I am very drawn to the ideals of voluntary simplicity.

 This is one of my interests passions obsessions. I have an aesthetic sensibility that leans strongly toward minimalism, and the fact that this isn’t very apparent where I live causes me mental and emotional stress.

I’ve come to realize that’s just one more facet of my perfectionism.

Despite the fact that I own less than the average person (I share a rented apartment and basically live out of my bedroom), I still feel like I have too much stuff, and I’m always trying to whittle it down even more.

But I’ve got nothing on this guy.

I’m officially in awe of Jay Shafer and his 96-square-foot home.

Actually, he has since gotten married and had a child, so they’ve moved into a 500-square-foot home, with his little one pulled up next to it. Still pretty darn small, though, since the size of the average home in the U.S. was a little over 2,300 square feet as of 2004, according to the National Association of Home Builders.

Jay now creates plans and builds tiny houses for others through his Tumbleweed Tiny House Company, and says that the demand for them is growing. (In fact, his house is featured on Yahoo’s front page today, and the server is so busy I can’t even get through to the site now.)

On the face of it, these little homes look like the ultimate in simple living.

But that ignores what the foremost proponents of voluntary simplicity say. For example, the front page of The Simple Living Network tells us that “…simple living is not about poverty or self-inflicted deprivation. Rather, it is about living an examined life—one in which you determine what is important and enough for you, and discard the rest.”

I like that a lot.

Jay Shafer has examined his life and figured out that he can live in extremely tiny houses. Me? I’m kind of claustrophobic, and a house I could walk through in ten steps or less would drive me nuts. Even if I were to succeed at something like The 100 Things Challenge, I’d still need some physical breathing room around me.

And then there are my books. That’s the one area where I have trouble minimizing, because I do read them again and again. I’ve long since gotten rid of the ones I don’t—and even some of the ones I do. I just ended up buying those again.

I think those of us with overly self-controlling and perfectionistic tendencies need to be careful not to (*cough*) over-complicate voluntary simplicity. Or any other movement.

As I often like to say (apparently agreeing with Julia Child in the bargain), “Everything in moderation–including moderation.”

Because the one area where we really do need to be minimalistic is in our methods of self-flagellation. We’re too good at that already.

It’s far too easy for us to tell ourselves that we must meet some arbitrarily created “simplicity standard,” such as living in a wee little house or owning a certain number of things.

But simplicity and minimalism are really about finding your own answer to the question of what is enough for you.

I find that walking this line is a challenging balancing act. What about you? How do you determine what’s truly necessary in your life? Please share in the comments—I’m very interested in hearing your thoughts and experiences!

If you’re anything like me, you’ve got piles of stuff to deal with lying around and weighing on your mind. Possibly to the point where you feel so stuck you can’t move ahead.

And it’s probably not even the truly important stuff—just the basic “to do’s” that happen over and over. Bills to pay, errands to run, magazines and journals to read, receipts to sort, laundry to do, papers to file, etc., etc., etc.

When all of these recurring tasks keep accumulating, how can you ever become current with them, let alone get to the things that you really care about?

You can. But first, you need to revise your definition of “caught up.”

Believe me, I know how tough this is. I’m still partly in denial about the fact that life’s inbox will never be empty. It’s no fun feeling like you’re in perpetual catch-up mode, and the fantasy of being on top of everything…someday…is SO attractive.

But our lives are much too complex for that these days.

There’s no way we can ever accomplish EVERYTHING we want (or think we should), so we need to be selective. That’s a meaty topic in itself, but first we need to feel in control of our current situation. And so…

Today’ I’ll offer one practical, hands-on way to deal with the backlog of stuff that’s holding you back.

Here’s how.

First, choose a physical space to start clearing. Start with one room at the very most, or make it even smaller—such as your desktop or a single file drawer—so that when you get it cleared you’ll have a feeling of accomplishment and spaciousness.

Pick an area that will make a difference in the way you feel. Would it be nice to eat at your dining room table again? Or find things in the hall closet? OK, start there.

