Progress!

Today I got to spend a little over an hour uninterrupted (my husband took my daughter for a walk) trying to improve our worst room... the room that taunts me with it's piles, risk of important stuff being lost or destroyed, overflowing closets, etc. The room used to be a combination office (since I work from home) and guest room, which means everything ended up there. Now it's main use is as my daughter's room.

I hate that she can't play in there because it's not safe. It bothers me that when she lies awake in her crib playing and studying the world, she's studying chaos. But, since most days the only time I can do chores is when she's sleeping in there, it's been impossible to do much about it.

An hour is not going to make it all better in there, but I did make a little dent. I accomplished my goal of making it safe to turn on the heater (cleaning out/moving away flammable stuff that's too close to it) making some space around it to let the heat get into the rest of the room, and getting physically close enough to the heater to reach the knob and turn it on. It's bad enough to provide a chaotic and messy environment for my daughter to sleep in, but now that it's fall, it's been a little chilly in there. Winter's right around the corner - she will have heat.

Every time I do this type of cleaning, I keep repeating the same thoughts over and over... why on earth do I have this/did I keep this? oh, that's where that is! I've been looking for that! And of course: hmmm, what should I do with this? I'll put it in the 'find a home for this later' pile.

Oh well. Tonight I will focus on the good feeling of having made progress in the right direction... however small.

Reminders from Backpacking

My first backpacking trip in 1999 was when I first got excited about the idea of a more simple lifestyle. For those weeks, everything I needed was on my back... simple food, only the basics for clothes and toiletries, etc. Laundry meant rinsing my clothes in a stream and hanging them in the sun. Luxury was coming across a campsite with an outhouse (avoiding a fresh set of mosquito bites in inconvenient places...). I appreciated small luxuries so much more than greater luxuries at home. It made me realize just how freeing it can be to live with a little less.

Not that I want to always live on the bare essentials. But after a short overnight backpacking trip this week, I'm remembering some of what first drew me not only to enjoy backpacking/camping trips but to seek a bit of that kind of simplicity in my everyday life.

I'm thankful to come home to a bed, an indoor flushing toilet, a warm shower and a machine that washes my clothes. I'm thankful for refrigerated/frozen food and so many other small things that I usually take for granted or ignore completely. But I'm also thankful for the chance to get away from all of this and remember how little I actually need on a daily basis, how quiet and uncomplicated life can be, the miracles and beauty of nature... when all I have to do during the day is put one foot in front of another, eat when I'm hungry, drink when I'm thirsty, and pitch a tent when I'm tired.

And even just a short trip to the woods can help me remember what's important, what's necessary, what's reasonable, what's a pleasant luxury, and what is excess in a way that hurts me and others. I think I may need to draw away to the woods more often.

Self-Forgiveness

I seem to be so focused lately on the ways I fall short of my own ideals for myself. I want to be more organized, keep things cleaner, eat healthier, exercise more, be a better wife/mother/daughter/sister/friend... There are a lot of things that I want to improve. And I tell myself that it's okay - how boring would life be if I had everything figured out before I even turn 30 (which I will soon enough)? And what kind of unreasonable standard is it really to think I'll ever really be good at everything?

And yet I'm increasingly measuring myself by this impossible standard, and it's effecting the way I see myself and the people around me. How can I work to improve in all these areas while still being comfortable with myself the way I am... a work in progress with a long way to go, yes, but who's also already come a long way in so many different ways. I really need to lighten up.

That's part of what simplicity means to me, I think... simplifying my environment as a part of simplifying myself. I need to learn not to base my identity and my sense of self-worth on impossible standards. But when I feel like there's chaos all around me, and when I feel as though I'm failing in so many different ways, after a while it becomes all I can see.

So again several days have gone by with little progress or even effort, really. I'm just so tired that I've given myself permission (at least mentally) to take care of myself a bit better. As badly as I want to see the progress and have the work done, I just haven't be willing, or maybe even able, to actually do it.

And for now that's okay. Maybe the lesson right now is self-forgiveness and acceptance of my own faults.

What's it really about?

Today I've spent some time reading some websites that deal with organization, home management, clutter, etc. I don't think I'm ready to follow anyone else's plan very strictly (and thus, according to them, none of them will really work), but I read some things that have been helpful.

