Remove one thing a day

We used to live a very cluttered life. We kept all sorts of items, from movie ticket stubs, Christmas cards, key-chains, empty boxes, instruction manuals, worn down clothes... This was normal. Everyone we knew lived this way. Things were valuable, and you stored them in case you ever needed them again. Getting rid of things always brought up emotions of guilt, regret, ungratefulness.

For us this changed when we saw the Marie Kondo show on Netflix. We got her book, followed her advice and suddenly lived a very different live. We became mindful of the things we owned, appreciated the things that gave us value and felt OK about removing things that didn’t from our lives. The negative emotions disappeared and what remained was a simpler, more appreciative life.

Konmari worked great for us, gave us amazing results that completely changed how we lived our lives. However, after some time (two years ) passed, we started feeling burdened by stuff again. We realized that over time we kept accumulating stuff, because we never developed a habit of getting rid of things that no longer sparked joy. They simply became background noise we didn’t notice anymore. We also stopped giving new things their home, so some stuff spilled out of storage and just laid around the apartment in random locations. We now, once again, have a junk drawer.

As with many other things, minimalism, Konmari etc. can only succeed if they become a part of who we are, a habitual behavior. If not they’re just a temporary fix. In our case it lasted a long time (two years ), but still temporary.

Minimalism as a life style - getting rid of 1 thing a day creates a habit of removing stuff - stuff that had no business being in your life anyways.

If you remove one thing per day, you will basically never run out of stuff to remove - we always accumulate stuff during our life time - in the shape of presents, impulse buys, new things we try. They're all great in the moment but as time passes, if they are not something you enjoy having or something you actually need, they become a burden in your home. If you want to have a faster cleanse, the Konmari method is a great way to de-clutter your home or just trying the 30 day minimalism challenge by the Minimalists - where you remove 1 thing on the first day, two things on the second, day, three things on day 3 and so on. By the end of the challenge you will have removed 465 things if you just follow that regime, but most likely you will remove even more when you will see the joy of removing excess stuff that you kept in your home.

But both those systems, even though they are great to start off with since they offer a great big de-clutter in a short span of time, can have the issue of not developing the habit of this lifestyle. You will have so much less stuff but as time goes by and stuff accumulates, if you do not develop the habit of removing new things or things that have served their purpose, you will eventually after years of newly acquired items, have a home filled with clutter. That's where the one item per day comes in handy - doing it daily develops a habit and gives a "cue", which is the item you no longer need or want, a "routine" - getting rid of the item and the "reward" - a sense of relief and control over your life.

So remove one item today - it can be really small - even just a Christmas card or a straw that has been lying in the back of that drawer. Make sure it's out by midnight, but that's it. Get back your time and gain control over your house again. Build your life around people and growth, not items.