Examining “emotional clutter”
by Sasha on April 9, 2008
In a previous post I referenced an article that categorizes clutter into 4 groups. The first category is emotional clutter.
“Emotional clutter has sentimental meaning but little financial value. It could include children’s toys or drawings, unused or unwanted gifts, school or university notes, or the personal possessions of absent loved ones.”
This is the toughest category of “stuff” within which to make decisions. I’ve focused lately on emotional clutter because of my recent move across country to the west coast. It’s hard to decide what to finally get rid of, what to leave at my mother’s house, and what to bring with me to LA. I have to admit that I still have ALL my dance costumes from when I was a kid saved in my mom’s basement and she definitely doesn’t need the clutter. But I do have them neatly packed into two same-size boxes and labeled nicely in bold marker!
Some examples of emotional or memory clutter are:
- Old toys, stuffed animals, board games, sports equipment
- Old letters, cards, notes, ticket stubs, ids, swag, party favors
- School projects, notebooks, textbooks, papers
- For the girls mostly – Barbies, stickerbooks, scrapbooks, dance costumes, dance shoes, ice skates
- Many more more! Basically any item taking up space that has no real use but has a memory attached to it.
So what tips can I give you to help with this category of stuff…
(A tip I read years ago) Take a picture of the memory item and then get rid of the physical item.
The idea is that you can look at it, frame it, or put it in a photo book. You can have a reminder in photos about the fond memory but it’s not sitting in your basement or junk drawer. Some of you many not like the idea but for some it’s enough to let go of the physical item.
Come up with an interesting way to display the item or turn it into something else.
I have a few old brooches that were given to me by my grandmother and some as gifts from my mom back in the 80s and I just never ever wear them. I’m not a brooch/pin type of person. Nonetheless, I have several that I’ve been holding onto for YEARS. I had an idea recently to turn them into small wall art, but in a cool modern way.
A simple idea I had was to get some photo frames, take out the glass and put some kind of patterned fabric or canvas material where the photo would go and pin the brooch to it. (maybe I’ll show my results in a future post:) I think I could come up with a really cool looking piece of small wall art to hang somewhere. So start thinking what you could turn your item into and display it in a way that will make you smile and honor the memory.
Scan It!
Before I moved I realized my scanner is not just for photos and slides, brilliant huh? I started scanning everything I could. I scanned old cards, letters, notes, etc… These are items I decided I definitely wanted to hold onto but it just wouldn’t make sense to send across the country and take up space in a smaller place. So now I have all these flat kind of items scanned and backed up a few times on different hard drives. And the great thing is that I actually look at them more NOW than when they were stuffed in a box. It’s cool to have it all digitally saved in my computer. If I wanted to I could get digital photo books printed of these old notes, cards, letters, etc and make a kind of digital scrapbook. It still saves a lot more space than the real thing.
I still haven’t been able to throw that stuff away and maybe I never will but I was able to digitally take it with me to the West Coast and leave the physical stuff back at my mother’s for now. This works for me to keep my new place out here less cluttered. Mom has the space, I don’t.
So hopefully these three tips help you get started. There are many more types of emotional clutter and ideas to dea with theml. Next for me is to finally part with my old stickerbook, which YES, I did bring with me on the move. I’m finally feeling that I can part with it. I will scan the stickers and get rid of the book. I’ll find a little girl who will have fun with them. And for those of you wondering, that is a Michael Jackson “Thriller” jacket at the top of my post made for the Ken doll by Barbie. This is the last Barbie item I’ve held onto. I’ve sold all my Barbies and Barbie clothes on the internet and at garage sales but the last hold out was this “Thriller” jacket! I am finally parting with this dear item and it will soon be off to Goodwill for someone else to enjoy like I have (I’ve got my photo!)
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
I think it’s a wonderful idea to take a picture of treasured pieces, so you hold onto them in your heart. This was a touching article. I liked it very much.
I hold onto too much, everything from papers to items, but mostly papers. And I hope that someday I can be clutter-free. One corner of my room is clutter-free, and I’ve kept that corner free from disorganization for 10 months. Now I have to organize the rest of my life and space.
Grace – so happy the article touched you. Getting organized and clutter-free is a process. And it always will be. Its really figuring out what’s important to you in your life. Keep up the good work you already started.
And you mentioned that papers are the bulk of your clutter. I highly recommend scanning stuff like that. As I mentioned in my post, I scanned tons of old cards, letters, notes, memos. They all had memories attached to them in some way and I just love having it all at my fingertips on my computer.