None of the places I was reading cover the whole picture of what I'm thinking about. It's not just about having a clean house. It's not just about being organized or trying to gain some sense of control. It's not just about having more time to spend doing what I enjoy, or being healthier, but rather a combination of these things. It's also about being a responsible citizen of the world... trying to learn to consume less and give more. It's not just about having a healthier body but a healthier spirit, and soul. I've gotten some ideas and motivation from these others, who have probably helped a lot of people, but none of them is really talking about exactly what I mean.

So I'm continuing to take it in small pieces, trying to have reasonable expectations, make a little progress everyday. Tonight I'm tackling the cleaning cabinet in the kitchen which has been bothering me for a while. It's kind of funny to clean the cleaning cabinet, but I'm hoping that an easier to use cleaning cabinet will make it a bit more manageable to clean in general.

More than specific projects, I'm thinking tonight about my motivation in all of this. In one of the websites I was reading she talked about blessing your family with your efforts. I so rarely think of it that way. That clean dishes and clothes are a gift to my family... that I do this to make our lives a little more comfortable, healthier, etc. I think so often in my head it's about meeting some standard, so that I and other people will think I'm a good wife, mother, person. Perhaps that's why I get so emotional about some of this... I'm assessing my own value based on my performance in some way. So in addition to wanting to make some changes in my habits or the way my apartment looks, I also need to make some changes in the way I think.

2 Steps Forward, 1 Back?

Friday night I was so proud of myself. Instead of going according to my original plan and cleaning a kitchen cabinet, I recommended that my husband get out a box or two from storage that he thought we should go through. We went through 2 boxes labeled "decorative items" that we hadn't even opened since we moved in 4 years ago. (I'm not not much of a decorator I guess.) No pressure on the things with sentimental value or anything I was feeling indecisive about. But we still put together a box of stuff to take to the second hand store and condensed the two boxes into one. Pretty good progress.

But for a variety of reasons this weekend my discipline and motivation fell apart. Not only did I not make any progress but I didn't really do all the normal everyday chores either. It's not the end of the world or anything but it's frustrating that it seems either I'm moving forward or I'm moving backward.

So now I'm trying to gather a bit of motivation and energy to get the week off to a little better start. It's getting late and I should probably think about going to bed soon, but if I can at least do some basic cleaning up maybe I'll be more encouraged and motivated when I get up tomorrow.

Wish me luck!

Stuff

There are only two solutions to the stuff problem... get more space for stuff or have less stuff. Getting more space seems like a step in the wrong direction. It would mean moving to a bigger place, which I would then probably just fill with stuff and clutter eventually too. Bigger place = bigger bills = working more to pay bills = less time = more stress = NOT seeking simplicity. So only one choice remains.

I come from a long line of seriously skilled pack rats. The two bad habits I was raised with are attaching sentimental value to everything so that it becomes absolutely necessary to keep it, and imagining all the possible situations in which I could use something and then of course being so glad that I'd kept it until then.

For example, this week I was going through boxes looking for something else when I came across the deflated carcasses of balloons from my high school graduation party. Really? I kept those? I guess after high school graduation I was feeling pretty nostalgic about everything and thought that the balloons might somehow help me remember the party? I'm not sure. Twelve years later, I know that they didn't. We had even bought these shiny balloon-weight things to keep them from flying away in the wind... and I kept one of those too. I imagine my thought process was something like, "I don't see any reason to keep all the balloon weights. Saving one will be enough to remember what they looked like." I don't remember but it kind of sounds like me. The thought probably came from my mother originally, as she is the grand master at attaching sentimental value to meaningless objects. We were probably cleaning up from the party and she would've said, "What do you want to do with these balloons?" And I would've said, "What do you mean?" And she would've said, "Well, I wasn't sure if you wanted to keep them for any reason." And while I hadn't before, suddenly I became aware of a strong emotional attachment to these balloons, such that I packed them in a box with my diploma, some scholarship plaques and similar awards, and my white hat with the tassel. Enough about the balloons, but it is perhaps a telling summary that I have moved thousands of miles with a box containing something whose sole function in the world is being heavy.

