In my fourteen and a half years of professional organizing, I have tuned into my clients’ reasons that they resist letting go of things they don’t love or use.
In my classes and workshops about clutter and organizing, I go into detail about what I have termed the “Sneaky Six”- a list of the six reasons we hold on to things that don’t serve us. I will do a post on each one.
We keep things for longer than we need to because of….
- Potential (use)
- Investment (cost)
- Identity (sense of self)
- Anxiety (control)
- Obligation (guilt)
- Loss (grief)
When you struggle to let go of an item that you don’t love or use, try to identify (without judgement) which of the Sneaky Six is at work. It’s often a combination of the Six.
Let’s begin with Potential. Potential sounds like, “I’m keeping this, just in case,” or, “what if I need this tomorrow?”
This is when we hold onto something for too long because of its potential use, even if we’ve had it for a decade and haven’t used it yet. This one is tricky, because if that moment ever does arrive where you actually need an item, it will justify all of your suspicions that keeping it was the right thing to do; it feels satisfying to have exactly what you need when you need it. But that feeling can be taken too far and result in a houseful of “what if?” or “just in case” piles and stacks. We have to find our own balance of space to live, and potentially useful items. If you have a big house with plenty of storage, and are good at keeping everything organized, then keeping a lot of items based on potential might not be a problem. If you live in a small home like I do, or if you value space to live and enjoy your home more than you do having lots of stored items with potential, it’s good to examine what you will realistically use.
Keeping items based on potential sounds like this:
- “But what if…”
- “I’ll need it as soon as I throw it away.”
- “If I ever need it, it will be expensive or time-consuming to replace.”
- “I bet I can use that in a craft…”
- “I might need that for a costume if my neighbors ever throw an 80’s themed party again!”
- “I can sell it when its value peaks and make a profit.”
- “It doesn’t fit now but it might when I lose weight.”
Common items that are kept for too long based on Potential:
- Junk drawer items.
- Crafting items.
- Mystery parts of things with no discernible purpose.
- Decorative items (“well in case we redecorate, it could go with the new theme.”)
What is the honest fear underneath holding on to items that have Potential but that don’t get used or loved?
- A scarcity mentality: “The universe is unpredictable; I don’t trust it to provide for me when I am in need. So it’s up to me to save things just in case.”
- “If I get rid of it now before it has served its purpose, I am being wasteful.”
Many of us equate waste with failure (I am guilty of this). Many folks acquire, hold on, and even hoard because of a general lack of trust in life. Our stuff is just a material reflection of our beliefs. Clutter is a tangible clue that something needs to be emotionally released. If we identify why we are really keeping this stuff around, we may find it easier to release it. I have kept items for too long based on Potential: when I was a kid it was “but I can make a craft with that!!”. Until a decade ago, I kept my Italian books and notes from college because I wanted to brush up some day. I was finally able to declutter it when I took an honest look and told myself that if I ever get serious about revisiting Italian, I will download DuoLingo. I think I kept those books and notes for so long because I worried that if I donated/recycled them, I would somehow be throwing away my potential for ever speaking Italian again. At this point in my life, space in our small, closet-less home for us to play with the dogs is so much more valuable to us than piles of stuff that we might need some day.