Second, if you don’t already have one, find some kind of calendar and planning system that you will actually use, at least for now. Keep it simple—maybe a spiral notebook for making lists, some sticky flags to mark off sections in it, and an inexpensive calendar to jot things in. Think basic and functional while you figure out what system works best for you.

Next, grab a few empty boxes and start going through the physical space you’ve chosen. Remove any “to do” items and sort them into three and only three groups—Urgent, Non-Urgent, and Fuhgettabouddit.

In my experience, the Fuhgettabouddit pile is the toughest one. It’s where you need to be honest and ask yourself the question, “What’s the worst that can happen if I never do this?” If the answer is something you can live with, the corresponding piece of paper or other object goes into the Fuhgettabouddit box. And then you know where to dump it.

The urgent stuff goes in another box and will remain somewhere easily accessible for now. The non-urgent material goes into the other box(es) and can be moved to a temporary holding location.

The main thing is to get your to-do piles contained and out of the way. You’ll be surprised how much better this makes you feel, even though you haven’t actually done anything about what’s in the boxes yet.

Now comes the interesting part that’ll make you go, “Huh?”

Don’t worry about the stuff in the boxes.

That’s right. You’re starting today with a clean slate.

The Fuhgettabouddit box has been dumped. The non-urgent material is waiting in the wings. The only thing you should do is quickly go through the “urgent” box for anything that needs to be taken care of by a certain date, then schedule it in your calendar.

Leave the things themselves (bills, blank birthday cards, coupons, presentation handouts, or whatever) in the box for now.

Because now there’s only one place they can be. That alone can remove enormous amounts of stress.

Every evening take a quick peek at the next day on your calendar to check what you’ll need to have with you physically, then find it in the “urgent” box and place it where you won’t forget it in the morning.

So now you don’t even have to worry about the urgent stuff falling through the cracks.

Now, make it a habitual part of your daily or weekly routine (you can schedule this in your calendar as well) to gradually dig through the “non-urgent” box or boxes. This can be as simple as ten minutes twice a week, or five minutes a day. Nothing there is pressing, so it doesn’t matter if you go slowly, as long as you gradually work through the box(es). Just make the time period you block out extremely achievable and non-intimidating so you’ll really do this.

You now have a plan for dealing with your backlog and can start fresh.

The final step is to design a VSS (Very Simple System) to manage the stuff that moves through the area you’ve just cleared.

In other words, you’re starting from scratch—from a place of spaciousness and clarity. Without all the stuff that’s been cluttering up the space and keeping you stuck.

Again, begin simply. If you’ve just excavated your desk, for instance, you might create a new home for any bills that need to be paid—under a paperweight, in a tiny vertical sorter, in one of those giant paperclip standup thingies.

Or you might set up an “in” tray for magazines and other papers you want to read—and resolve not to let the stack grow higher than the top of the tray. If it does, make it a point to deal with enough of the things in it (read, file, or toss) to whittle the stack back down to size.

And that’s it, at least for starters. Just change one or two small things at a time, and wait until you get in the habit of using your new VSS before tackling another physical area and setting up more of them.

Baby steps. Just remember—baby steps.

Let me know how it goes.

I’ve never been a packrat. By most people’s standards, I live quite simply and don’t have a lot of “stuff.” I have learned, though, that a lot of the material I do accumulate is like sea wrack, washed up against the shores of my living space by the waves of projects I’ve started and not completed.

Oh, I’ve tried to complete them—most of them, anyway. Usually by organizing the heck out of them first. I’ve kept lists of projects. I’ve whittled those projects down to bite-sized tasks, devised methods to streamline and schedule those tasks, and created whole systems to track my progress so that I could have the joy of crossing things off my to-do list. I’ve spent hours, days and weeks blasting through those to-do lists like dynamite in an all-out effort to finish as many projects and tasks as quickly I could, so that I could have the simple, uncluttered life I crave.

It never, ever occurred to me that I could simplify my life by eliminating things without finishing them.

In late 2001 I fulfilled a long-held dream and began to learn to play the Indian tabla drums. I took lessons for five years from one of the world’s acknowledged best tabla players, Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri. I adored the classes, and Swapanji is a wonderful, patient and gently humorous teacher whom I miss deeply . . . because I haven’t taken lessons now for over two years.

