8 Big Decluttering Mistakes to Avoid

Hello friends! Today, we will talk about decluttering. I know it’s something that you like here. And personally, I love a good decluttering session. The last one was before moving into the apartment and it was a closet declutter. And it’s been several years that I decluttered my stuff every year. And I know that some strategies worked and others didn’t. So here are the big decluttering mistakes you need to avoid. 

So let’s get started. 

Not having an overview of what you have

When you want to start decluttering and specifically when you have a big apartment or a big house, you tend to declutter space space space and not really category by category. And it’s the first mistake because you don’t have another view of what you have. I will give you an example. If you want to declutter your shoes and you know that you have shoes in a different space in your home you tend to declutter the ones in the entryway and maybe the next month the ones you have in your garage. It’s also the same for the papers for the books even for the clothes. 

You think it will be easier to declutter space by space. But you need to think by category. By Doing space by space, you don’t realize the volume of your possessions. And maybe you don’t realize that you have things twice. 

So what you can do is it to put everything in the same category in the same room to the declutter everything. And if the category is too big, you can decide to do it by subcategories.  for example, for clothes it could be a little bit overwhelming so you can decide to the declutter All your pants are all your blouses. 

I think that by doing this, it’s better to declutter because it’s easier to get rid of a lot of things when you see the amount of things that you have than doing this by space and don’t really realize what you have. 

Not decluttering clothes that are too big or too short 

I was guilty of keeping clothes that were 2 sizes below my current ones. It’s OK to lose weight to gain weight so it’s OK to keep clothes that are one size + or one size less. But you don’t have to keep things that are really too tight or too big.

Sometimes, when we go shopping, we see a beautiful dress or a beautiful top, and we tell ourselves that we will buy the size below to have the motivation to lose weight. It would be our goal. And you don’t have to be ashamed of doing that. We have all already done it once in life. And you can’t imagine the number of clothes I had doing that. 

And at that point, you will have more clothes that don’t fit than clothes in which you feel great. And you will feel really guilty about that. But losing weight takes time. 

And let’s face it, perhaps you won’t love the clothes you bought at that time for the “time you will lose weight,” and you will sell them or donate them. So it’s a waste of money, and you won’t find your motivation by having clothes that are too tight in your closet. 

Keep things you want to declutter for too long 

When you declutter things, you need to decide if you want to donate, recycle or sell. And you need to give yourself a goal about that. For example, you can decide to sell all the things within a month. After the month, these items would be donated if they weren’t sold. 

Keeping them for too long would be clutter in your home and in your mind too. 

And sometimes, you can be tempted to look inside these boxes and want to keep things you’d decluttered. 

Extreme declutter

It’s motivating when you see all these “extreme declutter” videos. Or when you see all these people talking about living with only 2 forks or without a bed. I don’t know. And sometimes, you feel so annoyed with what surrounds you that you want to donate everything and have a fresh start. 

And when you begin to declutter, you don’t where to stop. You get rid of too many things.

Even if I didn’t regret decluttering things, I didn’t want to declutter too much because I was in this kind of mood. And I know that I’m not an extreme minimalist too. 

So when you want to do your declutter, think about that. Don’t be too extreme because you’ll regret it. 

Not knowing your “why”

And finally doing it because it’s trendy. 

Okay, so you need to know why you want to get rid of things. Perhaps it’s because you want to spend less time cleaning, or maybe because you feel like you can’t move in your life because of everything that surrounds you. Or maybe you need money and you want to see things. Or maybe all of that at the same time. 

For my part, I felt like I needed to declutter things because they prevented me from thinking and living my best life. I felt like the clutter in my apartment involved clutter in my mind too. 

So what are your motivations? And depending on that you won’t declutter the same things. 

Having too many “maybes”

So, most of the time, when you will sort things, you will have 3 piles, one that you keep, one that you get rid of, and another for your maybes aka the things you don’t know about. You don’t want to get rid of them because you think you miss them, but you’re not sure too.

But if this pile is really huge, you will have a problem. Because you need to see this amount of things like an experience. The point is to see if there are things that you need within a month or that you miss. And declutter the rest. And you can’t experience this if you have too many maybes. If you’re scared about this, you can tell yourself that you will keep certain things and you’ll see if you want to get rid of them next time. 

You can keep around 5 things by category, like 5 books, 5 clothes, 5 shoes. 

Wanting to do your decluttering in just a day

It’s impossible. Even if your apartment is really small and perhaps it’s your first time, it’s impossible. I had a tiny apartment and it wasn’t my first time too. But just decluttering my clothes took me 5 hours. So if you want to do it carefully, you’ll need more than just a weekend. 

And you can see this on TV shows like that one of Marie Kondo. Most the time, the participants have 1 week to declutter everything. And sometimes it’s not sufficient enough. 

So be realistic when you plan your decluttering. You can decide to sort one category a day, for example, all your books a day. And if it’s a little bit challenging, you can decide to do a subcategory a day. If you have a ton of clothes, you can sort your tops a day and your pants another day. 

Don’t forget to put some music on, to ask for help with certain things if you want. And start in the morning. I hate when I don’t finish something at night. So I always try to begin in the morning to finish it within a day.

Thinking you’ll declutter once and never again

And unfortunately, it’s not possible either. You will bring things into your home, even if you’re careful about that. And it’s totally okay. 

And it’s not because it’s not a one time thing that you don’t need to start. And the feeling of decluttering is so satisfying that you will want to declutter all the time. 

I try to do it once or twice a year but it’s not as important as the previous ones because I’m conscious about I bring into my home.

Alright guys, I hope this blog post will help you to have an optimal declutter and gives you hope about this process. Tell me in the comment below what mistakes you made during your decluttering process. 

Bye friends!