Breaking up with Materialism

Guest post by Lauren (known to her friends as L Bee) – Authoress of the personal finance site “L Bee and the Money Tree“. On her blog she details daily struggles with the ever elusive “tree of wealth”, snarky thoughts on fashion and pop- culture, and gross/funny stories about her dog, Murray. A freelance writer based out of the Atlanta area, L Bee spends her free time enjoying theater, drinking wine, and annoying her boyfriend.

I used to organize homes for a living- closets, pantries, offices -you name it, I’ve organized it. We often worked hand in hand with homeowners, especially if they needed to go through their piles of junk. This proved to be a rude awakening for some folks when they realized they couldn’t just pay us to make it go away. After all, how was I to know I was throwing away your child’s birth certificate? It was in a box of garden tools, sex toys and golf balls (true story…) If it had been up to the clutter crew we would have thrown it all away, but alas, homeowners insisted somewhere beneath all of those mountains of s@^& was a proverbial golden nugget. Purging often was the most laborious and time-intensive part of our projects.

Some people are natural born purgers. One lady gave away thousands of dollars worth of Christmas decorations without batting an eyelash. (“I don’t need them anymore” she said). Still, across the board when it came time to get rid of something sentimental it would require a monologue between the homeowner and their former selves: the new mother they used to be, the sexy college co-ed, the guy who didn’t want to get rid of his nasty recliner from college. Present self had to talk past self into giving something away. There were definitely tears. Talking about the material is a financial topic (I’m a personal finance blogger after all!) but it becomes so much more than that. Many people see their possessions as an extension of themselves, or as a stepping stone to an aspiration they still hold but put on the back burner long ago.

I’ve been guilty of materialism as recently as this summer when I paid a lot of money to haul my furniture from NYC home with me. This weekend I sold my beloved chaise to my mother-who needs some furniture to fill the lobby of her new theater company. I’m not going to lie, I hugged the chaise goodbye one last time while I was at the storage unit. I was sad because that me was gone: I was no longer a sassy New Yorker with a studio, buoyed from my college days with my big-girl job and my sense of “making it” in NYC. The chaise was the first “real” piece of furniture I had ever bought, and I loved it. Partly because I wanted to be the person with the fabulous chaise in her living room. The other part of me considers it really silly that I’m so broken up about a piece of furniture, but I finally got what all of those hoarders were whining about years ago. In the spirit of breaking up with materialism I thought I’d share some methods we used to do to help our clients part with the near and dear. I’ve even done a few of these myself!

1.) Out of sight, out of mind- This not only works with old boyfriends, but also with your stuff! If you are on the fence about something, or know in your heart of hearts that you need to get rid of it but just can’t seem to let go, box it up and put it someplace unseen. Six months to a year later I guarantee you will find said box and throw it out without a second thought.

2.) Remind Yourself- It was hard with me to part with the chaise a) because of how much money I’d spent on it and b) how much it meant. Now that I’m no longer single and live with my boyfriend we don’t have room for the item anymore.My boyfriend and I want to take a really nice vacation around Christmastime and I need to come up with my half of the money. I parted with the chaise, but I put a picture of the locale near my computer so I am constantly reminded of how I’m moving forward and where that money is going.

3.) Sleep on it- This is like “Out of sight out of mind” on crack. You go through a closet or a room and divide items into “Yes”, “No”, and “Maybe” piles. Yes are the keeps, no’s are the throwaways/donated items and the maybes are obviously things you feel iffy about. Take the No’s away immediately, put the Yes items back into their “home” and then go to bed with the Maybe pile still out, don’t put it way or push it in a corner. Come back to the pile the next day. We had so many homeowners simply trash the maybe pile the next day because they got so annoyed seeing their perfectly organized spaces with an extra pile of crap we had to make room for. You adjust to living with less faster than you could ever imagine.

4.) The Ceremony- This might be a little unorthodox, but it works. If you read my blog you will remember how I did this with a particular nightgown I was loathe to let go. Take an item you can’t bear to part with, hold it in your hand, use it one last time, or put it on a shelf and look at it for a moment. Say thank you to the item for all the wonderfulness it gave you. Imagine where it is going and how many more memories it will make with someone else (unless it’s going in the trash). You may love your kids old toys, but some new child will love them even more and actually use them. That pair of jeans you loved? Someone else will love them too! You’d be amazed at what gets re-purposed nowadays.

The most important thing to remember is that you are closing a door, and when it reopens your home will be awesome and organized. As a person you will also have more time and energy for life when you aren’t mired down by so many possessions. It sounds ridiculously cult-like phony, but so many clients bragged about how much better they felt when they didn’t have the mess nagging at them. Get it? Materialism is like a naggy boyfriend that you need to break up with.