It broke my heart, but I had to stop for my own benefit. I took the classes far too seriously, and I felt such a sense of obligation that the lessons became more of a chore than anything else. I was feeling enormous stress over the fact that I couldn’t practice as much as I wanted to, and I thought I wasn’t doing justice to either the money I was spending on the classes or, even more important to me, the beautiful musical tradition of the tablas.

At the end of it all (and I still choke up just writing that), I was left with five years’ worth of cassette tapes. Tapes? Yes, because we learned so much so quickly each week that Swapanji allowed us to record the classes. I would come home from class, play through the tape, write down the new composition we’d learned, and refer to it as I practiced throughout the week or refreshed my memory of it later.

These tapes held pure gold. They contained the teachings of a living legend, instructing very small groups of students in a tiny room. Swapanji played each new composition for us. He gave us individual attention and advice. He gave encouragement, sometimes talked about the history of the tablas, and often told funny stories.

But 90% of the tapes were filled with us students, ineptly tapping and pounding away as we attempted to stuff each new kaida, rela, tukra and chakradhar into our short-term memories. This was nothing I would ever want to listen to again.

Once I’d finish transcribing each week’s tape into my permanent notes, I’d save it with the intention of extracting the 10% of the material with real value for future reference. So when I stopped taking classes, I had a gigantic box filled with five years’ worth of cassettes. I consoled myself with the thought that since I was (*sniffle*) no longer learning anything new, I would finally have time to deal with them all.

It was an Enormous Project. Just getting the (sometimes undated) tapes into chronological order took me a long time. The next step was to listen to roughly 200-250 hours of class tapes through an analog-to-digital converter, and sift through the dirt of the vast, useless majority of the recordings to find the tiny nuggets of gold where Swapanji was actually talking and teaching. I would then need to save those smaller files, date-label them, catalog their contents, and burn them to CD for safekeeping.

I really thought I could do it. In my spare time, outside of my full-time job and my many other projects and commitments. I expected myself to. This unfinished project weighed on my consciousness for two full years. All unfinished things have an oppressive weight to them, but this one was extra-heavy. After all, those tapes were priceless! They deserved to be saved, if not for me, then for posterity!

But slowly I realized that posterity didn’t much care. That other people took these classes, too. That I wasn’t personally responsible for being the caretaker of the material I’d learned. That Swapanji had been recorded—professionally—hundreds of times over the decades.

That I really, truly didn’t have to do this project at all. Ever.

So . . . I threw away the box.

Then I cried.

And then I was swept with the most profound feeling of relief I’d felt in years.

How odd that my biggest lesson came when I stopped taking classes.

Now it’s time for an admission. I’m really, really bad at being gentle with myself.

Specifically, I’ve been in a physical purging phase (no, not bulimia, just uncluttering) for a handful of months now, and at times I’ve been downright brutal about it. And you know what? Mostly it’s felt really, really good.

So I guess the last one was the “closure” post, and this one is the “disclosure” post. As in, full disclosure on my part. Because no matter what I said last time, and no matter what I say in the future, sometimes just digging in and going full bore until you’ve got some tangible results in one intense session of something can be extremely satisfying.

What’s been hard has been dealing with my own limited stores of energy, and that’s where the patience and compassion have come in. I can’t always go full bore like I used to. When I was in my teens, twenties, and early 30s I could burn the candle at more ends than the candle had, and to hell with the consequences. Well, now I’m living with the consequences. I’ve learned you can’t ignore your body completely, because it will let you know in no uncertain terms when it’s had enough of your disrespect. I’ve learned (well, okay, I’m learning) to ride the waves of energy as they come; to be grateful when I have enough to get things done, and to be at least somewhat at peace when I just need to stop and rest for a while.

But the stuff? The physical stuff? Oh, I’m getting rid of it right and left. I’m being as responsible as I can, taking bags of clothing and usable household items to Goodwill, but I’m also making myself just toss things. Sure, maybe I could get a few bucks for, say, that piece of old concert memorabilia on eBay, but to be honest it’s just not worth my time, effort, and energy. Energy has become currency to me, and I sometimes have to be even more thrifty with it than I am with money. (Ooh, ooh—I could write a blog post about that. Let me know if you’d like me to write a blog post about that.)

