Do we have too much stuff?

Blaizes

Doing a clear out and just realized the amount of clutter we have. I think we have too much and don’t need half of it.

The J Stands for Jay

Yes

SEPT 23 1989

I could walk out of my house with a sportsbag full of things I actually want and would never look back

Can’t get my head around this hoarding thing

It’s an illness

freshpopcorn

I'm good enough.
I do hang onto clothes sometimes but I generally use them for outside work/etc.

My father is a hoarder. He'd keep anything and everything is handy. Sometimes when I'm in a shop I talk myself out of things because I don't want to end up like him.

Car99

Of course we do. 99% of the **** we own is not necessary to maintain a healthy comfortable existence but we need it cause we're a lazy and wasteful species.

Atlantic Dawn

I've enough tools to rebuild a house in the morning despite me not knowing what half of them actually do.

Leg End Reject

Yes. I'm not a hoarder, but do tend to impulse buy. I've made a conscious decision to go for quality over quantity over the last 2 years and have donated/binned a lot of stuff. I think a lot of us went mad during the Celtic tiger years.

rob316

Black bags full of ****e I throw out on a monthly basis. I try to live a minimalist lifestyle after realizing the crap we buy but it's goes out the window when you have wife and kids.

kowloon

SEPT 23 1989 wrote: »

Can’t get my head around this hoarding thing

It’s an illness

I reckon it's an outlet for a natural urge to stockpile, the gathering part of the hunter-gatherer. When the urge gets out of control you get people with stacks of old newspapers using up every last available space. Those extreme hoarders can live pretty miserable lives.

Atlantic Dawn

SEPT 23 1989 wrote: »

I could walk out of my house with a sportsbag full of things I actually want and would never look back

Can’t get my head around this hoarding thing

It’s an illness

I think it falls in to 2 categories...
I don't want to throw it away in case I need to use it again.
I don't want to throw it away because I spent x amount on it.

Conas

We do have a tendency to hold onto items until there is enough wear and tear that there's nothing of that particular item left.

Similar enough to Andy Dufresne's rock hammer in the film the Shawshank Redemption, what was left of it after he tunneled through his cell wall.

I think you get the gist of what I'm saying.

JustAThought

Conas wrote: »

We do have a tendency to hold onto items until there is enough wear and tear that there's nothing of that particular item left.

I think not. Some girls in particular dont even necesaarily wear once or more than once half of what they buy and it gets kept or thrown/recycled as even.more is bought. We dont shop based on need but on desire or boredom or habbit. It is frightening what we buy and spend. No wonder the olanet is dying from pastic and chemical pollution.

Tell me how

Do we have too much stuff?

Most people, most definitely.

gozunda

Most of the junk seems to come from China. I'm seriously thinking of returning to sender tbh ...

Jim 77

I definitely have too much stuff and at this stage it would be too difficult to sort it out so I just stuff it all in the attic and when I retire I'll do a massive clearout. You know the type of clearout where everything is put out on the front lawn and just take in what you definitely need and then dump/recycle/donate the rest.

Blaizes

Yes as I said I think we have way too much stuff. I can’t get my head around it. It bothers me a lot. Before the kids there was much less. But even factoring in kids my parents had so much less stuff and I don’t think we’re the better for all we have now.

I also worry about what the world will be like for the next generation. Like we buy a new couch, pay to get rid of the old one but what happens it? How is it recycled, same with mattresses, old clothes, then their is plastic. Oceans swimming in it. Think we are too wasteful.

JupiterKid

Yes, for sure.

I think some level of hoarding is innate in human nature - especially as many of us did not have that much growing up - and I admire minimalists who are ruthless in keeping their abodes free of any clutter - but I have a passion for books and literature so have quite a lot of printed matter but do have shelving for most of it.

I could do with clearing out my wardrobe soon - there’s a few things in there that I no longer wear but admittedly I am not big into clothes.

Extreme hoarders who allow their places to become virtually unliveable have mental health issues and need help.

We live in a disposable, consumerist culture and people acquire and amass stuff they don’t need and for the future of the planet this needs to change.

The book Affluenza by Oliver James is a great read and an eye opener on our consumerist society.

Chicken George

Blaizes wrote: »

Doing a clear out and just realized the amount of clutter we have. I think we have too much and don’t need half of it.

Throw it all up on Adverts... turn it into cash!

Nomis21

Two of us have been traveling in a small van around Europe for a month. Living in a small enclosed space for a few weeks let's you know exactly how little stuff you really need to live...

BalcombeSt4

Don't worry, when the Socialist Revolution comes we will take everything you have, and you will work in the fields for 20 hours a day shoveling turf and you will be happy.

