I love this story from one of you! I completely agree that when things are overwhelming, letting the container make the tough decisions is so incredibly helpful.
Hi Dana, aka Nony-
I’ve been following you for awhile, and loving reading your emails and books, listening to your podcasts and watching your videos– and laughing at your wonderful sense of humour and marvelling at your ability to show who you are and your struggles to get order out of chaos, while raising a family 🙂
I raised a family of four, who are now wonderful, independent adults, while moving every 1-6 years around the US and around the world. I have gone through my stuff so many times, and suffered gut wrenching times of leaving so much behind. Being a foreign service family I’ve always known that there may be a time to evacuate in 24 hours, and take only what I can carry.
It has been suddenly become very real. With the current “situation” going on in pretty much every country, and borders closing, sheltering in place orders, etc, we may be on short notice to get “back home” within a day or so.
I had been thinking, “How do I know what to take? What do I leave?” and suddenly I thought, “Wait, I can use the container concept!”
I have only so many suitcases I can take on a plane, so I’ll just pick and choose until they’re full, and then that’s it.
Makes it much easier.
I pray we all make it through this stronger and closer to God!
Thanks so much!
P.S. The first step in my packing to evacuate is getting order in my home. A quick decluttering of visible messes so I can see what I need to pack. And that gives some sense of order to an otherwise disorderly situation. I follow your steps of clearing out the trash and putting away things- right then- that need to be put in their places so I can find them if/when I need them.Thank you for thinking all this through and putting it out there. We never know when that previous training of our brains will come in handy!
KimmyC says
I can really relate to this article. We live overseas as well and we are packing to leave. Just today I was going through some things. I was using a pouch to contain this particular type of things. There was one more of the item I was wondering if I should bring because my daughter would like it. And it fit in the pouch, so it was easy to say it could come. I didn’t feel guilty.
There are a lot of hard decisions to make, but the container concept is one that helps put parameters for what to do.
Mary Ellen Eckels says
Hi Dana,
The Container method along with your ‘layer decluttering’ method are so brilliant. When I first wrote you – maybe a year ago – I was a bit skeptical, but!!! tried it on my cluttered desktop – just to see – and voila! Amazing, cleared! Like in no time.
I just tried it again on two bigger projects – well one is HUGE and I’m achieving the same success. I’m so excited I had to tell you abou it.
First one – the seasonal closet switchover – now I love clothes and have tons – way too many. But I always find a ‘reason’ to keep them all. So I went through category by category using the Container method. I didn’t get into the emotional or value of an item – any of that. Just – this is the space I have and when it’s filled you’re done – so pick your favorites. I pretended I was shopping through mountains of shoes, clothes, etc – only category by category so no overwhelming mess on my bed so I have to sleep on the couch that night lol. Bottom line – easy peasy – no emotional overwhelm or exhaustion and I sent off 5!!! bags of ‘still with price tags” or nearly new clothes to ThredUp and two huge bags to Goodwill. YAAAAY! So now I’ll just do the one in – one out rule to maintain.
Now the HUGE project – I run a theatre and we have to move to a new building. I have 15 years of costumes and props, etc to move. But rodents, vandals, roof issues have ruined a ton of it. You could barely walk into the place. I avoided it until I had to just do it. And I did it using your rules and methods – and just kept chipping away at it. So far my town trucks have hauled away two truckloads of garbage. There’s now space to triage KEEP, THROW and determine what goes to which place – scene shop or costume shop. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Sorry this so long, but I had to tell you <3
Nell says
Please ask your listeners that if they have room to hold on to their donations, that they hold off on giving to the thrift shops until the thrift shops have had time to process all the items other people are dropping off. Call them in a few weeks and see if they are ready to handle more donations. We have to think of the recipients if we can of our good deeds of donating. Also, call the thrift shops first if you have large collections of things — National Geographics or books and ask if they want them. If not, they may end up having to pay for commecial haulers to dispose of them.
Deirdre Root says
I’m going through kitchen cabinets again. Really – FOUR packages of curry powder? My husband gets on a “cooking” kick and immediately goes out and buys all the spices for whatever he’s making. All our spices now fit neatly in our space. I told him NOT TO BUY ANY MORE SPICES WITHOUT CHECKING FIRST. I made a spice inventory database on our computer, which took forever but is worth it.