In a house filled to overflowing with 'stuff' this, of course, is true to some extent. Yet how much do you need to bend reality to consider that you should keep five flathead screwdrivers of the same size, or that there should be six breadknives in your kitchen when one will do the same job? How about the many sleeping bags and knitted blankets in the spare bedroom?
You've hung on to these since your kids were teenagers and you keep them in case you and some future visitors should be snowed in one extreme winter? It doesn't matter how you justify keeping these things, because your reasons have served you well until today. I ask you to consider them from a fresh perspective. If it might be useful, but you haven't used it in a year, let it go. Bag it, box it and take it to the goodwill shop.
There is a tendency to learn from our parents and grandparents that everything has a potential future value. We learned their value system and in most cases the good things we were taught can help us in life and we can pass on the good skills to our children and friends we care about. But there were things which were relevant forty years ago that just have no value now in a different, faster, more complicated, less self-reliant approach to life where we are these days.
Do you need to know how to build furniture in your garage, or keep all the tools to do so?
Should you be skilled in curtain making, dress making, book binding, or picture framing?
Is bike repair a skill you consider hugely valuable?
Should you hold onto all the furniture items in your home?
If two of your live in your apartment or house, should you have enough seating for another dozen people?
My Mum recently moved from her home where she and Dad raised us all, into a nursing home where she can be better looked after than if she were living alone and subject to the dangers and worry of infirmity and falling. My brother and I calculated last week that in the downstairs rooms of the old family home we have three sofas, three large armchairs, eight folding garden chairs and a glass dining table, eight stacking chairs and a dining table for the sun lounge, one dining table and four chairs for the middle dining room, and two writing desks and chairs. That's enough seating for thirty four people in a house that Mum has lived in on her own for more than ten years!
The house doesn't feel cluttered, but this volume of furniture represents extreme clutter. It also serves as a reminder that where nine of us once lived together, it was in a house that hosted parties, events, prayer groups, history club meetings, parish meetings and where there was always a chair to pull up and chat with my parents. Nostalgia and clutter do tend to exist arm in arm. My brother and I will work through the furniture and see who wants want - and will turn up to collect it - and then decide where we donate the rest to ensure it continues to serve where it is needed.