From Attic to Bookcase: A Clearing to Remember

[To remember]: At its essence, it means to call back all of our ‘members’ — those aspects in ourselves that we’ve neglected or have scattered or gone missing — and return to the truth of who we are. –A Year to Clear

My matchbook collection dating back to 1970 (before pruning)

My husband and I have spent most of a month going through years (read: decades) of stuff — some of it squirreled in the darkest recesses of our attic, some of it hiding in plain sight. This latest round of clutter clearing was prompted out of necessity: a need to prepare the attic (read: empty it completely) for a messy insulation project that will bring our 1875 home into the twenty-first century.

And why stop there? The bookcase, which takes up an entire wall in our house, wasn’t going to clear itself. That took another week.

And what a reveal it has been! From old passports, travel diaries, and keepsakes (like my matchbook collection) taking me back to audacious romps around the world; to bulging binders of student notes taking me back to inner, metaphysical romps in my early years of space clearing.

It takes time to take it in

It takes time to process and savor the moments and the milestones; time to consider what stays, what goes, what matters, what doesn’t; time to photograph the things you want to remember before they go out the door.

And I’m not even close to being done yet.

It would have been easy just to toss the whole lot and called it a day, but I would have missed so much.

I would have missed the illuminating opportunity to remember my strengths (the things I love in myself) — like my spirit of adventure, my resourcefulness, my love of beauty, my eagerness to grow and move outside my comfort zone — much of which lay buried inside some of these mementos of my past.

I would have missed out on the opportunity to marvel at how powerful it is to consciously let go. With love.

I would have missed out on the opportunity to name and feel my discomfort in real time — to free myself, once and for all, of patterns that are holding me back.

Lighting the way

My matchbook collection, after

I’m happy to report that the bookcase stands clear and spacious, as do a host of consciously curated treasures that get to shine more brightly. The shifts, both subtle and dramatic, are palpable. Like a lighthouse, these things beam their sparkly energy throughout the house now, guiding us back home to ourselves, again and again.

The attic, well, it’s not quite lighthouse-ready. It remains a work in progress.

What are you ready to dive into from your past?

What would you like to re-member that will bring you back to whole self, your spacious self?

Just asking the question is a great place to start. Even if you don’t get a clear answer, do something anyway: take one simple action step towards a goal today. And when you’re done, ask again tomorrow, and repeat.

And keep going.

Yes, watch what happens when you clear one small thing, pile, or area, every day for a week. It’s magic.

How we did it

If you could use a little nudge getting started, or are simply curious to know how my husband and I tackled the bookcase (yes, we did have a system and a set of guidelines that made the process much less overwhelming), I lay it all out in a post I wrote called “Taming of the Shelf.” It is here where I put on my space clearer’s hat, break the process down into smaller steps, and share some of my best tips on sorting and clearing efficiently — be it a bookcase, a shelf, or any small grouping of stuff.

And PS, if you want to follow along my clutter clearing adventures in real time, you can find me @spaciousway on Instagram. To view previous story postings, click “Clearing” in the header.

Happy clearing!