Rightsizing – To Keep or Not To Keep

One Cupboard Strategy

November 11, 2020August 27, 2020decluttering, Rightsizing, StrategiesLeave a Comment

If you are finding it challenging to begin your Rightsize journey, I recommend a very simple practice strategy. Choose one cupboard or drawer to start within your home and work through The Rightsizing Approach on a much smaller scale. Using all the same techniques we have read about on how to sort and divide your items, focus your attention only on this condensed space. ‘Practice makes perfect’, as the well-worn saying goes, will support you to have confidence in your own ability by practising your new Rightsizing skill set. Once completed, you will find yourself more prepared to develop and engage with a larger Rightsizing project.

**2020 Special Book Pricing** Click here to order your copy for $20.00 plus $5.00 for shipping anywhere in Australia http://bit.ly/2020RightsizeYourLife

Keep

October 21, 2020August 27, 2020Donate, Happiness, Home, Keep, Motivation, Recycle, Rightsizing, Sell, Space in your home, UncategorizedLeave a Comment

Our KEEP items are our belongings that we identify with and they will stay in our homes and lives. Marie Kondo, the author of The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up and more recent host of her Netflix show Tidying Up, uses the term ‘Spark Joy’ to describe objects to be kept. Her simple method recommends that you should only keep the items that give you the ‘spark joy’ feeling. Things that we love, find useful and use often will be a part of our keep items.

My first Rightsizing project started in December 1998 and took till June 2000 to complete so we could sell the property. My husband said to me, ‘You can keep anything you like.’ This is how I started by separating all the items that I wanted to KEEP. This project took eighteen months to Rightsize his belongings and is an ongoing curation process. As we minimised these belongings we felt stronger within ourselves but also within our own relationship. Together we had the courage to face this epic task one day at a time, box by box, carload by carload. Every little bit contributed to the solving of this wicked problem. We still believe today that if we survived emptying that shed we could just about survive anything! So far so good, still happily married after fifteen years and yes, we still own a lot less than at this time in our lives! When we KEEP items that we identify with and that provide us with the most happiness, joy, usefulness and value we will quickly be able to determine those items that do not align with these statements of acceptance.

**2020 Special Book Pricing** Click here to order your copy for $20.00 plus $5.00 for shipping anywhere in Australia http://bit.ly/2020RightsizeYourLife

Planning

September 30, 2020August 27, 2020Clutter Mangement, decluttering, Planning, Rightsizing, Space in your home, UncategorizedLeave a Comment

Planning is an important component when beginning any project. Creating specific, clearly defined goals will guarantee that you will heighten your momentum, motivation and focus. By visualising your best outcome, you will be able to physically recreate this goal in your home. Be ‘action’ focused and proud of the commitment you have made to address the clutter in your life. When we PLAN for obstacles that may cause distraction we will be able to anticipate and prevent these from extinguishing our attentiveness. Rightsizing is outcome-focused. Most of all believe you CAN and success will follow. Henry Ford said this about self-belief: ‘Whether you think you can or whether you think you can’t, you’re right’. When Rightsizing, projecting this self- belief means you are already halfway there to reclaiming your space!

**2020 Special Book Pricing** Click here to order your copy for $20.00 plus $5.00 for shipping anywhere in Australia http://bit.ly/2020RightsizeYourLife

Motivation

September 16, 2020September 17, 2020Motivation, Planning, Rightsizing, UncategorizedLeave a Comment

The Rightsizing concept is based on the psychology of motivation using cognitive perspectives. Cognitive theories give us an alternative methodology to motivation through expectancy-value theory, goal-setting theories and self-determination theory. Expectancy value theory reveals that outcomes are determined by how much someone believes they can accomplish something. Following this theory to achieve our goal we must first believe that it is possible. Goal-setting theories offer a cognitive tactic to establish outcomes through social learning, learning through modelling our behaviour patterns from the observation of others. Self-determination theory is a modern suggestion that people have three inherent needs of competence, independence and connection to others. Once these needs are met rather than compromised, one’s intrinsic motivation will be activated. Intrinsic motivation is our natural ability to be driven to undertake something for the satisfaction of the activity.

Peter J. Daniels says in his 1987 book How to be motivated all the time, ‘The best antidote to discouragement is motivation. A person who is both personally and permanently motivated doesn’t give up easily!’ Rightsizing your belongings requires a high level of commitment and ownership of positive outcomes before, during and after your projects. It is a skill that requires you to act upon your own motivational capabilities. Self-determination will allow you to improve your lifestyle by reducing the items you own by creating clearly thought-out goals. That will empower your overall pledge to the Rightsizing process, thus establishing a high level of motivation to your decided-upon goals and projects. Applying a growth mindset will mean you can spend your energies finding ways to solve problems rather than fixating on the difficulties. Looking toward the future with the knowledge of our past motivates us from within when following a well-thought-out action plan. When we physically act motivated our minds and hearts will follow suit.

**2020 Special Book Pricing** Click here to order your copy for $20.00 plus $5.00 for shipping anywhere in Australia http://bit.ly/2020RightsizeYourLife

Reclaim Your Space

July 17, 2019June 12, 2019Clutter Mangement, De cluttering, Find Your Why, Home, Project Mangement, Rightsize Your Life! The Balanced Approach to Living Better With Your Belongings, Rightsizing, Space in your homeLeave a Comment

Find Your Why

Finding your WHY is important for you to hook your motivation and ignite your intention to start your Rightsizing journey. ‘All knowledge meets an end at the question … Why?’, said American author and philosopher Criss Jami. If we know WHY we are doing something this will allow us to fully emerge ourselves in all we do. Drilling down through our WHYs will give us a clear, defined, specific outcome, which allows you to discover what your emotional outcome is. If we know what is in our hearts of hearts, or what our true emotional needs are, we will be able to provide ourselves with a new template to live our lives through. We will achieve our vision to live better with our belongings by identifying the emotional benefits we will experience from changing our physical space. Knowing your WHY is HOW we are successful but also it assists us in WHAT we maintain as lasting successful outcomes.

If we think back to our kitchen example, the why behind this could pathway like this:

Why am I starting in my kitchen? > I am choosing to start in my kitchen because I am frustrated as it is so untidy. Why is this frustrating? > Because I am unable to find items instantly. Why is it frustrating when you cannot find things? > Because I need to rebuy items I cannot locate. Why is this a problem? > It costs me extra money. Why would rightsizing solve this for you? > It will allow me to see all my utensils and I could avoid spending extra dollars on repurchasing. Why will this be beneficial to you? > Because I will have more time and money. Why is this important? > Because I will now be able spend both in other areas of my life. Why will this be valuable to you? > Because I will be happier as my quality of life will have improved.

This shows how asking ourselves WHY until we have reached our emotional outcome will allow us to verbalise our specific of our own WHY for our project.