The Completion of the Purge

I previously wrote about my quest to minimize my life by purging a lot of my material goods and I have realized that in the summer I just barely scraped the surface. I'm moving to a new city this weekend for a great job opportunity and a move is a great way to force yourself to purge. So I have finally completed the great purge of 2013 that I first embarked on in the summer. Here's the breakdown:

Here is some visual evidence of what I was up against in the context of all the stuff I had stored in my parent's basement:

As you can see, it was a mismatch of boxes, furniture and bags. It was quite the task: that's for sure! I started by making notes that read 'donate', 'garage sale/sell', 'keep/store', 'keep/move' and 'garbage/recycle'. I then just began going through everything and matching it to the corresponding note and sorting everything into piles. I consolidated a lot of the stuff I wanted to keep to either move or store in a few plastic boxes instead of having all sorts of random bags and whatnot hanging around. It took me a few days and a little help from my friends but I did it! 

What I learned in doing this purge:
- Sometimes it's hard to part with material possessions because of the perceived value and/or emotional attachment associated with these items;
- It definitely helps to have an unbiased second or third party to ground you in reality when trying to decide whether to part with certain items;
- In the end it's just stuff and it ultimately doesn't make me a more happy person nor defines who I am as a person or my worth to society;
- It feels really great to purge myself of a lot of the stuff that has been weighing me down physically and emotionally for many years.
- I've spent a lot of money over in the years in accumulating all this stuff and sometimes spending money I didn't have;
- There are many areas in my life that I can look to for becoming more minimalist;
- Now that I've purged the best way to continue in my minimalism quest is prevention;
- The best form of minimalism is to appreciate and use all the possessions I already have as well as loving and taking care of them.

Here is my 'after' picture of all my stuff:

The top left picture is the stuff to move, the top right picture is stuff in storage in my parent's basement, the bottom left picture is a couple pieces of furniture to move and the bottom right picture is the stuff to sell, donate or throughout. As you can see, it's a lot more manageable and organized.

I'm personally feeling much lighter after doing this purge and I hope it inspires others to do the same. It took a move to motivate me to get my butt in gear for my purge but you don't need an excuse: you can purge at any time. If you're thinking about doing a purge in the near future here is a handy chart, that my sister found and sent me, that may help you sort through the chaos:

Good luck with your purge and please share what worked, what didn't work and what/who helped you in your journey to minimizing your life. As always here's to your uncommonly wealthy life! :)

Fall Updates

In honour of the changing of the seasons and this beautiful Fall day here is an update on the status of my great summer purge of 2013. It was the summer of 2013 and I engaged on a rather ambitious summer project to become more of a minimalist. I set myself some lofty goals and I didn't get to every one of them because some were much bigger jobs than I originally thought; however, I did achieve a lot that I'm very proud of. I put a dent in my stuff and I took that all important first step and made some great strides towards living a more minimalist life.

Firstly, I tackled my closet with help from a friend and purged 170 pieces of clothing and I stuck to not shopping throughout the summer. Now with the new season I've found myself doing a bit of shopping again but I also know that another purge is due in order to organize my closet for a new season. I'm setting myself a new goal of shorting through my fall and winter wardrobe and then figuring out how to shop based on what pieces I already have and what pieces I need in order to have coordinating outfits that I'll actually wear. In terms of purging my accessories, I did pick out the ones that I really like and enjoy and wear the most often and I got rid of a lot of old and out of style ones.

The other big purge job I did was my books. I'm most proud of this because it was long overdue and I feel so much better getting rid of that access weight I've been carrying around with me for way too long. My books were originally on several different bookshelves throughout my parents house and I didn't know which books I had read or still needed to read. I also had way too many out of date texts books just hanging around and collecting dust and that I hadn't looked at since University (over 5 years ago!). So I sorted my books into the following categories: read & keep, donate/sell, and to read. I also sorted through the books I had that I needed to return to various friends and tried to do so as much as feasibly possible. I put all my books I was going to keep onto one bookshelf and organized them according to read, to-read, self-help, cookbooks and other.

