Christmas is meant to be a joyful time of giving and receiving, but often feels like dread and burden with too much stuff.
As parents Christmas morning is better than when we were kids. At least for me it is. I love to give my kids fun gifts I know they will love. However, this wasn’t always the case. But you might not know how to declutter before Christmas.
Set boundaries with your family, but don’t control them
It’s always okay to communicate your wishes and how you run your home, especially during holidays. However, it is not your right to control what someone does with that information.
Despite communicating our wishes for the holidays family and friends often do what they want according to their own values and lifestyles. This is okay. You are the gatekeeper of your home, and you have the ability to either opt out of family events or declutter whatever is given to you that does not fit into your life. Even if you have physical space, but not emotional bandwidth to manage the stuff.
Christmas used to feel like an obligatory shopping spree
This led me to purchasing gifts that were nothing more than placeholders under the tree. Even worse than that though, was the rest of the year before and after Christmas spent having too much clutter and stuff.
Our homes are not cluttered because of one day, or season of the year
It’s the other 364 days of our every day lives that has created the clutter. We buy too much stuff. Good deals lure us into buying things we don’t need in amounts we can’t consume.
Then on Christmas morning we blame the gifts that are now a part of our home. These gifts are not the problem, they are the straw that breaks our backs.
Decluttering the rest of the year, makes Christmas morning and beyond easy and fun
It’s normal to look at the incoming stuff from Christmas and lash out at it, and even the people who give it. This defeats the entire Christmas season, though.
There is no joy when you feel resentful toward your family and friends for giving you gifts as an expression of love. I know first hand now that we live clutter free that I can accept gifts with gratitude and peace knowing that I am the gatekeeper of my home, and do not have to keep anything we don’t have room for.
I know this is easier said than done, especially when family and friends love to go over the top with gifts
You aren’t helpless, though and you do have options. It’s possible to declutter your home AND have stress free Christmas.
If you want to declutter your home the simplest, most efficient way possible get into Decluttering Simplified. Your accountability is built into this program!
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