Having too much stuff around me stifles my ability to function, so I'm forever assessing what we need then recycling the things we don't. This can make visitors nervous sometimes. They fear they may find themselves either placed in a cupboard or put in my take to charity shop pile. I say 'mild' because I've read of people who suffer this far more intensely than me who constantly give away stuff they actually use or wear on a regular basis, whereas I only get rid of things that are actually redundant. (Although there have been a few fairly big exceptions to this over the years including a wardrobe which we could have done with 3 months after giving it away as we moved to another rental property and an external hard drive, which in my defence edged slowly towards the bin in the garage over a 6 month period. (I was giving it a chance you know? It didn't even try).
Spartanism extends to my digital activities too. My desktop looks like this:
If I'm working on something and save a few files on the desktop for convenience I MUST file or delete them before logging off, or deal with them FIRST THING the following day. Otherwise I feel like this:
Reports indicate that people will compulsively discard items like clothes, books and even expensive electronics and furniture in an effort to free themselves from what they consider to be clutter. It seems that people who compulsively throw objects out — the opposite of hoarding — are overwhelmed by possessions. Fewer belongings makes them feel more in control of their life and surroundings. (WiseGeek)
I totally relate to this. The more manic my life becomes, the less likely I am to ask the kids nicely to come back and pick up their nerf bullets / hello kitty trump cards / hand drawn tributes to our dead hamster Omnon / other assorted kiddie crap that is strewn around every room they've played in so far today, and will instead pick up a bin bag and yell 'I'm tidying up now!!.....'
The off switch to this behaviour can be triggered in various ways:
• Go on holiday (stay somewhere else for a few days and the neat rules don't seem to apply)
• Decorate (If the house is tipped up with brushes and rolls of wall paper, finishing THAT job overwrites any mental fixation with neatness)
• Have visitors / house guests over (ditto above- focus on people, not clutter)
• Move house (rather extreme I know, but it does have the same effect. And we have moved house quite a lot recently so it's been helpful therapy)
As long as one of the above happens fairly regularly it will prevent our home from looking like this:
So if you aren't doing anything today, please come round for coffee.