The finished beautiful masterpiece of my bookshelf! :)

In the case of my textbooks I was originally planning on just throwing them out because they are all way out of date and who wants/needs them at this point? But then I found out that a cousin of mine has been collecting old texts books at garage sales and re-selling them on amazon to all sorts of people, like students and collectors. So obviously I thought that instead of wasting these books and having them end up in a garage pile, I thought I would at least try my hand at the amazon seller world and see what came of it. So far I have sold 2 textbooks for $50 each, which is awesome considering I didn't have that money beforehand and now the books are going to a good home, at least I hope.

My pile of textbooks just waiting for a happy home to take them in. 

Now in terms of the other challenges of organizing all my stored stuff in my parents basement and purging my sticker/paper collection, I haven't quite got to that yet. They're very big jobs that will become part of a new Fall challenge for myself. The sticker/paper collection is a tough one because of the sentimental connection I have to it because I bought a lot of it as emotional crutches when I was going through a hard time. I guess having to go through and purge the stickers and paper represents in my head having to face that dark time in my past, but maybe it'll also help me cleanse and heal those old wounds? I think it is something I still must do.

My new Fall challenge to myself includes organizing and purging my winter clothes, my stored stuff at my parents house and my sticker and paper collection as well as continue to sell my textbooks on amazon. As always, here's to your uncommonly wealthy life! :)

Experiences Instead of Stuff

Many things have happened in my life since I lasted posted. All of these things have lead to me making a paramount life decision. This decision was always something that I felt and knew but that I didn't necessarily intellectually accept until just recently. This fundamental life truth is that I would rather spend my time, money and energy accumulating amazing life experiences instead of stuff. I have always felt this way however I'm only now realizing what this actually means and will entail. Let me explain.

Ever since I can remember I have always felt out of place in this world in which we call our modern western society. I have never understood the motives, desires and attitudes of my peers. I have always been one to feel (and at times act) rebellious towards authority figures, peers/colleagues and our society. I never understood the desire of females my age to rush into a 'fairy tale wedding' with any old guy just so they could walk down the aisle in a princess dress and/or their desire to procreate as soon as possible. I also never wanted to be dependent on anyone else for my life and livelihood, especially my partner. I never understood why people make themselves miserable and sick working at a job they hate for a soulless corporation that could care less about them just so they can buy a bunch of stuff, move to the suburbs, buy a house, car and have 2.5 kids all while accumulating piles of debt that lock them into their soul-sucking jobs and keeps them chained to their debt and location-dependent. When I think about the future of our so-called adult lives, why does anyone want that, why does anyone do it? It just sounds so terrible to me and a never-ending cycle. Once we settle for the things that don't make us happy in our lives it becomes easier and easier to settle for other not so great situations like toxic relationships and social injustices (to name a few).

By accepting the status quo we feed into it and it will never change. I just never understood and still don't understand the appeal of living this average life just like everyone else. I think there are others who have felt and/or feel this way, however as we grow older the world beats you down and you may find that you start to question yourself because you can't see any alternatives...most of the people you know, meet, trust and even love live this way and/or strive to live this way. So somewhere along the line you give in, little by little and it chips away at your resolve and you get caught in the cycle. It's like a trap and it's very hard to escape because oftentimes your friends and family are your jailors.

One of the major symptoms of this 'modern society mentality' (aptly named by yours truly) is the consumerism pathology. This pathology is characterized by an obsessive compulsion to consume as witnessed by overspending, buying things that one does not need, spending money one does not have and in extreme cases hoarding. Consumerism can be thought of as an addiction in a similar manner to the way we describe addictions to gambling, sex and/or food to name a few. The compulsive shopper gets a high from a new purchase in an effort to fill an emotional void in their life and then finds themselves feeling emptier (& poorer) than before when the high quickly dissipates and they're off again chasing a new, stronger and better high than last time.

