Simplify your space, simplify your life.
I used to be a natural packrat. I recently realized that my parents are packrats, too. I must have picked up this terrible habit by years of observation.
As a college student, I purchased too much stuff. I bought all sorts of supplies I didn’t really need at the time, hoping to use them in the future. I did all my shopping at large warehouse stores like Costco, where I could get the greatest value by purchasing in much greater quantity than I really needed.
Part of the problem is that I hate shopping. I consider it a waste of time, so I habitually overcompensate by purchasing more than necessary, with the hope that I can skip extra trips in the future. This strategy rarely worked; I often never used even half of what I bought. Binge shopping doesn’t save time because it’s hard to anticipate something you need in the future; all it does is add unnecessary clutter to your life.
Here are my biggest packrat mistakes:
My school stockpile: I bought 250 pens, 150 pencils, 15 erasers, 10 packs of white out, 10 rolls of scotch tape, 200 paperclips, 5000 sheets of ruled paper, and about 10 reams of white paper for the printer (about 50 lbs., 25kg). I could have stocked an entire office with these supplies. Sadly enough, I only used about 3 pencils and a dozen pens, so I ended up giving about 95% of it away.
My bathroom stockpile: Last year, I bought 50 bars of soap, 5 bottles of shampoo, 10 packs of toothpaste, and 7 bottles of dishwasher detergent. They’re still sitting in our closet. It may take us another year to finish it all.
My furniture stockpile: I picked up 2 extra tables and 3 chairs we didn’t need. We reasoned that the extra furniture would be useful for entertaining visitors, ignoring the fact that we rarely had guests over.
My parents also helped stockpile: They gave us a sofa, a bookshelf, a king-sized mattress, dozens of new clothes, a new computer, two printers, and two LCD monitors.
When we first moved into our apartment two years ago, it seemed enormous for just two people. Measuring 600 sq. ft., it was triple the size of the college dorms we were accustomed to. It was so spacious we could dance in the living room. Soon enough, however, we started to feel cramped because of the abundance of our unnecessary possessions.
About five months ago, I discovered Greenimalist living. It’s a way of living that emphasizes reducing your possessions to reduce your environmental impact while simplifying your life and saving you money. The key is to get by with exactly what you need and absolutely no more. In exchange for selling almost everything, we gained a form of simplicity that no possession could ever offer.
Are you a packrat? What was your worst purchasing mistake?
This post caused a commotion in my apartment!
Did you really get rid of all the furniture in the picture on the left? My friend was shocked. I don’t think it’s good for your back to study without a chair… or a desk. I agree that being a packrat is definitely annoying and really brings down the environment of the room, but I refuse to study on the floor. ahah. or maybe your desk is now on the other side of the room :] .
Hi there,
Yes, I actually have been trying to live without furniture! Hsinya hasn’t joined me yet, so we still kept 2 chairs and a table, but I haven’t used them for 3 weeks now. It’s not uncomfortable if you have a wall to lean against.
Why furniture-free? We’re going to be traveling a lot this year, to visit family and to find a new home. With a minimalist lifestyle, and no furniture, it’s really easy to move.
PS: I’ve also tried living without a mattress but that experiment hasn’t gone too well.
Hey, I don’t know if you know me but I’m a friend of Jessica’s.
Anyways, I totally agree, my parents are total packrats and it makes literally recycle, donate, etc everything I don’t need.
Sadly, I’m a packrat for emotional things. A lot of the things I decide to keep are literally all gifts, memories, etc. A lot of my clothes are club shirts too.
However, once a year, I go through all my memories and whichever ones still strong in my mind, I keep. So it’s not total hoarding.
But other that, I try to get my parents to give away things they don’t need. THEY ABSOLUTELY REFUSE to get ride of their 1987 Encyclopedia’s which totally baffles me. There is no emotional attachment. There is no practical use. NADA. I don’t get it. If you were to see my house, you would see.
Anyways, in a slight relation, I totally agree with the idea of “Buy only what you need”
People always criticize me for my really ghetto phone. It’s held together with tape and the screen is scratched up. It’s from 2006 (which isn’t even that long ago)
But it serves its purpose. Calls and texts. It’s fine. Why should I get a new phone if this one works still? Even if my contract gets me a new phone that’s “better”, that doesn’t mean I “need” a new phone. You know what I mean?
Hey Armand,
Yes, I still remember you! You helped Jessica build the Eiffle Tower a while ago for French class, right? :-)
I don’t advise everyone to give away their keepsakes, but for me, I don’t feel emotionally attached to old possessions. I scanned the best of my old photos, and I just recycled or gave away everything else. I used to keep old gift cards and written letters stashed away in an envelope, but I realized I never checked it until it came time to clean the house.
I’m totally supportive of keeping old cell phones. Hsinya and I both have 5-year-old phones too! Most of the things we buy have built-in obsolescence — they are designed to be replaced in two or three years, even though they work just fine. It’s a shame because it wastes money and just contributes to more pollution.
Love your blog and what you’re doing!
How do you feel about digital storage?
I take digital pictures of things with emotional attachments before ridding myself of the items. Also, I’ve scanned in a filing cabinet worth of paper (4,805 scans) and shredded 99% of the docs, keeping only things like passports and original wills in a safety box. All is stored on hard drive, passport-sized hard drive, and Carbonite.
Now I print to Cutepdf to avoid the paperwork in the first place, paperless online billing, etc.
Still, the files are storage and I feel the weight, but I no longer have the clutter.
Agree that the “new” cell phone mentality seems like a huge waste of resources. It’s nice to recycle, if you do go new, to a Women’s Shelter where the phones can be provided to women in dangerous living siutations for 911 calls in an emergency (a sad reality).
Great blog! Thanks!
Tez
Hi Tez,
In general, I dislike subscription services like cloud-based data storage. $10/mo. can eat a $120 hole in your wallet very quickly. I use cloud-based storage for work data, since it must be updated frequently, but not for my personal mementos.
Currently, we’re using low-tech data storage. I copied my wife’s photos onto my own laptop, so we have redundancy in case any one computer dies. I then burned the photos onto 4 DVDs, which we intend to mail to our relatives overseas, just in case both our computers simultaneously die. If you already have spare DVDs lying around, this storage method will only cost you about $5 in shipping fees.
So far, I haven’t run into storage issues yet. I’m not a sentimental person, so the only mementos I keep are family photos. Each picture is only about half a megabyte, so I only keep about 20 GB of data on my laptop.
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