"Addicted to a Real Bad Thing"

There's an old song called "Addicted" by Cheryl Wheeler.  She sings, "I'm addicted to a real bad thing...".  Her "addiction" is a guy who isn't good for her but she can't seem to live without him.

I, too, am addicted to some real bad things.  Stuff.  I have too much of it.  My kids have too much of it.  I feel claustrophobically crowded in a house that is adequate for our needs.   My girls each have their own rooms - the same rooms that 40 years ago were probably occupied by at least 2 children each.  My boys share what used to be a master bedroom and it still feels too small.  Their rooms are filled with things -  all sorts of things. My almost-seven year-old recently told me he doesn't want very many toys for his birthday because it's too hard to keep his room clean.  He told me this a couple of months ago when he was cleaning his room, but I didn't think he meant it.  Now I realize having too much stuff wears on him, too.  And yet, I pushed him for a list of things he wanted for his birthday so I would have ideas when I was asked about it.  That's just not right! I should have run with him reminding me that we don't need more stuff, but now it's too late. 

I'm afraid I've found myself coveting larger homes with room to breathe, but perhaps the problem is as much that we have too many things as it is that our home is too small for the number of people living here.  I am sick of organizing and reorganizing because we have so much stuff that we have to keep inventing new ways to organize it so it will fit in our house and so that we can live in a semi-orderly home.  What a waste of time.  When you consider what makes a truly meaningful life, organizing and reorganizing can really get in the way.

I am particularly afraid to make my kids get rid of all their junk stuff. I worry that I am raising a new generation of overstockers (nice way of phrasing it, huh?) because I don't know how to teach them to live with less.  I don't want to be remembered as the wicked mother that made her children part with their beloved belongings.  In fact, Olivia (age 9) just reminded me today about when I traded her old, way-too-tiny bicycle for one that would fit Alex when she got a new, bigger one that fit her.  This happened two years ago and I'm still hearing about it!

We accumulate stuff in so many ways:

• Retail therapy - there's the thrill of the hunt, or finding something that is perfect this week then change our minds next week.  Or there's the awesome deal that we simply cannot pass by.  And once we've spent money on something, for some reason it seems like we have to keep it for some period of time before we can get rid of it, even if we know shortly after we brought it home that it was a mistake. 
• Gifts - from Happy Meal toys to elaborate birthday or Christmas gifts these things add up quickly.  How about dumb little toys we give and get for our kids and their friends for birthdays?  We end up with tons of stuff we just don't need.  Their parts get strewn about bedrooms and yards and cars and we spend half our lives reorganizing our too-much-stuff .  And then there's all the time we spend nagging our kids to put their things away.  Even though most years I help my kids go through their things before Christmas to find things to donate to the D.I. before all the new stuff gets dragged in I'm certain we aren't taking as many things out as we're bringing in.  How do I know?  We have way more stuff than we used to have.
• Donations - People give us things we'll probably need in the future so we won't have to spend money on them later.  But then we have to store them and hope we remember we have it when we end up needing them.  These donations have helped our family spend very little on clothing for the past dozen years, but sometimes I wonder about saving things for a couple of years (storage), not knowing if the sizes or styles will even work for the child they're intended for.  I have a beautiful system for rotating clothing and keeping track of it by size and gender, but even with my great system I have a huge pile of Rubbermaid containers in my garage waiting for my kids to grow into them.  For the record, I love hand-me-downs and so do my kids (really!)
• Sentimental Stuff - I am not very sentimental about things (pictures don't fall into the "things" category for me, by the way) but this is a huge reason for overstuffed houses. I am not making any judgments here, I'm just pointing out another reason we accumulate.

And we keep stuff we don't need for many different reasons:

• We don't want to offend the giver
• We might need it "someday"
• We intend to eventually get to that project
• We don't know how to get rid of the things that accumulate a little at a time
• We keep adding things without getting rid of things at the same rate

Of course neither of these lists are complete - I just wanted to get you thinking.

In my extended family I am likely the one that gets rid of excess stuff the most frequently and the fastest, but I am still woefully overstocked because I don't know how to get rid of enough.  Maybe I'll get rid of a box of junk each week for the rest of the year.  Or maybe I should do it all in one fell swoop.  Or maybe I should put it all in a holding spot for a while to see if I end up needing it.  (Side note: because we can't seem to part with our stuff, storage units are apparently the business to be in right now in our society!)  Or maybe I'll invent a device that counts and categorizes items in and items out of a home so we can all manage our stuff before it gets too out of control  (somehow I think that wouldn't help the underlying problem). Or maybe it's time for a big yard sale (then again, maybe selling our junk teaches our kids that we can't get rid of it unless we get something in exchange for it).  What to do?!

The other day my sister was telling me how much she wants to get rid of things to simplify her life, but then she starts working on it and finds a reason for keeping almost everything.  I told her if she took care of my family for a week I could do it for her.  And then I realized I want someone to do the same thing for me at my house.  It would be immensely easier to get rid of someone else's stuff because each person has a tendency to keep different kinds of things (while we're on the subject can I just say that I would love to go through my husband's closet to weed out a ton of his stuff, but can't seem to part with much of what is filling my side of the closet, even though I don't wear it). But if someone else were to come in and de-clutter my house I'd probably end up being mad that the stuff I had saved for a reason was no longer at my disposal every time I needed it.  Or maybe it would be worth not having something at my fingertips once in a while in order to keep a more simplified home.  I think this is the direction I'm headed.

I'm reminded of a phrase I heard frequently in my youth: "All of life is a trade-off."  (Thanks, Dad, for this timeless phrase.)

And so I ask my readers..how do you (or have you in the past) dealt with the stuff in your life?  Any tips and tricks you want to share would be appreciated!


UPDATE, ADDED A FEW DAYS LATER:
So far I've cleared out two big garbage bags of clothes and shoes out of my side of the closet and have gone through several drawers in my hallway and got rid of enough stuff that now I have an empty drawer just waiting until the next time I need some space.  Next on my list: craft supplies.