Challenge Accepted

I am surrounded by the evidence of my move, and it is driving me insane. I still have unopened boxes and things that I just haven’t figured out where I am going to put them. It’s time to deal with all this clutter…

This is a serious challenge. Like every challenge that I tackle, though, I start with research. So I hit the internet and began digging through the plethora of blogs and articles about how to deal with clutter. I perused the library for books on organization. I watched countless YouTube videos and tutorials online. My head is full of information.

I have several areas of my clutter vortex that I have to tackle:

1) papers

2) keepsakes

3) stuff from the move

4) my emotional/psychological attachment to random crap

I did quite a bit of sorting before I moved. However, much of that sorting was done with a heavy heart and a very unclear head, as it was done because of my divorce. I did manage to purge much of what I had, even though that process was done after reading many articles on downsizing and divorce. I feel that given the challenges I faced and the time crunch, I did as good a job as I could expect. It is now time to implement phase two.

Phase 2 is going to be more involved and ruthless than the pre-move divorce culling that I achieved in phase 1 because it will involve really overcoming my attachment to random crap that I realize I have kept for decades, if not longer. What was the catalyst for this sudden motivation? My old nemesis: Facebook.

Ah yes. It started in the worst of places, some random acquaintance and their photo post. It was not so much what it was a photo of, but what I couldn’t see in the photo: clutter. I even sifted through all the photos in their albums to see if there was any clutter in other photos they had taken. I couldn’t see any, at least nothing like the mountains of crap I have taking up space in my dining room. Worse, this not-so-close friend of mine has moved just as many times in the recent past as I have, if not more. If she can have a clutter-free home, so can I, right?

Sure, it’s not healthy to compare yourself with another person, but whatever lights the fuse under my ass has got to be a good thing. I can become complacent with what is bothering me, but on some subconscious level, it drives me bonkers, and I act out in other ways. I have the next three days free from pending assignments or other commitments, so I will not squander those waiting for more, especially as I may not get more anytime soon. I will just try to get as much as I can reasonably accomplish done in these three days…Geronimo!