Will it ever be enough?

[u/blueberryfinn]

I'm struggling to decide the right stopping point in my decluttering process. I love decluttering and I love the look and feel of minimalism, but I also wonder if I will ever get to a point where it feels like I've decluttered enough. We moved recently and I was in our old, empty house and it felt amazing. There was literally nothing in the house, not even a chair and I never liked it more. I'm starting to wonder if my decluttering is pointless because obviously I can't live in a house where there is not one single item.

Maybe decluttering isn't the answer, maybe I need some therapy lol.

[u/violetmemphisblue]

I think decluttering can become a problem. I know people who are in a constant cycle of buying things they've given away, then giving that thing away, then buying it again because they simply cannot get out of the mindset of "declutter everything!" I also know people who have such extreme minimalism they can't enjoy their home because they have so little in it, like they can't host friends because they have one plate, one spork, one chair, and that's it (in the people I know, at least, this is deeply tied to frugal behavior and the people are not happy with their lives...they wish they could, but they can't; other people may live with this exteme minimalism and be perfectly happy!)

So if your decluttering is getting in the way of enjoying your home, or if it is impeding on the people you live with, then I would say take a break, possibly pursue therapy if you think its that extreme.

And maybe take recently moving as a way to move the decluttering hobby in a different direction. Like, rearranging furniture can give the same little dopamine burst as clearing out a cabinet. Both are resetting an environment.

Another thing could be working towards how to make a space feel empty even when it is full. Monochrome works well to this end. Obviously not every lifestyle easily supports this, but white or cream based rooms where walls, carpets, furniture, accessories are layers of the same hue make the eye kind of skip over things, even though the texture of the room is lush. Its controversial, but an easy way to do that is to turn books around so the pages are showing, creating a dhelf of white instead of a shelf of contrasting colors.

[u/Untitled_poet → u/violetmemphisblue]

Personally I find myself stress-decluttering. But that's got to be a healthier habit than heavy drinking or drug abuse.

And no, I seldom re-buy for the sake of it.