Month 1: The First Days - Physical Decluttering

Over the course of six days, I combed through all my belongings and, to my utter joy, discovered a substantial number of items to donate or discard. While my house generally presents an impression of minimalism (which isn't inaccurate), I now know that the insides of cabinets, closets, and drawers are truly purged of unnecessaries, with their surviving contents neatly organized.

The first round of give-away items.

Every container now has its matching lid, every bookshelf breathes with space between volumes, and my former "chaos kitchen drawer" contains only actual cutlery.

Goodbye second-hand mini-fridge I never used. Goodbye expired makeup I only bought because I was struggling with acne four years ago. Goodbye bag of flour that spent two years in the back of my fridge.

Clothes I used to love, but have since become quite raggedy... or simply don't fit with the rest of my wardrobe.

A shelf-filling stack of clothes awaited replacement. I made myself a solemn promise: once I found a functional equivalent I genuinely enjoyed, the old version could go. As time and willpower for shopping have materialized, I've steadily fulfilled this commitment. The stack of discarded clothes made me realize I've been in long-term relationships with items I don't even like. At least these relationships ended with me doing the dumping.

The exercise proved extremely satisfying. I felt a surge of hope when considering how much less I now had to clean, maintain, and feel guilty about not using.

My excessively messy set of tools. Some were broken, many were borrowed and needed returning, all needed organizing.

Hope affects my mood far more profoundly than I had anticipated for something so specific as cleaning my house. More broadly, while this resolution project makes me nervous, it also fills me with visions of a better, slower, more loving way of life. The mere thought of living better helps me act the way I want to feel. My days haven't gotten easier - if anything, this first exercise has added more work to my busy schedule - but this work is infused with the tingling sensation of progress. It feels good to do the hard thing now so the nagging feelings can finally rest.

While I still have more physical clutter to tackle, the excitement of this early success propels me toward an even greater challenge: decluttering my schedule.