When You Downsize Your Stuff It Positively Affects All Areas Of Your Life

You need stuff in order to live, but accumulating and keeping more stuff than you need, sucks up your time and energy until you are owned by your stuff.

I recently downsized and got rid of a ton of items, and instead of missing those items, I feel lighter, freer and happier.

I admit it was hard to pry myself away from nick-knacks that people gave me. I had an emotional attachment to the people I associated the items with, but they live on in my memory, not in the items they gave me. Letting the items go did not make me love them any less.

The old Aquarius rock that my friend Janelle Aiken gave me in grade 5 40 years ago, had to go. I donated it to the SPCA thrift store, so maybe another little girl would find it for 50 cents, and the proceeds would go to help the shelter animals. Often downsizing doesn't hurt us, and is like paying it forward to someone else who can use the items we no longer need.

Here’s What I Learned From Letting Go Of My Stuff:

The consumer mindset of accumulating increasingly more items affects your functioning in every area of your life. - mental, physical, emotional, and financial.

I know someone who is working more hours so he can buy more stuff, which doesn’t make him happy, because he is working longer to maintain it and acquire more. This pattern of needing more affected his FINANCIAL state and landed him in debt.

Your stuff affects your PHYSICAL space. You spend time and energy and money cleaning it, organizing it, de-cluttering it, maintaining it, insuring it, moving it and storing it. It adds physical weight to your life. You are not free to move on short notice. Discarding items makes your physical space simpler to maintain, cleaner and more peaceful to spend time in. Being clutter free means you travel light. You can move easily if you want to. You are free.

Having too much stuff negatively affects your EMOTIONAL state. When you feel sentimental about an item, it is hard to let go of it. It may remind you of a happy memory from the past, or even a bad experience from the past that makes you feel bad, but you still hang onto it, because that is what you do.

When we carry too many items from our past we feel stuck in the past emotionally. Items carry energy, and when we release items, we release emotions. The past lives in our memories and our hearts and our photos, not in the stuff people gave us.

Your MENTAL state is affected when you hold on to too much stuff too. You are avoiding dealing with the stuff. You are worried you will throw something away that you might need it in the future, and you are afraid to make a wrong decision, so you make no decision. Having too much stuff adds weight to your mind. It adds responsibility. That decision to buy something in the past that you don’t use, weighs on you. It releases a weight off your mind when you let it go.

Letting go of your stuff frees you to spend your time in a fulfilling way. You become more mindful of what items you choose to allow into your life and how you spend your time, money, and energy. If you were using shopping as a form of entertainment, you spent precious hours searching for items that quickly went out of fashion so you bought new ones. The cost of those items didn’t end at the checkout. You had to clean them, dust them, store them, and move them. You are free of that hassle and burden now.

Out With The Old And In With The New

Clearing out your old stuff creates space in your life for more mindfulness about what you need now. What is useful and beautiful now. It helps you remember that experiences are more valuable than stuff, because your experiences help you learn and grow and love and share which creates true happiness.

You begin to see the value in buying consumables that enhance experiences - flowers, chocolates, drinks, gift cards, food, and movie passes Less stuff, but more fun, and more intentional living.

In Summary

Keeping something because “someday” you might need it, limits your life. Someday may never come, and even if it does, you may not find the item in the mess of stuff. The tendency to accumulate things is often passed down to us by well meaning people, but we must remember we can always go out and buy something if we do need it. Accumulating experiences is much more fulfilling. Our experiences live on in our memories not in our stuff. The more experiences we create, the more expanded and beautiful our life becomes and the less we identify with and spend our precious time on our stuff.

In the end, it is not stuff that makes us happy, but becoming more of who we are through our shared experiences with other people.

photos Pixabay