If you’ve ever experienced a sense of guilt when trying to declutter your home, then you’re not alone. These guilty feelings can take many forms, as they can be motivated by a number of reasons. If not addressed, they can make your decluttering process grind to a halt all too easily.
Learning more about this decluttering guilt, and how to let it go, will help you continue to make progress towards achieving your goal of a clutter free living environment.
Below we explore several different scenarios in which we may end up feeling guilty when trying to part with the things that are no longer useful in our lives. Obviously, there is no one-size fits all answer for how to overcome these feelings of decluttering guilt, but in each case the thing to know may give you a new perspective and help you to understand them. That will give you a better chance of conquering your decluttering guilt, once and for all, so that you can achieve your dream of a clutter free life.
5 Essential Things You Need to Know about Decluttering Guilt
There are a number of reasons why we may feel guilty – and you may be able to identify with a few of them – but these 5 things to know could help you to view that guilt differently.
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1 We have wasted our money
We may feel like the thing we have bought turned out to be a bad purchase, as it was poor quality or not worth the money paid. Or if we have bought an expensive item of clothing and there was always a slim chance of ever wearing it.
Decluttering these types of items means we have to face up to our mistake and that can be tough.
We can also feel like because we have invested money in the purchase, it would all have been for nothing if we quit, so instead we hold onto it despite knowing we shouldn’t. Sunk cost fallacy describes this behavior, it is where you stay in a situation despite losing money, time, or effort. It’s almost as though we are trying to avoid losing twice, once when we paid and again by getting rid of it.
Thing to know: In fact, holding onto this type of item can have a worse impact on us than getting rid of it.
By keeping something which we are unhappy with, we are allowing it to take up valuable space in our homes, as well as using up our mental space. Surrounding ourselves with things we love could have a more positive effect – in the words of Marie Kondo: “Keep only those things that speak to your heart. Then take the plunge and discard all the rest.”.
Each time we see the item we think we have wasted our money on, we are reminded of our mistake, but removing this item will let us move on. If we are lucky, we may be able to recoup some of the costs by reselling it.
2 Adding to landfill
Environmental concerns are another common reason for decluttering guilt. It’s easy to understand why we might hold onto something we don’t need if we are feeling guilty about it potentially ending up at the tip.
Thing to know: There are so many ways to reuse items we don’t want these days, so it’s much easier than before to avoid sending them to landfill.
If the item is not something that can be repaired then, whether you give away through community groups, sell, donating to charities, repurpose or upcycle – landfill really is the last resort for the things we no longer want. It may take a little more time and thought to arrange, but it certainly will save the eco-conscious amongst you from guilty feelings.
3 Gifts or inherited items
We’ve all been there.. the tasteful gift given, or left, to you by a relative was well intentioned, but you simply couldn’t imagine ever using it or wearing it. So to avoid having to deal with the problem, you put it at the back of a closet or in the loft and try to forget it.
Thing to know: Understanding the true motivation that people have when they give or bequest us something, can help us to see these items differently.
For a lot of people this can be one of the most challenging types of guilt, because we often feel that if we part with the item, we would be ungrateful or disrespectful to the person who has given it to us. However, remember that the purpose of the act of giving is to make the recipient feel happy – it’s all about that moment when the gift is received.
Once the receipt part is over and you have showed your appreciation, then whether the gift is retained or passed onto someone else who will love and use it, is less important. Fortunately, re-gifting is no longer seen as being cheap, but as a way of dealing with unwanted gifts in a logical (in my view) and environmentally-friendly manner.
4 Not achieving a desired lifestyle change
This one brings to mind the classic story of the treadmill which ends up being used as expensive clothes horse. It certainly wasn’t cheap, but once the (often New Year) enthusiasm for a new exercise regime diminished it ended up covered in clothes.
Not managing to make big life changes is common because we are so busy and cannot fit everything in. We can also feel guilty about the expenditure, if it’s a substantial purchase.
Thing to know: Getting rid of the item will allow you to move on, but that doesn’t mean you have failed.
Like any change to our lives, adopting healthy habits is an ongoing progress. The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg has some great strategies for building new ones.
Feeling like we have failed in our endeavors to get fit and be healthy can bring down our mood and make it challenging to find our motivation again. However, this is all part of the process of finding out what will work for your life. Treadmills aren’t for everyone and there are a whole load of other ways to exercise!
5 Throwing out something that isn’t ours
I have included this one, because if, like me, you live in a busy family household, you may find yourself doing this from time to time!
Thing to know: Sometimes this is necessary because of storage restrictions.
As long as you do this in a controlled manner, and the items are not things that have sentimental value or are in regular use by the owner, then I think this can be justified. For example, my partner has a habit of never throwing anything out (!) and when his mostly hole-ridden, threadbare vests started to spill into a second drawer, I had to draw a line…
Final Thoughts
Remember that it’s normal to feel guilty when decluttering, but there are ways to get past it. These ideas for avoiding different types of decluttering guilt will, hopefully, help if you struggle in any of these circumstances.
Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed this post about the 5 essential things you need to know about decluttering guilt. Feel free to pin and share this article, and come back soon to discover the latest posts!