The spring cleaning bug always seems to hit me early, when the days are short an winter has us firmly in its clutches. I am not alone. Several of my favorite people have been posting about their organizing endeavors. January was National Get Organized month, and newsstands were full of articles and inspiration to spur us on. Maybe it is our instinctive reflex to the excess and consumerism of the holiday season?
I haven't accomplished as much as I'd like, but I did manage to clean out my basement storage room and send an embarrassing pile of donations to Goodwill and ReStore. I've read a few books recently too, and rather than let all those little nuggets of wisdom bounce around in my head until they disappear into oblivion, I thought it would be fun to share them here and try to capitalize on the motivation.
All this to say, I am thinking of resurrecting Feng Shui Friday weekly posts. In a less structured way, of course. It may be a quote that inspired me or a project I'm working on, but it will all be related to simplifying and organizing. (Maybe having a weekly topic to post about will pull me out of the blog funk I've been in??)
So for today, a quote that made me pause:
“Storage Experts Are Hoarders—
Putting things away creates the illusion that the clutter problem has been solved.”
(This book has been bouncing around the blogosphere and it's a good one. I won't share more now but I'm sure I will be quoting some of my favorite passages in the future. Thank you for the inspiration, Jolene!)
Yeah, she wrote that for me. Nothing sets my heart a flutter like a beautifully designed closet or pantry. Swoon. Need a space organized? I will sort by color, shape, and size and spend big bucks on new, gorgeous, evenly-sized containers so it will look tidy and beautiful.
Hold the phone. I've been doing it wrong! The problem is that I have all the stuff to begin with!!
Once I was complaining about cleaning out a closet that held every cleaning supply imaginable that my grandparents used over the last 50 years. Or a drawer full of random hardware and tools. I can't remember. But my dad made a comment I haven't forgotten. "You have more stuff than your grandparents ever had".
Gulp. It's true. Granted, we are a family of 5 and they moved into this house when most of their kids were grown, but still. Just because it is MY stuff and I know where it all came from doesn't mean it isn't excessive.
Cue the purging. Except it just takes so. much. time. Marie Kondo will tell you to set aside the time to clean out your house in one fell swoop or it will never get done (says the single author with no kids who lives alone). True. But impossible. She says to start with your clothes. I've done my underwear. Hey, its a start!