downsize your belongings

We all have an over-abundance of things.  As I’ve mentioned in the past, at some point in your life you will have a need to downsize your belongings.  Waiting until it becomes a necessity is not a good approach.

Don’t wait until that time comes because it’s inevitable that you will need to downsize your belongings at some point. Be proactive, start before it becomes a necessity because if you wait, you may not have the physical or mental capacity to get the job done. You want to be able to make decisions for your things, you don’t want others to make those decisions for you.

A good approach is by being proactive as mentioned above. There are steps you can take as you go along in your day-to-day activities to downsize your belongings.  Mindfulness, or being aware of your surroundings is key to eliminating excess in your living spaces.

Examples of Mindfulness

  • As you’re looking in your closet for something to wear, be mindful of how many clothes you have, specifically how many of one type of clothing. For example, do you have several pairs of black pants that fit? Or that don’t fit? Having 2 or maybe 3 pairs of black pants that fit is sufficient.
  • Keep a bin near your closet and when you find a clothing item that doesn’t fit, that is uncomfortable, or that you don’t like the way it looks on you, put it in the bin. When the bin is full, take it to your favorite charity to donate.
  • When you’re preparing a meal and looking for a cooking utensil and find several of the same, discard the excess. What I mean by discarding the excess, is donation if it’s in good condition, or put it in the recycle bin if it’s not and recycling is an option for you.
  • Personal care items can overcrowd storage areas very quickly if you aren’t mindful of the contents. In the morning as you are getting ready for the day, pay attention to how many bottles of shampoo are taking up space in a cabinet, or in the shower. Sometimes we start using a product and decide we don’t like it, so we buy another one to try. The one we stopped using is now taking up valuable storage space. When you replace the one that didn’t work, use the one in one out rule and discard the one that didn’t work to free up space.

This is the basis to downsize your belongings every day. Being mindful, or aware of your surroundings goes a long way to having your belongings be proportionate to your living spaces.  When you downsize your belongings as you go along, when it becomes a necessity, you won’t have that many things to decide their fate.