30-Day Minimalism Challenge

Each month I will be embarking on a new habit-changing challenge. I’m hoping that by being very strict with these challenges for 30 days, once the challenge is over I will be able to incorporate these healthier habits into my life in a more realistic way. They say it takes 21 days to create a habit, so I’m testing that theory with these challenges. At the end of each month, I will write a blog post letting you know how it went! 

Rules: Ok this month I am doing the 30-day minimalism challenge. This was created by The Minimalists and it is perfectly timely with where we’re at in life right now. So on day 1 of November, I will get rid of 1 item. Day 2, 2 items. And so on and so forth through day 30. This will result in me getting rid of 465 items total, either through trashing, selling, or giving away.

Reason: Ok, I’ve been talking about and studying and preparing for minimalism for a few months now, but now is the time to put it all into action. Colton and I are moving on Friday, so it is the perfect time to assess the things we have and the things we no longer need. I want our new home to be more of a representation of us and less stressful and cluttered with things we’re holding onto for no reason. So over this month, we will be getting rid of 465 items we don’t need or want in our new home. That’s 465 fewer items to move and 465 fewer items to clutter the next stage of our life. Let’s do this!

Result:

So I didn’t exactly do the day 1, day 2 thing. If you’ve been following my minimalism journey, you’ll know I’ve been putting things in our storage unit that we no longer need over the last several months to then purge right before we move. So this month, I finally boxed up all the storage stuff (which we never touched, by the way), plus several more items to donate. We gathered well over 500 items to get rid of, easily completing this minimalism challenge. It took both of our cars, filled to the brim to take all that stuff to donate.The crazy thing is, it feels like we barely made a dent. We still have so much stuff. It becomes painfully obvious as you have to pack up and move all of your things. All we have is a one bedroom apartment but it still just feels like so much. So so much.

Obviously, my minimalism journey is not ending here. Remember, it is not just about one act of decluttering. From now on, I’m going to have a one in, one out rule. So if I purchase a new article of clothing, I need to get rid of one. That way my closet never becomes overflowing again. We will have only enough coffee mugs to fit on our mug holder. Not a single one more. So if I get a new one, I’ll donate one. Easy peasy. We will also be more aware of our purchases. Our new apartment is a little bigger and costs a little more, so I really want to be intentional with our finances and with the items we put in our apartment. I don’t want to completely fill the space just because there’s more of it. Minimalism is all about being intentional. Not replacing the crap you just donated with more crap.

I am so ready for this next chapter of our lives and I’m ready to tackle it with far less junk weighing us down.