So, you have been on your minimalism journey for a while now. You have accomplished all of your initial purge goals, you are comfortable in your home and it no longer brings you stress. Then suddenly three months later you go to grab something out from below your bathroom sink and boom you are hit with stress once again! How did you end up with a ton of stuff back under there? 
You swear you weren’t bringing anything extra into the house. But then you remember that when you went through stuff in your bedroom some stuff “got put away” under the sink. You got a gift from a friend of a three pack of hand cream and that got shoved under there. And before you know it, that small little space is no longer clean and organized and is an area of stress again. It takes you 5 minutes to dig through everything to get the one thing that you need out and you realize it is time to do a maintenance purge!
Just because we are on this minimalism journey and are making better choices about not bringing excess into our house and trying to be conscience of our space it does not mean that all our areas are going to be perfect forever. We will need to go back and take a second look at things. Are some of the clothes we thought we would use daily are now regulated to the back of the closet and never worn because they just don’t fit right anymore? Have you received some gifts that you have stashed in a drawer or cabinet? Did you buy three new pairs of shoes for work that you needed, but failed to get rid of the old ones you don’t wear anymore?
All of the things listed above are things I have realized in my own home over the last month or so. My work shoes were really wearing out and I needed to buy new ones, but never took the time to get rid of the old, even though it meant my shoes no longer fit in their organizer, so they were just pushed onto the floor. I have lost a lot of inches recently, even though the scale is not budging much, but that means there are clothes in my closet that even though they are perfectly good clothes I love and are useful, just don’t look that good on my anymore. They just don’t fit my new shape. And I had allowed my cabinet under my bathroom sink to become my catch all for anything beauty related, even if I wasn’t using it anymore!
So, over the last two weeks I set small projects for myself. I went through my clothes and shoes and donated most of the stuff that didn’t fit and got rid of the stuff that was old and needed to be tossed. I put everything from under my cabinet into a box and while watching some women’s soccer last night, I went through it all and a majority went into the donation box for the women’s center near me. Below are my before and after boxes. So much did not make it back into my cabinet!
Minimalism isn’t a destination or a goal, it is a journey that we walk through to achieve goals and destinations we want to get to. I want a house that is clean and stress free. I want to be debt free. I want to focus on making memories and not collecting things. These are goals that are not met and moved passed as we continue our lives, these are goals that are lifelong and thus the lifelong journey of minimalism will help me to achieve them. It is a journey I need to keep walking and keep in the forefront of my mind. That means that just because you have done those initial full house purges you are not done. Your journey has not ended. You must maintain those spaces and that mindset. You have to remind yourself why you are on this journey to make sure your head is in the right place and periodically review your physical spaces to see if you need to do a maintenance purge of any areas.
Minimalism is a way of life and a journey, it is not a destination, so remember that just because you have purged your house once you are not done. You must remember to sometimes look around and do some maintenance on this path you are walking on!
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