My mom's comment about my bookshelf that actually helped

Last year my mom came over and looked at my living room and said 'it looks like a storage unit, not a home.' That hit me hard. I had boxes of stuff from college stacked in corners and shelves crammed with junk I never touched. I ended up getting rid of about 60% of what I owned over the next 3 months. Now I keep things on shelves that I actually use or enjoy looking at, not just stuff I felt guilty throwing away. Has anyone else had a family member call them out and it actually worked?

3 comments

3 Comments

diana5128d ago

Jumped right in myself after my dad said my place looked like 'a museum of unfinished projects.' I had this whole shelf of art supplies I kept telling myself I'd use again, plus textbooks from a class I dropped five years ago. It felt like getting permission to let go of the guilt, you know? Once I actually started tossing stuff, it was like a weight lifted, and now I only keep things out that I actually touch or smile at. The weird thing is how much easier it is to clean now that there's not a dozen random boxes in the way.

paige3318d ago

Did you actually toss the art supplies or just move them to a closet?

margareto267d ago

My aunt actually did toss a full plastic bin of paint tubes into the dumpster behind her apartment building, and then she called me crying because they were worth like sixty bucks. I get the relief @paige331 mentions though, because I did the same thing with a stack of old guitar picks and sheet music from college that I was never going to touch again. Ever since that day, I look at every mismatched box in my closet and ask myself if it's really worth the dust.