Graces7

kowloon wrote: »

I reckon it's an outlet for a natural urge to stockpile, the gathering part of the hunter-gatherer. When the urge gets out of control you get people with stacks of old newspapers using up every last available space. Those extreme hoarders can live pretty miserable lives.

If you can, watch the BBC programmes on Hannah Hauxwell especially the last one. My life caught the end of that era when we had so little everything was saved and could be useful.. drummed into folk in the war.. I have moved too many times .. I do "hoard" knitting yarn but it does get used. No access to shops helps! Especially charity shops... second hand books I yearn for

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

We all hold on to some things we don't immediately nor necessarily need for a range of reasons; from frugality to sentimentality.


The crux is in "too much". We have a lot of things after being married, and living in this house 48 years. I have many things stored away as a result of my travel and work in the past. There are over 1000 books in the house, for example. But, there's no clutter. Everything that is kept has it's place and we do make a point of clearing out and sorting rooms, presses, sheds etc every year.

tigerboon

Conas wrote: »

We do have a tendency to hold onto items until there is enough wear and tear that there's nothing of that particular item left.

That's ok. That means it's being used

Eggs For Dinner

I buy lots of nice thing for myself, but I'm happy to pass on or dispose of stuff that I no longer use. Now, my other half hates to get rid of things "in case we might need it someday"

valoren

Did it last week as part of "nesting". 8 bags of recycling, 6 bags of baby clothes. Absolutely ridiculous what accumulates over time. Don't even get me started in the amount of crap in the shed and the attic.

JohnnyFlash

BalcombeSt4 wrote: »

Don't worry, when the Socialist Revolution comes we will take everything you have, and you will work in the fields for 20 hours a day shoveling turf and you will be happy.

I get the feeling you’d be on the first train to the ‘re-education camp’. The sort of lad who’d be up at nearly 6 in the morning spouting shïte on the internet isn’t going to be a good and loyal comrade.

biko

Why do people in this thread keep saying "we" when they should focus on "I"


"Do I have too much stuff?"
"No, I don't. You might."

Wanderer78

BalcombeSt4 wrote:

Don't worry, when the Socialist Revolution comes we will take everything you have, and you will work in the fields for 20 hours a day shoveling turf and you will be happy.

Thankfully that isn't gonna happen

Harry Palmr

House is full of bits and pieces. I've habit of holding on to stuff "just in case". Then there's the tapes, records, books, magazines which I've hoarded because I hate throwing away that kind of thing. The shed is a disaster - about I've got four pairs of shears, three grass collecting boxes, a few mowers, loads of buckets, pots, bits of timber, plastic sheets, tarpaulins etc, old power tools. Old tool boxes, draws of electrical and mechanical odds and ends.

HELP!

Graces7

Harry Palmr wrote: »

House is full of bits and pieces. I've habit of holding on to stuff "just in case". Then there's the tapes, records, books, magazines which I've hoarded because I hate throwing away that kind of thing. The shed is a disaster - about I've got four pairs of shears, three grass collecting boxes, a few mowers, loads of buckets, pots, bits of timber, plastic sheets, tarpaulins etc, old power tools. Old tool boxes, draws of electrical and mechanical odds and ends.

HELP!

If you are ever out this way I can take some off your hands..

biko

Harry Palmr wrote: »

House is full of bits and pieces. I've habit of holding on to stuff "just in case".

Hire a skip and let some friends toss all the crap out.

Irish_rat

I bought brand new house 3 years ago and whenever I get something done like gas boiler service they think I just bought the place, I don't believe in hoarding and dump most things that come in the door.

The only thing I would have is a couple of Lego sets really but they are put on shelves away from everything else.

suicide_circus

i need a bowl, spoon, pair of jeans, shirt, jocks n socks, pair of shoes, jacket, phone, phone charger, sunglasses, wallet and its contents. thats it. everything else is an anchor round my neck.

kowloon

Graces7 wrote: »

If you can, watch the BBC programmes on Hannah Hauxwell especially the last one. My life caught the end of that era when we had so little everything was saved and could be useful.. drummed into folk in the war.. I have moved too many times .. I do "hoard" knitting yarn but it does get used. No access to shops helps! Especially charity shops... second hand books I yearn for

My mother stores wool in her attic space where the only thing it's displacing is more insulation, which can be wool itself, so I'm not sure it counts as hoarding.

whisky_galore

Wanderer78 wrote: »

Thankfully that isn't gonna happen

Yes. Nobody 'shovels' turf.

Strumms

I’ve around 900 CDs. I’ve been a music lover from as long as I can remember and compulsively bought music weekly since I was about 18... so 20 years. Now with Spotify they are obsolete and essentially worthless bar the odd boxed set, bootleg or rarity. Here I am in a room with stacks of CDs, money spent, space taken up, eons of time spent trawling through music shops home and abroad yet the iPad in my hand basically with the touch of the screen can take me anywhere in music. Still, the walking would have done me good.