I know this pathology very well because I have succumbed to it in the past and I'm still firmly in its grasps. Earlier in my adult life I found myself lost, alone and damaged and instead of listening to myself and the universe I listened to society and made some colossal mistakes. I had lost my trust in myself because of mistakes I'd made that hurt myself and my loved ones so I thought I could make up for it by doing what I was told, but that didn't work out so well. In ignoring my own instincts and the signs from the universe, I set myself up to fail, which was the one thing I was so afraid of doing. I realize now that mistakes are inevitable and a natural part of life and especially important in our development and growth, which was a huge step forward for me. However, before I realized this fundamental life lesson I went through a depression that was fueled by compulsive spending.

So I'm here today feeling like my life is making a lot more sense and I think I'm figuring it out, slowly but surely, but I'm still living with the consequences of my previous actions. I am shackled by credit card debt and a student loan with not much to show for it and I find myself dependent on other people (my parents) to sustain myself. I could have a really negative outlook on the entire situation, which I have in the past, but instead I have chosen to see the positive in it. I'm slowly chipping away at my debt and living with my parents has given me the freedom to explore myself again and to truly figure out my life and calling. I will also have a chance to explore living more of the life that I've always wanted and that starts with becoming minimalist.

I realize that another part of being a minimalist is to appreciate what I already have, even if that's not much, instead of always wanting more and wanting what everyone else has. So a major goal that I would like to add to my summer purge challenge is the appreciation of what I already have. I have also been inspired lately by a few life-changing experiences and amazing new people who have entered my life that have all reinforced my own feelings and the messages from the universe that rich life experiences are way more important to me than a bunch of stuff that I barely use or look at and just gather dust. Therefore, I'm here today to re-devote myself to minimizing my life by purging my stuff so that I can eventually become a location-independent globe-trotter full to the brim of awesome memories! :)

Challenge Accepted!

Here I am 2 weeks after my initial blog post and that first post was a long time in the making because of my fear surrounding putting myself out there in blog form and then I did it and I didn't find it so bad. It was slightly scary but I love my friends and family because they have been super supportive and that helps a lot.

This week I would like to talk about a personal challenge to myself to become more of a minimalist. This includes living with less, pairing down the stuff I have and fighting the urge to accumulate more. I have been reading the signs from the universe and she has been very clear in illustrating that I need to stop shopping and stop spending my money recklessly. These signs have come in the form of me continually losing and/or breaking many of my things lately.

With inspiration and help from my best friend over at the Sarcastic Bystander,I have already paired down my closet. I donated, repurposed and/or threw-out about 170 pieces of clothing that I no longer wear or are inappropriate for various reasons including being worn out, wrong size, etc. I donated most of the pieces to Value Village and threw out anything that was too far gone. Here is a handy visual of all the clothes I purged from my closet:

                                                                        Picture used with permission from http://www.sarcasticbystander.com/

Before my closet demolition, I also helped her purge her closet in her quest to live a more healthy and minimalist life. Check out her purge I helped with!

We have also embarked on a challenge to not buy any more clothing for the rest of the summer. So far I have stuck to this challenge fairly well (minus a slip or 2). So in that vain and with inspiration from my best friend and her healthy lifestyle I am going to set myself an additional summer challenge.

The Summer Purge of 2013 (as I have so named it) will include the following:

• In addition to buying no more clothing for the summer, I also commit to not buying any more accessories and purging the accessories I do have;
• Purging of my books and bookshelf, including finishing the numerous books I have started and getting rid of those University textbooks I will never touch again;
• Organizing and purging all the 'stuff' I have stored at my parents that I hope to use once I move out; and
• I am a paper and sticker hoarder, so I think it is time to use, sell, donate & purge a lot of that stuff as well.

So this is my challenge to myself and one thing that has always been hard for me in sticking to challenges and commitments I make to myself is the follow-through. I can talk myself into or out of anything and I am great with the excuses. I hope that this public commitment to the challenge will help motivate me better than I've been able to motivate myself so far. I know a lot of you can relate to this so please help me out and keep me accountable. This will be the first of many challenges I set for myself that I will share with you that will hopefully lead to a healthier, happier and uncommon life. Challenge Accepted! :)