So there's probably a whole lot of stuff stored in boxes that is in a similar category. Ten, fifteen or twenty years ago these items would've had some kind of sentimental value and today I have no idea what they are. These are the things that will make me laugh at myself as I throw them away or give them away if they might be useful to someone else.

But in so many cases it will not be that easy. I will agonize over some of the decisions, and will ride an emotional roller coaster of indecision. I know because I've tried this whole notion of cleaning out before. I've made progress here and there, but eventually all the feelings wear me out and I give up. I'm wondering how to make it different this time. There's definitely a place for keeping things for sentimental reasons, but there should also be a limit on how much. And some kind of boundaries on what's reasonable to attach sentimental value to in the first place.

So I've decided to start in the kitchen. The kitchen is probably the least cluttered room in the apartment right now so it's not terribly overwhelming to start there. And there's little in the kitchen that's quite so emotionally loaded. Maybe if I can see some progress in the kitchen it will motivate me to be a bit more ruthless in weeding out other rooms.

I started with plastic bags. Certainly plastic bags, collected mostly from shopping, have uses. But realistically, we have no reason to save every plastic shopping bag we ever get. So I picked the best, nicest ones, in an assortment of sizes, and then the rest went in recycling. Clutter reduced, even if only slightly.

I moved on to the cabinet where we keep containers for leftovers. Some are nice containers like Tupperware-type. Those we can keep. We've also accumulated plenty of containers over the years that were originally margarine tubs, or similar. I looked into this cabinet and wondered how many leftovers I was really imagining having at any one point in time. Not even half of these would fit into our freezer and refrigerator. Again, pick the best and nicest ones with a good assortment of sizes, and the rest go into recycling. Can not believe how much extra space is now in that cabinet!

It may seem silly, but these plastic bags and butter tubs represent a small victory. On to the next cabinet!

What does it look like?

Hopefully eventually it will become a habit to update my blog. I want to post a little more regularly.

So what does simplicity mean and what would it look like to live the more simple life I desire? In itself not such a simple question.

There are a lot of ways to look at it I guess. One is just plain stuff. It's everywhere. Too much stuff. Our storage spaces are full and so the stuff we use somewhat regularly is in piles on just about every flat surface. It's like it's on display for everyone. I don't want to be a strict "a place for everything and everything in its place" kind of person but I'd like to start heading a bit more in that direction at least. Especially now that my daughter has reached the age of her increasing mobility meeting her incredible curiosity about everything in the world around her. I want her to be free to explore in our home without risking her hurting herself or destroying things. So that's a more general goal... reduce clutter and maximize storage to effectively baby-proof the apartment.

Another has to do with time and schedules. There are so many things that I want to do in life that I'm afraid to waste a minute. And yet I've reached a point of exhaustion so that I may be doing a lot of those things but I'm not really enjoying them. What's the point? I think in the longer term, bigger picture, I need to have a clearer focus on what I want to really invest myself in and try to pursue one goal well rather than spreading myself so thin. But shorter term, I need to scale back a bit and get some rest and recover. With the summer coming that will be a bit easier - there will be less I need to say no to. But when the fall comes around again, I will need to have a bit more focus and willingness to say no to somethings.

Generally I want to simplify myself in some way. I think the stuff and the time will be big components of this. But I want to be more present in the moment, enjoying and appreciating where I am and not so scattered in my head. I think this is a goal that I'll need to return to more once I've made some progress with the others. A lot of this is still somewhat vague in my head so perhaps a general goal in this area is to begin to clarify what it is I'm really seeking when I say I'm seeking simplicity.

So there's the bigger picture of what seeking simplicity means to me right now. The next step is to set some concrete, measurable, achievable goals and develop a plan to begin to reach them. And to begin to set said plan in motion.

Getting Started

The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, right?

For so long I've been wanting to simplify my life and sometimes that simplicity seems at least a thousand miles away. But one small step at a time I can get there. Or at least get closer, since I'm not completely sure where "there" even is. Step one is starting this blog, to journal my progress, setbacks, and feelings about the process. Posting it online rather than writing in a regular journal will help me be accountable. Even if no one else ever reads it, just knowing someone might will help keep me on track.

So, step one accomplished. My blog is no longer just an idea - it now exists.
Next step, identify some short and long term goals and start brainstorming ideas to help reach them.