Anyway, back to brutality. (Now there’s something I never expected to type in my blog.) During any of my recent decluttering sessions, I’d pick up the next thing in the area I was working on and ask myself, “Is this something that you love? Not just like, but truly cherish?” If not, I’d ask, “Is this something you use with any regularity?” If the answer to both questions was no, the item was history. Okay, there some exceptions, such as paycheck stubs, tax returns, and other papers that I sort of have to keep on file for a certain amount of time, and a few projects that I still intend to do (no, really!) and simply haven’t gotten around to yet. And books. My biggest gazingus pin. I’ve learned the folly of getting rid of books. It doesn’t work—they find a way back.

So if you find yourself ready for an intense bout of Whatever-Clearing, here are some tips I can offer you based on what has worked for me.

Clearing physical possessions? Give them the Active Ownership Test.

Active ownership is different than passive ownership. Passive ownership is keeping your two-sizes-too-small jeans in the very back closet where you can’t see them, so they are there if you ever lose the weight. Active ownership is hanging them in full view as a motivator to do your daily workout. (Not that you should—that’s just an example off the top of my head.) Passive ownership is storing a box of Grandma’s heirloom jewelry on a shelf somewhere. Active ownership is keeping a few pieces in your jewelry box and wearing them occasionally, with fond thoughts of her when you do. Passive ownership is using your weight bench as a clothing rack and plant stand. Active ownership is picking up those barbells and dumbbells on at least a semi-regular basis and doing some lifting.

The Active Ownership Test fits into the concept of wabi-sabi. Does the thing you’re considering have great value for you, such that you truly cherish its utility, uniqueness and presence in your life, or is it just taking up space? I’m not advocating asceticism, or tossing out things you really will regret later, but it’s important to recognize that our possessions take up energy in our psyches as well as space in our homes and offices. If you’re only passively owning something, you might want to take a close look at it and decide whether it’s worth the space and energy needed to maintain it. Letting go of things does not make you a bad, disrespectful, wasteful, or ungrateful person if it’s truly time to let them go.

Working on your to-do lists? Give them the Rolaids Test.

Yes, I just made this up right now, because I’m a word geek who likes inventing acronyms. And yes, it’s kinda silly.

That activity you’re considering. Does it have a ROLAIDS (Realistic Or Likely Action I’ll Do Soon) in its pocket? If it does, leave it on your to-do list. If not, do one of two things with it. Either put it on a separate “someday/maybe” list (concept courtesy of David Allen’s book Getting Things Done) so that it’s written down where you can review it later but you don’t have to waste energy by having to remember it, or drop it from your list entirely. Ahhhh! How do you spell relief? )

In either case (physical items or to-dos—and yes, those can and often do overlap), an intense session of Going Through Your Stuff can have fast-acting, stomach-easing results. But use with caution! This method works so powerfully that it can sometimes trigger unintended trauma. When in doubt, test it on a small portion of your home or office first, wait 24 hours, and observe the results. Proceed carefully. Less invasive methods may be indicated.

And always consult your decluttering doctor before beginning any new exorcizing program. Here are a few I recommend highly because I’ve personally worked with them all:

Lisa Baldwin of Divine Order
Jennifer Hofmann of Inspired Home Office
Shannon Wilkinson of Your Life – Inspired

And remember—if you can—that being gentle with yourself also works wonders.

Or so they say.

No, it’s not something you would order at your neighborhood sushi bar. Nor is it a new character in a manga comic book. It’s a Japanese compound word which describes an entire philosophy and aesthetic in four simple syllables.

You’ve got to love the Japanese for being so elegantly efficient.

A little Internet research reveals the inevitable drama and conflict—some say that the two words wabi and sabi should never be used together. (Neither word translates directly into English. Wabi holds connotations of loneliness, rustic simplicity, humility, and quietude; sabi refers to imperfection, the aging process, and the interest these lend to things.) Others decry the new popularization of wabi-sabi in the West, and its commoditization as a new “style” in architecture, interior design, and the like.

