Junk

[hummingway]

Originally Posted by ERNA BLUE

Well, I never! This topic relates to me so much and I never knew the reason why I could not un-stick myself from all the every day JUNK and just go.I am doing everything that has been said above and am getting nowhere. We should open a 'nearly ready to go' forum and help each other with ideas on how to overcome junk problems. I am just at the beginning of this process as I am newly retired and am working very hard at it. The 35 ft world sailing cruiser is waitjng in the marina and the Yachtmaster instructor certificate is burning a hole in my pocket. Why oh why?

I think if you really want to go you have to let go and just give away what ever it is that's holding you back. Maybe it's the memories associated with some things or the effort it took you to get them in the first place. A lot of people seem to suffer from a "I may need that someday" syndrome. It's amazing how little of what we have we need and how good it can feel to really know that.

[SkiprJohn]

Since moving on a acre of land I've come to realize that junk abhors a vacuum. I've stopped going to yard sales and have even said "no" to people who have wanted to give me things. It hasn't helped. I have more junk today than I did yesterday and I haven't even left the house. It was so bad a few years ago that I bought a 20 acre lot and put a couple of containers there. Still too much junk here. I built a shed roof to cover some of my tools a couple months ago. Its full already.
Americans certainly are rich.
Someday I'll get organized.
kind regards,

[Reach]

Interesting topic! Seeing your possessions as just more "stuff" is a distinct frame-shift and a mindset that sounds very familiar. Once you have this radar-vision, you can never go back...

Luckily for us, we started thinking this way long before we went cruising full-time. We lived relatively simply and sparsely while working, and no doubt people wondered what was up with us? Now they know

Starting with less junk made the divesting even easier. We had great luck using eBay and Craigslist over time, long before we sold/gave away everything else & sold the house. And yes, it is liberating, so it sounds like you will enjoy doing it too!

Now if we can just get some of the weight off of this boat ...

[Tingum]

It will NEVER change. We are sitting stuck in Sodus Bay,NY waiting for the erie to reopen and folks here are putting their boats away for the winter. I am getting the biggest kick looking at all the JUNK they are hauling off the boats. I am going around asking how much stuff they actually touched in the course of the season. Most just laugh but some try and say they really needed that beach umbrella!

[ERNA BLUE]

I quite agree that junk does not like empty spaces, or rather the owners are motivated to spread their possessions into any available empty spaces in order to get them out of sight and out of mind. We are selling the house in the spring, come hell or high water! But it needs to be reasonably empty by then. I am emptying the contents of the large garage, by making different piles in the garden and covering them with tarpaulin, while my wife empties the contents of all our wardrobes into the garage! We are working like mad, but we have no idea what the next stage is going to be. We are not jet ready to hire several skips and pay to have our past life removed. I think I would first have to suffer a major nervous breakdown before further progress can be made.

[GordMay]

Stuff accumulates to fit the space allotted*1; just “work expands to fit the time allotted.*2”

1 May’s corollary to
2 Parkinson’s Law

[High Heels]

We are two days from our house going on the market and I cannot tell you how much my perspective has changed. I was just thinking before I saw your post how I have been to Target two times in the last year and it has been to buy food because I was in a bind and couldn't make it to our coop or local grocery. I don't mix that plastic box or the plastic crap that one can buy there.

My mentality has changed a lot.

Start the process Now, do not wait. I have been working on this downsize for a year now and there are processes like selling books online that I wished I had started much earlier.

Good luck to all with their process. Mine required a lot of focus and mental fortitude to de-program myself from the 'gotta have it' mentality. It has been one big relief in so many ways!!!

[Adax]

Junk is mystifying. I am not attached to junk. If I lost it all today I would not shed a tear. However, the act of getting rid of it bores me to tears. But as I am selling my house to start a new life on different shores it has to go. Anyone wanna buy a bunch of junk with a house wrapped around it ?

