Feeling the need to de-materialise (long sorry)

I would look - I remember articles about research into compulsive clutterers linked to on there.

I just dread my house ending up like my parent's - stuffed full and filthy. A real Kim and Aggie job

I have a bead collection too - am tempted to offer to take it all off your hands but am also concerned I will never have time to use mine!

I am so with you all. I hate clutter, hate stuff, and If I’m honest feel a bit.. miffed at the idea people attach so much meaning to objects. My in laws will not throw anything away, but the result? their house looks like a cave, shite everywhere, and sometimes i feel tense just walking in. its closing in on me!

I will throw anything away. I very much wished this translated into not buying things, but unfortunately not.

our house now is tiny, and I actually love it because we CAN’T get things in. the downside is all out furniture was bought when we lived in a bigger house so it sometimes looks like a furniture shop!

I feel so much calmer, more orderly and organised when there is no clutter.

(ok, this is really OCD but one of my biggest fears is I’ll get ill (just flu or something, not anything awful!) have to spend a week in bed and MrH will clutter everything up for a whole week unattended. I actually get stressed thinking about it. I actually spent the lead up to my wedding concerned about coming home to a house with stuff everywhere from where we’d been getting ready there. its odd, I know)

I have a friend who is a lovely declutterer, I’d love to know how she does it. She says they just have to as their flat is so small but it works really well.

Hyacinth, I think thats the key getting rid of stuff would make me calmer because things are more orderly and organised (cos theres not so much of it)

I thought it sounded silly saying I can get stressed out about the fact we have lots of stuff, how daft does that sound? But less stuff would make me calmer, this I know!

Lol! It's hard isn't it? I have so many hobbies that I simply don't have the time to pursue.

I think I will get it all bagged up, counted and photographed tonight, I will sell it, I will...

Result! Svensk has been motivated to sell her beads!

There is a link to pisodes of a program on hoarders here

http://www.aetv.com/hoarders/episode-guide/

Knownowt - I am so glad i read that - it's me to a tee. I feel quite disgusted with the amount of consumption. I am not a hoarder but I love shopping, and I am very materialistic - I think i equate success with the capacity to buy things - I know it stems from childhood and my mum who was born into real poverty - Glasgow slums basically - and she just can't help herself when she has a Saturday free she goes shopping for absolutely no reason and comes back with all this STUFF. I kid myself that because i don't hoard (the charity shop loves me!) and don't go shopping, that it's not a big problem, but actually it is; i just shop online. I clear it out; i fill it up again. My husband drives me batty beecause he IS a hoarder - but let's face it - his turnover of stuff is just a lot slower than mine. His parents' house is huge and completely full of JUNK because his mum won't throw anything away in case it comes in useful. He claims that because he's a historian that his stuff is "future social history" and he won't throw it out. but of what use is a Vietnamese rug which he bought in Saigon in 1986 which is vile - that just tells future social historians that in the 1980s the Vietnamese made lots of money out of gap year students with more money than sense.?

This is a great blog /the-minimalist-principle-omit-needless-things/ which iI enjoy reading. I also like Flylady's saying: "you can't organise clutter" - I am looking at my children's things and thinking they have about 4 times as many toys as any child needs, and given J's favourite activity is riding a stick in the garden that's shaped a little bit like a horse, and waving another stick that looks a little bit like a sword, I know they don't need it. But it's a bit rich throwing out their stuff when i have a house full of books which i won't throw out but probably won't read again, as if books are disqualified from this.

/love-life-not-stuff/

Rache, I'm almost the opposite - I can't bear to get rid of or replace things that aren't actually worn out/broken, so I have a lot of essential things (tablemats, for instance) that are as tatty as hell but still "work", and I'm fond of them, so I keep them, and keep my other ones for "best". I infuriate myself ? Very little clutter though, except books.

I'm trying to do this as we move into our new house. Thankfully our old one was an apartment with no storge so we don't have huge piles of things, but do have a lot of 'stuff', most of which is unused. Knownowt was far more eloquent than me, but we were quite poor as kids, and I had to leave uni coz of debt, and I think I see stuff as success, when, in fact, I would far rather travel.

My cookbook collection is excluded from all this though, I love it.