So here’s my disclaimer. I’ve spent maybe 30-45 minutes looking into the term, and it’s pretty much guaranteed that I’m not going to do justice to the subtlety and richness of the concepts involved. But since the object of this blog is to highlight the practice of imperfection, it feels like it would be very humble-and-imperfect of me to continue.

Of all the discussions I found online, this is my favorite. From the first two paragraphs:

Pared down to its barest essence, wabi-sabi is the Japanese art of finding beauty in imperfection and profundity in nature, of accepting the natural cycle of growth, decay, and death. It’s simple, slow, and uncluttered—and it reveres authenticity above all. Wabi-sabi is flea markets, not warehouse stores; aged wood, not Pergo; rice paper, not glass. It celebrates cracks and crevices and all the other marks that time, weather, and loving use leave behind. . . . Wabi-sabi is underplayed and modest, the kind of quiet, undeclared beauty that waits patiently to be discovered. . . . It’s a richly mellow beauty that’s striking but not obvious, that you can imagine having around you for a long, long time . . .

I started this blog to talk about perfection and imperfection, but in my mind, they keep bringing me back to concepts like clarity, simplification, and authenticity. There’s a close relationship between these things and allowing myself to let go of my need for perfection, and that’s why I was excited to find a strongly resonant term that ties them all together.

But there’s also a paradox. I have a personal aesthetic that is very wabi-sabi on its surface—my dream house, for instance, would contain lots of grainy wood and irregular stone and earthy-looking fabric and soft, natural tones and comfy furniture you could put your feet on, and very little plastic and shimmer and glitter and ruler-straight lines and loud colors and modular, matched fixtures.

My desire to pare down my personal possessions to only those things I truly need, love, or both also seems to fit the wabi-sabi philosophy very well.

But I’m forever wanting to declutter, organize, buy things that look artfully distressed, and otherwise force-fit my space and my belongings into the spare, uncluttered, and peacefully serene picture I have in my head.

In other words, I think I have a romanticized notion of imperfection.

Ouch.

Rather than trying to fit myself into an idealized image of what I think imperfection “should” look like, wouldn’t it be more authentic and humble and mentally/emotionally quiet and peaceful of me to simply accept that my space doesn’t look like I want it to, and make changes slowly as I can without beating myself up over the fact that it’s all . . . erm, not perfectly imperfect yet?

This new revelation actually came about as I was writing this post. Yay! Fresh insight! Now I just have to let it percolate for a while.

I guess what it all means is that (cough) I would like to lobby for making wabi-sabi not just a hobby, but a part of my regular jobbie.

(And if I haven’t just scared you off with that, feel free to comment!)

Wrong.

In fact, the physical clutter that surrounds us is often a source of guilt and shame. In classic perfectionist style, we tell ourselves that we “should” be able to manage our stuff and our surroundings better. We often don’t invite people to our homes for fear they will judge us for our messy dwellings. And the clutter can weigh on our minds even when it’s not in sight. I’ve often said that the state of my mind reflects the state of my bedroom; even when I’m somewhere else, I can’t think clearly because I’m remembering the mess that awaits me when I get home and feeling the pressure to deal with it.

So why does this counterintuitive thing happen? Why do perfectionists so often find themselves being . . . well, really messy? For a number of reasons.

One is the drive to be thorough and complete beyond necessity. Maybe you have piles of magazines or papers sitting around that you haven’t read yet. Or craft projects, or clothing to mend, or auto parts in the garage, or that broken clock you’ve been meaning to fix for the past two years. To toss these things would constitute an admission that you’ll never get around to doing them even though you’ve decided that you should. And that would mean you’re less than the perfectly together person you want to feel you are.

Another reason is the infamous “just in case.” What if you finally lose the weight you’ve been trying to, and you can fit into that overflowing closetful of pefectly good “skinny” clothing again, rather than the ten or twelve outfits you’ve been rotating through for the last year? What if you eventually write that book or start that business, and need a quote from that very article you printed off the Internet several months back? You know, the one perched precariously on the stack of boxes in the corner full of books you really do intend to read. Someday soon now, honestly.

