Goodbye Things: How to detach from objects

I remember how I came across goodbye, things. It’s simple design and attractive front cover. The blue font and and clean aesthetics. When I took this book, along with a few others, I didn’t realise it would have a profound effect on my life. If I can influence just one person to read it, I would be happy.

This book just made sense. It isn’t written as a novel or a memoir. Rather, it is a collections of advice on how to find your own minimalism and ways to achieve it. There may be a number of revised editions, but the one I read did seem to make made so you do not have to read it chronologically. I believe it was written so you can find the topic that is most important to you at the time.

Fumio Sasaki opens his book on ‘Why Minimalism?’. He states we all came into this world without material possessions and how unnecessary objects suck up our time. He compares minimalism to entering a clean hotel room with little obligations, and maximalism to leaving the hotel room in a stressed state, unable to close the suitcase or find your passport. I like that. I definitely feel this way when things are not in order or untidy.

However, I will not summaries the whole book, but you will learn about what his life like was preminimalism (which is an eye opener) and his life after minimalism. He defines a minimalist as someone ‘who knows what is truly essential for [them]’ and owns possessions that ‘are really important to them’. On reflection, this can really can look different for everyone and is something I will be exploring in this blog as I navigate my journey of living more intentionally. Below are 5 tips from Goodbye Things that helped me detach from objects I found difficult to let go:

Get rid of things you haven’t used in a year.

This is not something I learnt from Goodbye Things. In fact, I saw it when I used to watch a TV show where volunteers would declutter a house of a hoarder and decorate it. The lucky winner would be given stickers to place on items that they absolutely want to keep, and the host would tell them not keep items they haven’t used in a year. I was quite young when I watched this, but I do remember reflecting about this and seeing this again really helped me to keep my clothes to a minimum. I believe there are still shows like this on TV, but there are also shows on youtube, and I recommend watching them. Fumio Sasake states that dust will help you recognise these objects. The heavier the layer of dust, the more likely it is an object that can be discarded.

With dust in mind, try to limit your ornaments around the home. I used to take my teddys off of the top of my wardrobe so I could dust. I used to chuck all of my books and many little objects and things onto my bed to dust my bookcase. Every item on a surface lengthened the time it took me to dust. My mum called them ‘dust collectors’ as she never had anything around the house. In a way, my mum has always been minimalistic with her home decor, and lived similar to Fumio Sasake where she cleaned up after everything she used. For many years now, I try to keep my surfaces clean to help me keep on top of the dust.

Have you noticed you feel reluctant to dust because of how long it will take? Do you perhaps wipe around objects?

Put on a timer and dust your home. See how long this took, and then go through those objects and donate some. After some time, put your timer on again and dust. Can to let go of more items?

Take photos of the items that are tough to part with.

I believe this was the tip that helped me detach from a lot of my storage items. My biggest struggle was letting go of my old school books and similar items mentioned in goodbye, things. My husband was the same. We had double the amount of storage boxes that were never opened. After learning about taking photos of items, I decided to photocopy and take photos of my old school books.

Before learning this, I created a scrap book. Here I stuck all of the birthday messages from cards I had kept for over 10 years, stuck all of the restaurant cards I took for memorabilia, as well as cinema tickets and boarding passes. What I learnt was that the ink of these items fade over the years. Photos would save this. It also gave me a sense of freedom. These photos were safe, whereas my items could get destroyed in an accident one day. This is what happened to our baby photos when the roof leaked into the attic, destroying everything.

It was not easy. But ask yourself this: when will I use this item? What if it gets destroyed? How much money am I spending to store this (if they are in a storage unit OR if you have a larger home just for storage reasons)? I challenge you to take a photo of these items anyway, just in case.

Our things are like roommates, except we pay their rent.

Moving on nicely from the last tip, goodbye, things has an interesting Japanese analogy on how much space a person needs. Yet, he compares the items in our home to a roommate and calls them Our Things. The only downside is that the items cannot pay rent, help with chores, and essentially creates more work for us and should be kicked out. Earlier to this point, I remember Fumio Sasake also talking about the price of a house per square meter and how your objects own that and not you. If you buy or rent a larger property to fit these objects, you are giving more to the object then for yourself.

This point of the objects being comfortable in my home links to a previous post on carefully choosing furniture to serve me, rather than having more things to do to maintain them. It helped us stop spending hours and days searching for a property with only it’s storage facilities in mind. Ultimately, we now have a property that serves us well for cheaper than one that would have more storage.

Some things to think about: how much of your home can you use? How much space do your items take up? How often are you home? If there are more things around your home than you need, try starting to reduce items in one room at a time. Try to start with the storage units/attics/garages/basements who are living rent free for many years.

Rent what can be rented

Ok, this is one tip I have always used. There are a few activities that I want to do, but not often enough to need to own the item. For instance, a carpet cleaner. You can rent these large items from the local supermarket or a rental locker in the local library. In the UK there are many libraries that have a wall of lockers with tools, equipment, and technology to rent. How often do you mow your grass? Do you have anywhere to store the lawn mower? I do not, so I would need to rent this. I would first ask a family member or friend if they have one, and if not I will find another way to get this.

Babies. These cute little human’s get bored, very quickly. They also grow up, very quickly. I borrow books from the library, which I change every two weeks. If a book sparks joy for my baby, I will borrow it again and again. There is also a local rent-a-toy place nearby, which is a brilliant idea. Currently, I take my baby to many activities that are hosted in my local area. She can play with instruments, dive in ball pits, play with all kind of toys I had never seen or heard of, and have lots of fun. It would be a nice idea to swap toys with other mums that have babies of a similar age, too. My baby enjoyed playing with a toy, then became bored, but after another month or two she enjoyed it again.

Think of buying as renting

This is another concept I had been using before I found goodbye, things. Ever since my first smartphone, I kept the box. This may not sound like minimalism, but hear me out. I treated my phones carefully and I had never broken, smashed or damaged them. When I wanted a new one, I was able to get hundreds off the price of the next one by placing my phone in its original box (with its wires and books etc) and traded it in for the new phone. I had done this with most technology, and I can sell or trade them in for high prices. I do not have a drawer of old technology that I cannot use or sell.

The concept is to treat your items as if you were renting or borrowing them. Often, we respect items that we need to give back because we don’t want to be charged for damage or upset our loved one who lent us the item. I heard a saying that you should give back borrowed items better than when you received them. If you know you will eventually replace this item (usually technology), try out this concept and see if you can easily sell or trade it when you want to replace it.

I have used this concept for a vast majority of items and sold them fairly easily on online platforms. I sold my big desk, which someone thought was new but actually was 10 years old. Then, I sold shoes, wardrobes, chest of drawers, Xbox and games, TVs and kitchen gadgets. Now, I chose my items carefully so they are easy to maintain and keep.