'Tis The Season To Declutter

With the huge gift giving season on the horizon, now is an excellent time to put on your decluttering goggles and look over the things around your home. Clearing out items that are unused, unloved, unwanted or unneeded (the real kind, not the guilt-provoking one) will allow you to prepare your home to have a spot available for the new stuff.

For inspiration, I've listed several excellent resources from around the web over on Taking Care of You that will give you new insight or just a swift kick of motivation. Decluttering is a worthwhile and freeing exercise so have fun!

Focus Challenge - Month 10

This month's Focus Challenge comes during the time that a person who struggles with mental clutter would identify as a "difficult" time of year. I'm not knowledgeable on the traditions of all religions and all cultures, but I am guessing that most of us are celebrating during this season by exchanging gifts in some way.

After working on ourselves and our spaces for many months to slowly (one-item-a-day) release clutter from our lives, this may be the time of year when we could take in a whole lot more. I say could because the choice is ours. There is no guilt allowed here in the 365 Days of Decluttering Challenge...whether in decluttering past clutter or present clutter!

We'll receive an item and go through the wrenching dance between our mind and heart, or even between us and others, about whether we should keep the item. If, instead, we feel positive feelings and the sentence reads, "We'll receive an item and feel ___ (positive feeling here)", the end result will undeniably be we will keep the item.

For experiences that have a "should", realize that you've given up the power of your choice to clutter...both physical and mental!

An end result with a "will" in it is most importantly a decision of your own choosing. A much better way of living, don't you agree?

Hopefully, we have been taught civilized manners and are gracious when receiving a gift. Regardless of it feeling like clutter, mental or otherwise, we know (or are learning) that we are not obligated to accept mental clutter attached to a gift. And, we are already gaining momentum in purging physical clutter from our life. We won't be stopped by this physical clutter.

Only in a private moment with ourselves, after showing kindness to the gift-giver for their thoughtfulness, do we choose to allow the gift into our life or choose to let the clutter go.

Your Focus Challenge is to focus your decluttering efforts for the next month on mental decluttering. For now, it will be on gifts. As the new year begins, with a newer "you" than the last, you will also be setting up a foundation for purging even more clutter from your life.

Happy Holidays to you. Here's to an even Happier New Year!

Focus Challenge – Month 8

We've been decluttering our way through spring, summer and now we're into autumn. As the weather in my area has done an abrupt about-face and went from 90 degree days to 60/70 degree days PLUS cold wind in the last week, I am suddenly feeling very autumn inspired.

It wasn't so last year. I'm kinda excited! Last year I was not in the holiday mood, did almost nothing to decorate our home and even let holiday gift-giving sneak up on me...anyone who truly knows me understands that I buy holiday gifts during the year and have only little things to buy after Thanksgiving. So, this year, I've signed up for The Holiday Countdown to inspire me via babysteps to gear up for the festive season.

Many of us have decorated for Autumn, Halloween and maybe even Thanksgiving already. If you've not done so and want to, c'mon, join us! Let's illuminate our spaces with little touches of the season to give thanks for the harvests; to enjoy the time of gatherings between friends, families and neighbors; and to celebrate the end of another year.

Let's use this inspiration for our Focus Challenge this month.

1) If you've got your holiday things here, there and everywhere, spend 15 minutes each day to bring it all together. If you've already decorated, look for stuff that you did not put out--odds are good there is a reason for it.

2) As you find things, give them the "clutter or not" once over. Do you love it?...Want it?...Use it?

If not, declare the item to be your 365 Days of Decluttering Challenge item of the day and celebrate another day that you stayed true to your challenge!

For those who haven't decorated and want bonus points, choose a holiday decor item that passed the clutter or not test and put it up. ;-)

3) After all of your holiday stuff has been given a once-over, start thinking of a central way of storing it after the season. There's no use having to start at Step 1 (bringing it all together) next year.

- Do you have adequate containers, shelf space, etc. to store it together?
- Do you want to separate Autumn decor from the Halloween decor? Or separate Thanksgiving from Christmas, etc?
- Do you want to put everything that gets put up first during the season into one container or in one place? If so, maybe having the containers or spaces labeled as one, two, three, etc. will help you out next year.
- Can your holiday gift wrapping supplies be stored together and away from your regular gift wrapping supplies?
- How about storing seasonal cookware, cookbooks, etc, together and away from your everyday kitchen stuff?

No matter the task, my thought process is this: don't let stuff overrun me.

Since we are trying to declutter our homes, it makes sense to declutter our seasonal stuff too. If we use it/love it/want it, then we should take care to have it around for the next year. Use this season to declutter and give yourself the gift of order next year!

Halloween Costumes

If you're like me, you really want to buy an awesome costume for your child to wear but you don't want to pay so much. Unless they'll play dress-up in it during the year, you can save it for a younger child to wear next year, etc., it's a lot of money to spend on a one-time use object!

On Lisa's Twisted Blog, I saw her link for a great deal at BuyCostumes.com. So, thank you Lisa, and now I'm going to post it here to share with you all as well.