Sometimes you simply feel overwhelmed by the thought of all the decluttering that needs to be done, and so you keep finding (consciously or unconsciously) ways to avoid it.

If you see yourself reflected in any of these descriptions, there are things you can do to begin extricating yourself from the morass of stuff that surrounds you, both physically and psychologically.

First, take an honest look and decide whether it’s really all that bad. If you’re anything like me, you hold yourself to a higher standard than anyone else around you. So pretend for a moment that this is a friend’s house, or a colleague’s office. Would you fault them for what you see, or would you consider the amount of clutter to be reasonable? Maybe it makes the home feel cozy and lived-in. Maybe it’s the office of a busy person who has more important things to do right now than handle all the back-filing. Would you be forgiving of the way this space looks if it wasn’t your own? If so, can you allow for the possibility of forgiving yourself?

If you decide that the mess truly is problematic, there are some things you can try to circumvent your pesky inner perfectionist. One very effective method is to assign yourself one extremely small area per day to declutter. You might tackle the top of one cabinet one one day, or a single desk drawer. If you’re decluttering the kitchen, do one cabinet shelf. Have two boxes or baskets handy. In one, toss the items you’re going to get rid of. The other is for all the items that are being temporarily displaced until you find or clear a space for them to have a new home. You’ll be surprised how quickly you will see a difference in your physical environment by tackling just one small area a day. Even more, you’ll begin to feel a sense of clarity, space, and relief that will amaze you.

Another thing to try is to get some of your thoughts and feelings down in words. Write about why you really want to use up those candlemaking supplies or work your way through that stack of novels. Sometimes just getting it all down on paper is enough to give you some fresh perspective on the situation. This can clarify your goals, allowing you to refocus on some while possibly eliminating others–and all the physical stuff that goes with them.

You can also try reasoning with yourself about what you actually need. If you tend to hoard things, sometimes you can find ways to gently release some of them from your life. If you ever really want to read a particular book again, there is always the library, or the Internet since so many publications are now available online, either for free or (for used copies) cheaply on sites like eBay or Amazon. How quickly can you honestly expect to lose the weight you want to, and wouldn’t someone who shops at Goodwill or the Salvation Army be able to get good use from your non-fitting clothing while you’re losing it? Besides, think what fun it will be to shop for new clothing to celebrate your weight loss when you get there! Maybe you can even plan on doing that at Goodwill yourself.

I remember reading about a man who sold all his unneeded things on eBay, and banked the money in an “If I Ever Need to Repurchase Anything I’ve Sold” account. Which he then earned interest on. Brilliant idea.

Sometimes it’s just too much for you to face on your own. In those instances, it’s often best to enlist the help of a professional. Paying for decluttering assistance is not a luxury–it’s a legitimate “taking care of yourself” investment that will pay off many times over in increased peace of mind, productivity, and ability to focus on what’s truly important in your life. In the United States, the National Association of Professional Organizers maintains a list of accredited professional organizers with many different areas of expertise. This is the best way to find a trustworthy professional organizer in your area. 

Surprisingly, there are many people who can assist you at a distance over the Internet. Three individuals I can recommend (I am not being compensated for these recommendations, by the way) are Jennifer Hofmann of Inspired Home Office, Lisa Baldwin of Divine Order, and Alison Marks of Inside Out Design Coaching. Check them out to see if what they do resonates with you.

The main piece of advice I can give you throughout any of these processes is to be compassionate with yourself. You are a diligent, hardworking person who sincerely wants to do the best you can–that’s why you’ve surrounded yourself with so many to-do’s, probably more than you can handle. It absolutely does not mean you’re a failure if you never get to them all.

We’ll talk about these inner, “feeling” aspects of perfectionism much more as time goes on, and how we can be gentle and forgiving with ourselves.

In the meantime, happy gradual and compassionate decluttering to you! Feel free to respond in the comments below and let me know how it’s going for you, or if you have any questions you’d like me to address in future posts. You’re always welcome to e-mail me, too. My e-mail address is at the bottom of the “about me” page.