www.jillcampbellfarris.com

Meet Jill Farris.  I don’t know where to begin to introduce this amazing woman to you.  She is a long time homeschooler, writer, and speaker and has spent much of her life working with Wycliffe in Bible translation.  There’s so much more to her than that though and you’ll be blessed if you click over to her blog (after reading this post of course–grin.)

Here’s Jill with her wisdoom on decluttering:

 De cluttering Begins in Your Brain

(and other wise and mysterious truths you didn’t know you needed to hear)

Years ago I read a Heloise’s Household Hints book that said we can hire someone to clean our houses but we can’t hire someone to make important decisions about which of our possessions we should keep, sell or give away.

Heloise was right! It’s up to you and I am here to help you face up to your responsibility!

If you are a follower of The Grocery Shrink you are a do-er (or a wannabe do-er). If you have read Angela’s incredible story of the really hard choices her family made to get out of debt and you were inspired by it, than you are just the kind of person who can learn to tackle clutter and create the kind of peaceful, orderly home you want.

De cluttering really does begin in your brain because that’s where you think about all the stuff you own.
Your brain looks at that strange looking thing that is (quite frankly) ugly to the rest of us and your brain says to your emotions, “Oh, don’t you remember? Your best friend in the eighth grade gave that to you the day you moved away and never saw her again…you can’t get rid of that.”

So you lovingly clean the ugly little whatever-it-is and cram it back into an already full box and then stuff the box back onto an overflowing shelf. Or, you may look at a brand new blouse and feel guilty every time you look at it because you paid too much for it and it wasn’t until after you got it home that you realized you didn’t look good in it. You can’t just get rid of it because (after all) you paid perfectly good money for it and you feel so bad about that…

You see how clutter starts in your brain?
We keep stuff for a reason. The reason may be as simple as being too tired to drop it off at the thrift store…but it’s still a reason.

I’m here to get your brain thinking about the why of your stuff (The why of your stuff doesn’t that sound like some odd motivational seminar?) because you can go through all the steps of clearing clutter and organizing your home but if you haven’t dealt with your emotional tie to your possessions nothing is going to change.

I’ll begin with stating a few truths that you probably already know but it helps so hear them said out loud.

1) People are more important than possessions. Value the people in your life and think less about what you wish you could buy.
2) Given the amount of stuff each of us has, it stands to reason that you will get rid of something and later regret it. I call this de clutterers remorse. It happens to the best of us. If you were meant to have that item again, you’ll get it again. If not, it wasn’t meant to be. Don’t waste time fretting about it.
3) Frugality does not mean holding onto everything. We have far more material goods than people did even 40 years ago. Even if you have a large family it may not save you money to hold onto clothes to hand down to the next child. Use your space wisely.
4) If you have a real problem with letting go of your stuff don’t have a garage sale. Planning a garage sale will postpone you releasing the stuff from your house. Get it out! It’s more important to free up time and space than trying to make money by selling it.give it away.

Another Heloise’s Household Hint said, “Never clean out a drawer or cupboard unless you are really mad….you’ll just clean it out and put all the same stuff back into a clean drawer.” Another good piece of advice!

Are you mad? Are you sick of the clutter? Or maybe (like Angela) you are nearing childbirth and feeling that last minute desperate “Am I ready?” feeling. Childbirth or frustration…whatever it takes.

Let’s start tossing! Yippee!