Family Heirlooms and Decluttering
Family heirlooms can make decluttering more complicated. While you are decluttering and simplifying your home and your life, you may be thinking who you want to leave what to: ________ to a child or grandchild, ____________ to a niece or nephew. (You get to fill in the blanks).
There is no need to wait until you are gone to leave them these family heirlooms.
There is an overlooked part of the book, The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Clearing: How to free yourself and your family from a life time of clutter by Margareta Magnusson. The author asked her children and grandchildren what they wanted from her home. She was surprised by some of their requests. Some simple things sparked powerful memories, while others had little emotional resonance for her family members. She then gave them these mementos and family heirlooms to enjoy now.
Margareta benefited from this strategy in several ways:
- She experienced the pleasure of giving them those treasures while she was alive, and witnessed the joy of their receiving them.
- She got notes, emails and photos of these things being enjoyed by her family and knowing these treasures had a new life.
- She was able to give the right thing to the right person, preventing anyone from getting well-intentioned but unwanted “stuff”.
- She avoided holding onto something (clutter for her) in the mistaken belief a family member wanted it.
This freed her to let go of things.
You can have the same benefits.
When you give family members mementoes of your family history, and extra touch is including a note with the gift. The note could tell the story of the item: who owned it, when and why they got it, and what it meant to them. This will keep memories alive.
Think of this as you declutter. Ask family members what they want. If someone asks for something you want to keep, just let them know they’ll have to wait. 😉
Ideas for what to do with gifts and heirlooms you don’t give away – Click here!
One way to motivate yourself to declutter is to imagine the space you want to have when the clutter is gone. Want help envisioning the space you will love? And that works in the reality of the space you have? Contact me, today!
Photo by Nicholas Rhose on Unsplash