After beginning the book, I was keen to get started on whittling my ridiculous wardrobe down. And as I started clearing it out, I was actually mildly concerned about how easy it was to create a huge ‘discard’ pile. I mean considering I did a substantial cull last year and have a year and a half of no shopping under my belt, it is frightening to see how much stuff is sat in bags in my spare room waiting to be loved once more by a buyer in a charity shop. 

After the initial emotionless cut, I was left with my ‘love’ and ‘not sure’ piles. There was still quite a lot remaining. Gosh 33 seemed like a small number…

Courtney suggests that you make a list, numbering your items 1-33 with permission to alter the list several times until the final edit. I did’t do this, mainly because I have my children running round and they are small and need a lot of input! Instead, over the following week I just got things out of my wardrobe and weighed up how much I loved it along with how likely I am to be pleased to have it there. Then I’d make a new ‘not sure’ and ‘love’ pile and return the ‘love’ items back to the wardrobe. With the number 33 in mind, it really does get trickier once you have sub 50 items, all of which you’d say you love. This process has continued in snippets of stolen time throughout the week and is still going on.

As it stands at the moment, I still haven’t got to 33 items total. In fact I’ve only just got to 33 items of clothing. Just clothing. 

Although I’ve ruthlessly culled my whole wardrobe, spilling over my 33 are trainers, jackets and bags. And I confess I have a number of pairs of heels in there too, which really is ridiculous because I know I won’t have the opportunity to wear any of them in the next few weeks. And even if I did, I’d have to go on a lot of date nights to wear each pair once. I think my reluctance to let go of them is something to do with holding on to my pre-children life and I’m meeting some inner resistance to moving toward simplicity. Oh wait… This isn’t my journal…  

Over all I’ve found the process reasonably easy (probably because I still have all those shoes…) However, I did come across some bumps. I got my knickers in a twist about some well loved and used A/W pieces. Thankfully I untwisted my underpants once I realised that for one, it’s OK to keep a few things I know I love and use ready for the next 3 months. I’m not getting rid of anything yet (except the definite discard pile) and also, this is a process. For me this is the start of a new phase of my journey towards consuming less. And that’s OK. (Full confession – I also kept my Christmas jumper and an emergency funeral outfit. I know. I’m weird). 

I may not be where I want to be today, but I’m further on than I was yesterday.

Anna Firkins

As for the two other piles of clothes – the ones I’m not totally sure about saying goodbye to, and the ones I still love but didn’t make the final cut – their fate will be decided in 3 months. The idea being that in 3 months, I won’t want to welcome the chaos and clutter back into my life and I’ll be much less attached and so will be able to part with it easily. 

I guess we’ll see…