Decluttering. What a whirlwind of thoughts flood my mind. See if any of these sound familiar to you…..
I can use this.
I forgot I had this.
Why did I keep this?
I want this but where in the world should I put this?
How many of THIS do I need?
What will happen to me if I get rid of this?
I can’t bear to give this away, I paid good money for it!
Maybe I’ll try to sell it.
Maybe I’ll try to return it, even though it’s been 2 years since I bought it.
This was me yesterday as I was decluttering the infamous, way-overstuffed-with-trash, bathroom drawer. Truth. I kid you not. I had the whole gamut of thoughts!
Mostly though, in this particular bathroom drawer, I was annoyed! Why would I keep 10 nearly empty tubes of toothpaste? Why would I let all those used toothbrushes stay there. Since when does Gold Bond powder go in the bathroom drawer. I’m lucky it didn’t dump out in there, coating everything with a nice powdery texture.
The truth is, I know why I let those things accumulate in my drawer. I had lots of good reasons!
- I was always planning to get to that drawer later, but later never came!
- There was still a dab of toothpaste in that toothpaste container. I didn’t want to waste any.
- I didn’t know who the toothbrushes belonged to and not everyone was home for me to ask them.
- I did’t want to declutter just one drawer, it wouldn’t be enough. I’d think, “I’ll wait until I have time to declutter the whole bathroom.”
If you’re not a procrastinator you won’t quite understand. We genuinely think that we REALLY WILL come back to it in a reasonable amount of time. We just don’t want to do it right now. Couple being a procrastinator with being unorganized, you can have seriously disorganized spaces in a hurry. The truth is, if the job is very time consuming, we won’t come back until it’s way out of control. We have to find ways to make ourselves do it and get it done. For me, it was committing to you that I would declutter something every week and show it to you on Tuesdays. I know that won’t work for most of you, but…..there’s other ways. You could purpose to do something right when you think of it, you could work together with a friend who will keep you accountable OR you could even meet a friend online, then both of you run and set your timers for 15 minutes while you’re getting something done. I’ve used all of these ways successfully.
As I told you, I’ve decided to take Tuesdays to share a decluttering project that I’m working on in my house.
I had thought that I’d tackle all of the shelves & drawers in the bathroom. But, once I got in there, I got seriously overwhelmed. It’s a small space, but we can sure pack the junk into it! So…instead of tackling it all, I decided to pick the worst drawer and make it look great! I know that’s not as good as if I had done everything, but I knew I wouldn’t have time for ALL of the shelves that day, so I’ll have to tackle the other ones later (said in true procrastinator style). But, really, I will tackle them. I will try not to bore you with one a week for many weeks to come. 😛
Unfortunately, I tackled this drawer before I read the next chapter in Dana’s decluttering book called
Drowning in Clutter? (Don’t Grab a Floatie . . . Drain the Ocean!)
After reading the first section of her book, I realized that I broke one of her first rules. I should’ve started in a more visible space. Instead, I started behind a closed drawer, but honestly, I’m still glad I started here. It’s been bothering me for a long time! But, I’m also wondering if maybe I wasn’t being ruthless enough when making decisions about what to keep. I mean, the trash was the easy part, but I kept a lot of tubes of things. I did put them all in a baggie together, but will I really keep them in there? Will I even use them? Would I miss them if I didn’t decide to keep them? Or will I let them all clutter up the drawer again? Hmm, I’ll have to think about whether I want to go back and declutter this space again, but until I do, I’m going to enjoy the progress that I made so far! Yay! What do you think?
Here’s my after picture….
Have you been decluttering this week?
Show me pictures! Tell me about it. I’d love to hear YOUR stories, because they keep me motivated. Also, If you’re a woman and you’d like a group to help keep you going each day of the week, you can join us in the Stop Procrastinating Facebook group! Just go here and request to join.
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