Extreme Declutter Results (👋 95% is GONE!) | Before & After » HOARDER TO MINIMALISM Family of 4

two weeks ago i finally unpacked my most precious possessions the few that were left after decluttering 30 years of emotional hoarding a process that took me 5 years in total to complete i didn't start decluttering with the intention of becoming a minimalist and yet here we are five years later and my family of four decluttered our entire home sold and donated almost everything that we owned and moved to europe with eight suitcases today i want to share with you the [Music] triumphs [Music] and the tears as well as the incredible decluttering results from our five-year minimalism journey so hit that like button and drop a door emoji down below if you are on your own decluttering or minimalism journey and remember the first step in crafting the life you want is to get rid of everything you don't this is a trigger warning to those of you who are sensitive to content that contains references to death grief trauma hoarding emotional neglect and other forms of mental distress please proceed with caution i was nine when my mother died after a long battle with cancer that's when we started putting things into boxes and i guess we just never stopped my dad would say things like just in case and to remember her by we got really good at putting things into boxes even our emotions i think i boxed up my emotions for too long and that's why they constantly spell out now my father didn't talk much about my mother after she died i don't even know how they met or how he proposed he wasn't very good at talking he was really good at collecting things though our home was a constant stream of new cars and collectibles at one point he had three harley-davidsons and that was on top of all his other cars and trucks every christmas i got boxes and boxes of presents i am asked a huge collection of swarovski crystals barbie dolls beanie babies and so much more my dad loved to tell me how much these things were going to be worse someday that they were going to pay for my college spoiler they didn't but we'll get to that later i wasn't allowed to touch or to play with any of these things we kept them in boxes or nicely displayed in cabinets for later always for later the year that he died it felt like the whole world collapsed around me i was in my early 20s when i lost my father my home and everything in it i remember breaking down and sobbing on the floor of my tiny apartment because i didn't have enough space for everything and a lot of it had to be sold or donated it felt like everything was being ripped away from me outside of my control i never wanted to feel like that again i saved as much as i could but it was too much for my one home what i couldn't fit got stashed in the basements and the closets of friends and family members but it didn't stop there that year started with the death of my father and by the time it ended i had lost eight people that i cared about clutter is a mirror our internal clutter is reflected as external clutter what does your clutter say about you i am sad i am lonely i am afraid to let go that's what my clutter was saying flash forward to 2015 and i'm married to a wonderful man we have just finished a two-year expat assignment in shanghai china and moved back to our small and cute condo in chicago the 900 square foot two bedroom in chicago that was perfect for us as a newly married couple started to feel pretty crowded after the birth of our second son honestly it was a mess my husband worked long hours and because both of my parents were gone and we had no family members nearby i never had any help and i felt constantly overwhelmed a few months later we ended up getting sent to my home state of indiana we went from a small 900 square foot apartment to a 1900 square foot town home with a two-car garage i finally had enough space to bring all the things that i had saved into one place but it still felt like it wasn't enough space and instead of comforted i felt stressed out and overwhelmed there were always toys on the floor appliances and baby stuff crowding the countertops and of course the boxes and boxes of sentimental items left behind by my family hiding in the shadows of the garage and lower level i didn't even know where to start i was chatting with my neighbor one day when it happened she told me she had downsized from a 5 000 square foot five bedroom home to a town home the same size as ours and she had already made thirty thousand dollars decluttering and selling her clutter i was floored and i decided i wanted to explore this thing called decluttering so i ordered a pretty little book you might have heard of it it was the life-changing magic of tidying up by marie kondo i am so glad that i started with her book did you know that marie kondo spent five years as a shinto shrine maiden in japan her reverence and empathy resonated with me have gratitude for the things you're discarding by giving gratitude you're giving closure to the relationship with that object and by doing so it becomes a lot easier to let go well letting go still wasn't easy it was like tearing off a band-aid it hurt but i could also see myself healing slowly along with the book i also ordered a small rose gold scale some plastic mailers and a torso mannequin i fondly called marie antoinette here she is modeling a vintage adidas crop top that i bought for 50 cents in high school can you believe i sold that baby for 25 almost 15 years later slowly lovingly i continued to declutter we moved two more times ending up in new jersey that place was smaller so the clutter stood out even more but i kept at it it felt so good to know that i was sending my things on to a new home a new life a new chance to be loved the kind and thankful words from the people that i sold to also helped me heal remember the collectibles my dad said would pay for my college most of them sold for less than a half or a third of what my dad had paid for them in the 80s and 90s i hope that the people who bought my barbies have little girls of their own and those boxes will finally get opened the more we got rid of the freer we felt doors we didn't even know were there started opening my children were happier we were happier something inside of us shifted my husband and i made the decision to do something drastic we decided to get rid of everything and move to germany where my husband's family lived my children would finally get to be around grandparents aunts uncles and cousins i wish i could go back and hug the me from five years ago and tell her it's not okay but it's going to be hang in there our life now is totally unrecognizable to what it was before if i had to use three words to describe our life they would be peaceful loving free now i spend less time cleaning up and feeling stressed out and more time playing with my kids and relaxing with my husband [Music] our home is filled with light and laughter from the outside you might think it's too much space too many empty corners i know i get a lot of comments about the echoes sorry about that guys you can't see it but that empty space is actually full it's full of happiness and love we fly paper airplanes and do cartwheels in those empty spaces we build incredible things out of legos and blocks we collect moments instead of objects i didn't keep much but the sentimental things i did keep have a special place in our life i use my father's knife set to cut fresh bread from the cute little bakery on the corner and i share stories about my grandparents treasures that are proudly displayed on my bookshelf my children get to eat fabulous home-cooked meals off the plates that my parents received when they got married i've been eating off the same plate for 38 years and now my kids can as well isn't that amazing this is what minimalism looks like to us i am done putting things into boxes we are surrounded by possessions that have so much meaning and history but if they should break i won't be sad i will know that they have served their purpose not only in my life but also the lives of my loved ones the ones who went before and the ones who came after my name is marissa and i am a recovering hoarder turned minimalist mom thank you for listening to my story today if you struggle with clutter please consider joining my family on youtube and remember the journey of a thousand miles begins with one step but you don't have to walk it alone take care bye-bye [Music] you

Channel: A to Zen Life

Views: 2,699,278

Keywords: minimalism, minimalist, minimalist family, family minimalism, extreme decluttering, declutter results, decluttering results, hoarder to minimalist, hoarder to minimalist declutter, minimalism family of 4, konmari declutter, declutter, minimalism with kids, minimalist journey, konmari, konmari method, extreme decluttering minimalism, minimal mom, minimalist mom, marissa zen, minimalism decluttering, i sold everything, declutter before and after, extreme minimalism, decluttering

Id: VeLg5rDNs-8

Length: 11min 28sec (688 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 02 2021