[slowshoes]

Originally Posted by Microship

Now, trying to move aboard, I'm constantly having to paradoxically fight my own frugality: it's hard to get rid of something that I "might need someday." Argh.

Want some tonnage? Anyone? ;-)

Man, do I ever know the feeling. My problem is that for every 10 things I'm keeping that I might need someday, they'll be one I actually use. Then because I actually used that one thing, it makes it even harder to throw the other 9 away.

Talk about a vicious, never ending circle!

I've have to learn to toss the 10 things and realize if I ever need any one of them, they can be bought again. So easy to say - somebody help with the doing!

[High Heels]

Originally Posted by ERNA BLUE

Well, I never! This topic relates to me so much and I never knew the reason why I could not un-stick myself from all the every day JUNK and just go.I am doing everything that has been said above and am getting nowhere. We should open a 'nearly ready to go' forum and help each other with ideas on how to overcome junk problems. I am just at the beginning of this process as I am newly retired and am working very hard at it. The 35 ft world sailing cruiser is waitjng in the marina and the Yachtmaster instructor certificate is burning a hole in my pocket. Why oh why?

Erna Blue, I know how ya feel. I don't think of myself as materialistic. I have a sentimental streak that if measured in miles would probably circumnavigate the globe about one million times.

Out of all the 'DeClutter' books I have read (and I started reading them before we planned our cruising adventure) I found I could relate best to Peter Walsh's books. "Does this Clutter Make My Butt Look Fat?" is one of them. I am hoping that it has been the clutter, because with the amount I have dumped I should be in that size ten dress anyday

As well, I think a scanner is the best investment you can make if you have a computer. Being able to scan the paper clutter, letters, pictures, etc...has saved me immense space in my office.

Having music digitized and being able to say goodbye to books and maybe consider a 'Kindle' or like book storage device I think is brilliant and can really help this process.

For me, just getting away for a couple of weeks on the boat and really concentrating on living has helped me to see that all the extraneous 'JUNK' has only served to stress me out and keep my attention divided.

The very interesting part of it all is that I really believe JUNK holds energy from the past and can hold us back emotionally. I cannot say the mental adjustments and new insights have always been comfortable as I have gotten rid of some of my most favorite JUNK but I can say, that the progress I am making in my outlook on life and my new found sense of self is more valuable than any of that stuff I had...

I feel a little like a rebel and a bit on the margins of society with my new found sense of not biting the hook of consumption, but I am quickly learning to love the new found FREEDOM!!!

[delmarrey]

But, but, but just yesterday I finally used a special 1-3/4" wooden dowel that I have been storing in my garage for the past twenty years.

[ERNA BLUE]

Thank you, High Heels, for your excellent advice. I have to go now and add to my JUNK and buy the book you recommended. However, by moving and sorting my junk, from my dinner jacket to my red London bus toy I got for my seventh birthday, I am beginning to hate it all with a vengeance. The idea is germinating of leaving all as is and when the house is sold, to get in a house clearance firm to empty it. I just have to work out how to overcome a few problems, such as how to get my wife aboard before the clearance people start their sinister deed. Ah well, confusion is prevalent! I never knew this was such a hard nut to crack.

[ReMetau]

Wife and I had a great time selling almost everything we owned. We sold most of the smaller stuff on eBay, gave a lot to family and friends and then the rest went to Goodwill. If it didn't fit on the boat, it didn't fit in our lives. It feels great not to be owned by our stuff.

[High Heels]

Love this website too What It’s All About She talks all about simplifying life for simplifying sake.

I have to say I am glad we had this big adventure planned because I am not sure I would have had the gumption to do it just for the act of living in simplicity, but now that I am almost there I am sure glad I started down this path!

[Don1500]

Looks like my topic struck a chord with some people. One thing I do know about my junk, the accumulation of 40 years of married life, is that if there were a fire tomorrow I don't think I would miss a stick of it. Nothing would be lost that can't be replaced. My family pictures are all on the net and that's all I really care about.