Counting all of my things to get back control over my life

For the last few months I’ve been embarking on my journey to minimalism, I’ve gotten rid of maybe four big trash bags of stuff, which I mostly donated but some things were so old or idiotical that no one would have had any use for them so they went to the landfill. And it felt really good, I’ve got to say that, especially my wardrobe feels so much lighter these days but I still feel like I have so much stuff I don’t ever use but I was struggling to get rid of this excess baggage. That’s how I came up with the idea of counting everything I own and make put it all on a list. This might not seem like a huge waste of time — it probably is, but to me it kind of makes sense. I think that having an overview of all the things I own and evaluate what I use will help me get rid of the things I don’t use.

But why minimalism — why so drastic?

I will probably have to introduce myself and talk a bit about my journey to minimalism first before I can start with the counting. So I’m a nineteen-year-old student, I still live with my parents and I was a very messy kid. I was a very messy teenager too. I had so much stuff I didn’t know where to store it all so it would land on my room’s floor. By the age of sixteen, I had so much stuff it didn’t fit into one room anymore, so my parents (bless them) emptied my mum’s office so I was able to put my desk somewhere. I never got rid of anything, had a strange emotional bond to every single thing — especially old postcards I stored in a huge box I never opened except when I wanted to put other postcards in it. I finally decided to get rid of at least some of my stuff after my first solo trip at the age of eighteen. I did a three week long trip with a huge backpack from England to Edinburgh with plenty of time to visit other parts of Scotland too. And let me tell you I was also in pretty bad shape back then, carrying a seventy-liter backpack with me with mostly useless things in it was hard. So I learned a couple of things and switched to a smaller forty-liter pack for all of my trips and it was way better. I noticed that I don’t need much to live and I thought it might be interesting to apply this not only to my travels but also to my day-to-day life. And so I did. I slowly started to get rid of clothes I didn’t like wearing but I also bought new things that actually fit and make me happy. Now I love every single piece in my closet. I also got rid of I’d say around 90% of my books. I had a huge collection of books for my age because I loved to read but having 400–600 books you get disoriented and don’t know what you want to read anymore. Also, I spent so much money on books I never even read. The process of getting rid of them was really hard, not because they meant all that much to me but I felt guilty, a lot of the books were presents from my parents, relatives, and friends. Another huge thing for me was getting rid of my puzzles and art supplies. But having gone through all of that I do feel more independent now. But I feel like there are still a lot of things stored may be in other places around our house that I forgot about and don’t really use. So that’s why I’m taking upon the count-all-my-shit-challenge.

Okay let’s get to it:

So I do have a bit of a gameplan, first of all: I’ll count all furniture that only I use but not the shared furniture, that being said, I will also not count other things we share as a family such as cutlery.

So I’m planning to structure it by room and then by use I guess. So I’ll start in our bathroom since I think that’s where I have the least amount of stuff.

Hygiene:

For my tattoos

Shaving:

How I used to try to hide pimples:

My oils:

Hairstyling products — mostly products I didn’t want to throw out because I couldn’t pass them on to anyone so now I’m just trying to finish them

My office is a bit more complicated since that’s where all my stuff for school is and most of the things I need for my hobbies

General things for school:

School books:

I try to be paperless when it comes to things like school, as you can see it doesn’t always work that well because this year I wasn’t allowed to use my notebook in all classes.

Personal:

On the walls, pinboards and other “decoration”:

Hobbies:

Arts and crafts:

Language Learning outside of school:

Writing:

Programming and Electronics:

Furniture:

Furniture:

Closet:

Hobbies:

Photography:

Traveling:

Decoration:

So that’s everything I own. Of course, also share lots of things with my family including furniture, cutlery, and plates. But I think this is a pretty accurate representation of everything that belongs to me or that I use the most of our family. So how many things do I own?

What do I conclude from this number? Nothing really, I think the way more important thing in this process was to list everything I own. Having to go through all of my things, having a look at every single item, made me realize what adds value to my life and what I use regularly. In this process, I was able to get rid of around 100 things, which is pretty good.

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