Survey #242—Full Response from Ginger
| Please read the two statements below, then answer the questions that follow. | 🔳 Nature vs Nurture: Statement B and possibly a step beyond. ▪️ I believe I’m a naturally organized person. Always have been. I remember sorting the neighbor’s button box when I was 5. And, cleaning and organizing my parents’ medicine cabinet before school one morning. I was in the 2nd grade. I always liked my things tidy. I’m frequently called upon by family to help them organize their homes. ▪️ I believe I have the knowledge and skills to declutter and organize. I know the steps, the questions to ask myself, the reasons why I want to declutter. I understand the pitfalls of certain practices like pulling more out than I can deal with in one session, shuffling clutter to other spaces, etc. ▪️ I’ve read all the books and explored the various methods with their various different perspectives. ▪️ I’ve questioned - and answered - “how much is enough” for most categories of our possessions. |
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| Please read the two statements below, then answer the questions that follow. | 🔳Confronting the Elephant: Somewhere between A & B. ▪️When I approach a decluttering project it CAN feel overwhelming. But not so much I won’t work on it. I DO know where to start & how to work my way thru it. I’m good at breaking jobs into smaller chunks. And, I do well with assessing the clutter and making decisions before ever taking actions, then quickly taking the actions. Arms-length decisions seem to work best for me. ▪️I think my biggest obstacle is staying with the declutter project thru to the end. ▪️I lose focus. ▪️Or, perfectionism rears its ugly head. I must do A before I can do B. This is why the shower rod & curtain hasn’t been rehung. I intended to scrub the tile walls. ▪️Or, I feel indecisive about what to do with the stuff. Clean it up & donate it? Or, throw it out? Or, I start another project. I have 2 going now! |
| Please read the two statements below, then answer the questions that follow. | 🔳 Sentimental Values: I have a different approach. ▪️I keep a list of sentimental items. I describe the item and who it’s from. I’ve taken photos and written stories about them. Sometimes - the story doesn’t quite live up to my initial feelings about it. I begin seeing it in a different light. Some of these items are on a “goodbye tour” in my mind. ▪️I revisit the list periodically and consider my feelings about the items. I’ve donated a few items. I’ve taken a few items to our annual family reunion and auctioned them off for other family members to enjoy. |
| Please read the two statements below, then answer the questions that follow. | 🔳 Justin Case. Statement B. ▪️I’ve graduated from any version of a scarcity mindset. I’m not worried about needing it and not having it. ▪️I struggle more with feelings of it being wasteful to get rid of perfectly good things. I have countered these feelings with a story about how I need to set it free to live out its useful life with someone who WILL use it. Otherwise, it sits on my shelf gradually becoming useless. How sad. ▪️No more of the annual exercise of testing all the pens to throw out the dried up ones - then returning the remaining pens to “death row”. We know which pens we like. We buy what we need - when we need them. |
| Please read the two statements below, then answer the questions that follow. | 🔳Sunken Treasure: Statement B ▪️When I’ve donated expensive or new, unused items (juicer, shoes, new clothes with tags, etc.) I think “someone is going to be happy with this find”. |
| Write a statement that summarizes your current mindset with respect to the decluttering and organizing journey. | 🔳 My Current Unique Mindset re: Decluttering & Organizing ▪️We wrote a vision about how we wanted our home to feel and function. We continue to work toward this vision while maintaining the parts of the vision we’ve achieved. We’ve achieved most of our vision. ▪️The section of our vision related to Decluttering and Organizing reads: “We regularly make decluttering rounds through our home to maintain the order and root out clutter. We question everything. Every item in our home has its own designated space. There is nothing stored under our beds or on the floors of closets. We KNOW what we have and WHERE it is stored. We USE everything we own. We have everything we NEED. We're HAPPY with our possessions. They SERVE us well and bring us JOY. We have ENOUGH. Not too many. Just Enough. Just enough bath towels. Just enough bed linens. Just enough dishes and clothes. Just enough food. Just enough pens and pencils. Just enough. Each year we assess our needs and make repairs/updates and replace worn items.” ▪️Each year - we assess the status of our home. I identify the areas in maintenance mode, the areas needing tweaking and areas needing a serious declutter. We also look for other maintenance and repair jobs and areas needing refreshed. This year we’re doing a lot of refreshing. Paint, new flooring, new furniture. I plan to have fewer tables, fewer drawers in furniture. So, we’ll be getting the clutter out. ▪️This year - I’ve set a monthly goal to COMPLETE one declutter project each month. (Complete = items totally removed from our property.) I’ll also continue my usual monthly maintenance decluttering of the spaces in maintenance mode. They are staying that way with monthly clutter checks. I’ll gamify these projects as much as possible. |
| Future topics | Great survey! I’m looking forward to the content planned this year. The room reviews and other planned future topics make me feel more enthusiastic about completing a homework assignment to report in the tittle each week. |
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