Sure I can see when someone links to the blog, and I can track the number of hits on the site, and comments, but most readers pop in, read, and pop back out. As much as we bloggers talk about “blogging communities”, a blog is mostly a sounding board for a single individual, or a couple of writers, with a percentage of readers who comment on some posts. I love comments, but get relatively few, compared to the number of people who read this site. Sometimes I wonder…what’s the point? So much energy goes into this site. Does anyone really read it? I like writing, and the blog can be a good way to process my own thoughts and record our daily life, like an online journal, but the real hope is to impact some change. Living more simply changed my life. My hope is to pass that along. So it’s always encouraging to hear that someone was inspired by something I wrote, or a link that I shared.

Relatively recently, a friend started a minimalist challenge that she said was inspired by this blog! I found that very encouraging. Then I got a note in the mail from my mom today. She told me that she’s “following my mantra” – a load of stuff to the Goodwill every week! That is indeed how I pared down our stuff, and it felt manageable to make such incremental change, along with a sweeping whole-house Minify every now and then when the spirit moved me. My mom has been such an inspiration to me in so many ways (especially now that I’m a doc student – she’s been an excellent source of advice on life in academia!) It’s nice that we can inspire each other, every now and then. So that got me thinking – what advice helped me in the process of paring down our stuff? What was the hardest part, and where did I get stuck?

And that’s when I realized – I should share the Libra test. (I made that name up, by the way. It’s not a thing. Yet). I’m not an astrology buff, by any stretch. I like the Greek and Roman myths behind the names of the constellations, and I like astronomy quite a bit, but I digress. The point here is that this test has nothing to do at all with astrology, except that it was named after the zodiac image for Libra. Do you know it? The scales, for weighing two things against one another? Like this:

The Libra test involves weighing your attachment to a pair of items, while literally holding them in your hands. It’s a way to help you let go of the less-loved thing, and to realize that parting with it will be totally painless. It started because I am a sentimental sort of gal. I save movie tickets, photos I don’t really like because they remind me of someone I do like, gifts that don’t fit. Or I used to, anyway. I have a hard time parting with an object if I have a sentimental attachment to it. “I still like this,” I tell myself, even when the object I’m holding in my hands is one I’ve never used, which lives on the back of a kitchen shelf. I feel an attachment. I really started noticing my attachment to things when I started participating in Project 333. It was so simple, and lovely, to dress with just 33 items. I realized that I didn’t need a closet full of stuff. I certainly didn’t need to own 12 cardigan sweaters. But when it came to actually getting rid of some of them…I had a hard time letting a single one go. “I sewed these buttons onto this one when I was in college,” I would think, holding a sweater that I hadn’t worn in the past year. Or “I got this one at a clothing swap from a friend who has now moved away,” about one that never quite buttoned up the front. I realized that I needed a way to help me remember that it doesn’t hurt to part with a thing that I never really use, and don’t need, especially when it could be put to better use in another home.

Here’s a current example: I have a pitcher that I bought in college. It was handmade, by a pottery student at my alma mater, and it reminds me of the mountains. In fact, that’s why I bought it: the glaze pattern reminds me of the blue ridge mountains. I like the pitcher. Since buying it ten years ago, though, I’ve acquired several that I like better. A fish-shaped ceramic pitcher from my mom, which glugs when we pour water from it. We use that every day. A blue handmade pottery pitcher that matches the set we got for our wedding. We use that whole set of pottery at every meal. And I have a sunset-colored pottery pitcher, also handmade, that I love so much that when it cracked down the side, I turned it into a crock for our kitchen utensils. I use that…you guessed it. Every day. The pitcher from college, meanwhile? The one that reminds me vaguely of the mountains? It sits unused, high on a shelf, because I have too many pitchers, and it’s my least favorite. It’s still a lovely object, and could probably get some daily use in a less cluttered home. Someone out there is going to love it even more than I do. And I can feel that – the sense that I don’t really love or need it – if I hold it in one hand and hold in the other hand an object that I do adore. When I compare the mountain pitcher to the blue pitcher from our wedding set, there’s no question of which object I love more, or would keep if I had to choose between them.

That’s all it takes – that moment of comparison, between a real affinity for an object that I love, and a mild sentimental attachment to an object that I know I should let go. That’s what reminds me that it’s okay to part with an object that I still kind of like, when I have several similar object that you like even better. It’s another way to approach the question, how many of these (scissors, pitchers, cardigan sweaters) do you really need and want to own? Figuring out which things I still really love, and which ones someone else will love even more, has been helping me pare down and get closer to a house that feels well loved, instead of just full of stuff.

Try it. See if it helps. Meanwhile, I’ll be parting with this mountain pitcher. Anyone want it? It’s in search of a better home!

Simple Living Tip #2: Edit Your Possessions

our donation pile, which we try to add something to every day. Someday I hope we’ll reach an amount of stuff that feels comfortable, but we’re not there yet!

I’ve written a lot about this already, but it bears repeating – one of the best things you can do to simplify your life is to get rid of about half of your stuff. I know, that sounds extreme. I thought so too, back when I started out. I initially thought of clutter as the things we didn’t want and weren’t too aware of – the things sitting on shelves in our closets, or shoved under the bed. But I’ve come to realize that I had too much nice stuff as well, perfectly useful or lovely things that would do more good in someone else’s home. I loved both of our cake stands, but eventually realized that there will never be a circumstance under which I use both of them at the same time.

It’s not just about donating your old cell phone when you get a new one. It’s about considering how many t-shirts you actually want to own. They might all be nice, but for me, if I have too many of them to fit in the drawer, some of them have to go. It’s a way of limiting the amount of space we need, the amount of laundry we do, the difficulty of moving, and that sense of weight that comes with overconsumption. It has also, in a handy bonus, helped me to really reconsider my purchases. I think more about whether I really want to own something for a very long time, rather than buying it just because I like it. It helps keep our budget in check.

Edit your possessions, folks. Limit the things you own. It’ll feel good, I promise.

Back in the Saddle

I promised an update at the end of the first week of the thing-a-day challenge: here it is!

I have to admit that I took a vacation from paring down over the summer. I started to find myself reluctant to get rid of things, wanting to hold onto them instead. The same old rationalizations (“maybe this will be useful someday” or “well, I’ll keep it because it was a gift”) were crossing my lips more and more often. There’s nothing wrong with keeping something that is actually useful, or a gift you treasure. It’s the potentially-useful, not-quite-treasures that trip me up. So I undertook the thing-a-day challenge. And you know what? It lit a fire under me. So far our little household has gotten rid of:

• a wrap dress that didn’t quite fit
• a nice sweater I almost never wore
• 3 dish towels
• a desktop organizer (and much of what was in it)
• a book I’d already read
• a mailing tube I thought I might use (I don’t even have any posters to mail…)
• 3 old bottles of shampoo and lotion

And that’s a week’s worth of minifying, right there. I’m still trying to recycle or donate whatever I can, because just landfilling all of this wouldn’t be responsible. That means that I’m due for a thrift store run – I haven’t really achieved anything until I take that final step. But even just having packed away those few things each day to donate or recycle, the house is a little better, it’s inspiring us to keep it a little bit cleaner, and I feel like I’m back in the rhythm of how I want to be living. At the very least, there are some actual clear surfaces up in this place!

I still believe that one of the greatest truths I’ve learned in my adult life is that the spaces we occupy, most especially our homes, really do matter – they impact our happiness, our habits, our well-being. It’s up to us to shape them to fit the kinds of lives we want to have. And that doesn’t mean buying newer, shinier stuff. For me at least, it still means a simple, healthy, happy home.