Letting-Go Experiment: Month 1

It has now been a little more than a month since I began my experiment in letting go of the extra "stuff" in my life. As I suspected, the first 30 days (June 11 - July 10) have not been too difficult, though I do admit to feeling temporarily stumped a couple of times.

I keep a running list of what I let go of each day. In the material stuff department, it has been a mix of small, inexpensive or used stuff to moderately priced or brand new stuff. Most items were used or old. A few were brand new. Items ran the gamut from magazines, to clothes, games, books, household items, and office supplies. The biggest item was a pair of cross-country skis, complete with boots and poles, that I purchased in the 1970's but only used a handful of times. Some items were tossed and some were given to charities. Nothing was sold. In the non-material department, I closed two store charge accounts and cut up the cards. It's possible that I've also let go of a couple of pounds, though these are not yet official let-go's.

And here's what I've learned so far:

1. I get overwhelmed by the amount of paper stuff that comes into my home each day - mail, newspapers, magazines and catalogues. If I can't, or don't, get to it right away, it piles up and up, creating clutter and confusion in every room in my apartment, especially in my office. It clogs my energy and my clear thinking. I am beginning to understand the importance of dealing with that paper stuff each day it arrives, and not letting it stack up. A professional organizer once advised me to handle each piece of paper mail only twice. First, either scan or read it. Second, either toss it or file it where you can easily find it again. I have tossed several trash bags full of paper stuff in the past month, and I still have a large stack of stuff to file. But I've made a start.

2. Letting go of stuff is not all that easy - at least not for me - even when surrounded with a fair amount of stuff I never use. For example, my daily newspapers sometimes pile up for days or even weeks before I read them, if I ever do. Yet, it takes an effort to throw them out if I haven't read them, because I might miss something important. And I haven't yet let go of my newspaper subscription (which is up for renewal next month). A few days ago, I threw out (recycled) all my back copies - more than a month's worth of mostly unread newspapers. Then I made a pact with myself to read each newspaper the day I receive it, and/or to toss it that same day. Already, I am breathing more easily. This, I can manage!

I have piles of magazines around that I haven't read yet also. Yet, I maintain those subscriptions too. In both cases, I say to myself, "I'll get around to reading these soon," but somehow I rarely do. There is something about the printed word - whether it be newspaper, magazine, book, or the papers in files in my office - that often seems too valuable to discard. If I were to admit to being addicted to anything (in addition to chocolate), it would be to the printed word, and especially to books. I suppose this warrants some further contemplation.

The experiment continues. Check back in mid-August to see how Month 2 went.

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An Experiment in Letting Go - Part 1

When we are in transition, the first stage is letting go. The process of letting go comes in many forms. We are sometimes called upon to let go of relationships, jobs, objects, habits, beliefs, emotions, desires, and more, including anything that clutters up our lives.

My life is too cluttered. It's not that I live in a large space or have a lot of stuff, but I do have too much stuff for the two bedroom apartment I currently occupy. Lately, I've been thinking about simplifying my life, scaling down my living even more in preparation for a move I will need to make within the next year. Along with this impending move, I also find that I am developing a strong yearning for a really stripped-down,Thoreau-esque life. How little, I wonder, could I live with and be happy?

I recently came across the book Give It Up! My Year of Learning to Live Better with Less, by Mary Carlomagno. Carlomagno is a coach and organizer, who discovered that her own life was becoming too cluttered with items and habits. So, she decided to do an experiment. Each month for a year she gave up one item or beavior, and noted what happened. In my June newsletter, I describe her experiment in more detail.

Her experiment gave me an idea.

I decided that for one year, I would let go of one thing or item each day. That's 365 "things" altogether. When you think about it, that's a lot of stuff.

Letting go includes: selling, giving away, or disposing of the item, or stopping the behavior on a permanent basis. By things, I mostly mean material possessions - especially knick-knacks, books, magazines, clothes, and other household items. However, it could also mean habits, behaviors, subscriptions, services, credit cards, or even pounds of body weight.

I've made a few "rules" for myself:

1. Material things include: furnishings, household items, clothing, books, cosmetics, weekly or monthly magazines, unopened food packages (canned goods, etc). [Junk mail, daily newspapers, opened food packages, trash, and miscellaneous office papers do not count, though whole files or notebooks of papers do count.]

2. A pound of body weight does not qualify as an "item" until and unless the weight has been off for at least a month and does not return during the year.

3. No buying or acquiring anything just for the purpose of having something to let go of later on.

4. I can let go of things in groups and log them as separate items for a sequence of days, as long as there are at least 365 items within the 365 days.

My experiement began June 11th and will end June 10th, 2007. I have started a log, to keep track of this experiment. I've been doing this for four days now. The first day, I discarded a small burned down candle that was beginning to annoy me. A relief. The second day, I let go of a pink T-shirt that I never really liked. No big deal. Yesterday, it was an extra phone book, and today it is a Newsweek magazine from April. Tomorrow, I'm donating my 30-year-old cross-country skis, poles, and boots to a fundraising fair. That decision wasn't difficult, though the form of letting go posed a challenge. I had thought of selling these skis, not giving them away.

When I started this experiment, I figured that the first month or two would be easy. There must be 30 to 60 things in my possession that I could easily part with - more, if you consider the 30-50 pounds I would happily part with, if only it were that easy! I had also identified several things around the house that I would not miss at all.

However, since I do have only four rooms full of stuff, I figure that after a while it might get downright challenging to find things to let go of. That's when the rubber will hit the road, as they say. That's when it will get interesting.

In fact, it's already getting interesting! On days 3 & 4, I had a devil of a time picking an item to release, even though there was theoretically a lot to choose from. I wonder how it will be later on down the pike, when the pickings are slimmer? Tune in periodically and see.

This experiment is about letting go of clutter - clutter of several different types, including objects, habits, services, and body pounds. And maybe - just maybe - it will come to be about a whole lot more than that.

If YOU were to let go of an item a day for a year, what would you choose, and why?

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The Power of Words

Be intentional about your word choices. Words - the building blocks of thought - have power, and they can either serve us or sabotage us (or others).

Here is my very short list of words to eliminate from our vocabularies, along with suggested words to use instead.

Eliminate: can't, cannot
Replace with: I can

Eliminate: try
Replace with: I will, I intend

Eliminate: should
Replace with: I could, I want, I choose

Eliminate: always, never
Replace with: sometimes, often, frequently, rarely, usually, occasionally

Which word(s) might be holding you back?

Here is my challenge: Pick one of the above words-to-eliminate and remove it from your vocabulary for the next week. Substitute one of the suggested empowering words instead.

Watch what happens.


Note: This article is reproduced from Connie's LifeWork Letter, May 2006 issue. To subscribe to this complimentary monthly newsletter, and/or to view archived issues, click here.