Graces7

kowloon wrote: »

My mother stores wool in her attic space where the only thing it's displacing is more insulation, which can be wool itself, so I'm not sure it counts as hoarding.

when I was first in Ireland I met a lady like that who was delighted to clear some so she had space to buy more! I was delighted to have wool to work with so it was a happy encounter. Wool is appallingly addictive!

BalcombeSt4

JohnnyFlash wrote: »

I get the feeling you’d be on the first train to the ‘re-education camp’. The sort of lad who’d be up at nearly 6 in the morning spouting shïte on the internet isn’t going to be a good and loyal comrade.

We wont have education camps, just torture camps were you are forced to listen to Taylor Swift on a endless loop.

BalcombeSt4

whisky_galore wrote: »

Yes. Nobody 'shovels' turf.

Not yet anyway.

Graces7

stuff breeds you know. Increases when your back is turned..

freshpopcorn

I think a lot of people are in the middle.
I know people at both ends of the scale. Somebody who keeps nothing and people who are bad hoarders.
They'd both turn you off being like them.

ceadaoin.

We moved house in November and so took the opportunity to have a massive clear out. It actually feels great not having cupboards stuffed full of crap, but organised and tidy. Problem is the new house is big and has tons of storage space so plenty of space for "stuff" without it being cluttered. So yeah, I probably still have too much stuff but you wouldn't know it. There's a big difference between that and hoarding which is an actual mental illness.

I don't have a lot of stuff. I moved around a great deal and for that reason I kept things simple. I also live pretty simply and I'm one of those people who has a good think about something before I buy it, instead of impulse buying. At a conservative estimate I'd say I own less than a third of the amount of clothes than my friends would, but I wear more of them. They seem to have much more stuff but use only about 10% of it.

the_pen_turner

freshpopcorn wrote: »

I think a lot of people are in the middle.
I know people at both ends of the scale. Somebody who keeps nothing and people who are bad hoarders.
They'd both turn you off being like them.

The chronic dumpers are even worse than the chronic herders. They are same but feel superior

It's the people in the middle that are grand. Most people are normal

iamwhoiam

39 years in this house now and yes we have too much stuff . Much of it is the “ we might need that one day “ . We came through 2 major recessions and find it hard to throw anything out that looks like it might be handy .

Capt'n Midnight

Atlantic Dawn wrote: »

I think it falls in to 2 categories...
I don't want to throw it away in case I need to use it again.
I don't want to throw it away because I spent x amount on it.

Category 3

I threw out something that sat in a drawer for two years and had to buy a replacement 3 days later :mad:

Capt'n Midnight

Strumms wrote: »

I’ve around 900 CDs. I’ve been a music lover from as long as I can remember and compulsively bought music weekly since I was about 18... so 20 years. Now with Spotify they are obsolete and essentially worthless bar the odd boxed set, bootleg or rarity. Here I am in a room with stacks of CDs, money spent, space taken up, eons of time spent trawling through music shops home and abroad yet the iPad in my hand basically with the touch of the screen can take me anywhere in music. Still, the walking would have done me good.

Microsoft just pulled the plug on it's eBook store. Gone forever.

Best you can hope for is a refund
consumers exchange money for goods because they preferred the goods to the money.

Capt'n Midnight

Atlantic Dawn wrote: »

I've enough tools to rebuild a house in the morning despite me not knowing what half of them actually do.

Do you have a stick for stirring paint ?

NewbridgeIR

Strumms wrote: »

I’ve around 900 CDs. I’ve been a music lover from as long as I can remember and compulsively bought music weekly since I was about 18... so 20 years. Now with Spotify they are obsolete and essentially worthless bar the odd boxed set, bootleg or rarity. Here I am in a room with stacks of CDs, money spent, space taken up, eons of time spent trawling through music shops home and abroad yet the iPad in my hand basically with the touch of the screen can take me anywhere in music. Still, the walking would have done me good.

They're not obsolete if you still get enjoyment from them. Spotify is overrated and doesn't have everything. CD sales are falling but stuff goes OOP a lot quicker than it did. Reissue market still buoyant. I've bought records since 1981 and CDs since 1986 and have no intention of stopping.

SEPT 23 1989

You think you own it but

It owns you

PoisonIvyBelle

I've moved around a fair bit, both in Ireland and outside of it, so i wouldn't say I've a lot of "stuff" accumulated really. I'd say a lot less compared to most people (especially other women - all my clothes and shoes fit in one wardrbobe!). I've had to fit my life into a suitcase more than once so i'd say that sort of stuck with me! That said, I do keep some things for sentimental value and I wouldn't consider myself a minlmalist either