A photograph of guest Claire Birnie, project 3000, in a white top smiling

Episode 62 – Project 3000 with guest Claire Birnie

In this podcast, Lesley talks to Clair Birnie. Clair is the owner and head organiser at The Tidy Life Project, an Edinburgh-based professional organising, decluttering and minimalism coaching company.

Never before in human history has the average family owned so much stuff. In fact, professional organisers have estimated that the average home holds as many as 300,000 items. With such an overwhelming number of belongings, it is no wonder that so many of us are seeking to declutter and simplify our lives. And back in 2018, Claire started a journey to live with less and inspired lots of other people to do that with her through her initiative Project 3000. Participants came from all around the world and it was a huge success.

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Transcript of this podcast episode

Intro  0:07  
Welcome to today's episode of The declutter hub podcast, your channel for super easy, no nonsense advice on how to declutter and organise your home. Please welcome your host, professional organisers, Ingrid Jansen and Lesley Spellman.

Lesley  0:23  
Hello and welcome listeners to Episode 62 of the declutter podcast. I'm Lesley if you have clutter and want to sorted out this is the show for you. Along with Ingrid, we are the declutter hub. We know just how overwhelming decluttering can be. So we are here to help with our podcast, checklists and guest blogs. We also have an exclusive members area where we guide our members step by step on how to declutter every area of their home. We're there every step of the way with courses live q&a and community chat. Take a look a members dot declutter hub.com In today's episode, I'm very excited to be talking to Claire Birnie. Claire is the owner and head organiser at the tidy life project an Edinburgh based professional organising, decluttering and minimalism coaching company. So never before in human history has the average Western home owned so much stuff. In fact, a professional organiser estimated the that the average home can hold as many as 300,000 items. With such an overwhelming number of belongings, it's no wonder that so many of us are seeking to declutter and simplify our lives. And back in 2018, Claire started a journey to live with less and inspired lots of other people to do that whole initiative project 3000 participants came from all over the world, and it was a huge success. So a huge welcome to Claire, thanks for joining us on the podcast today.

Claire  0:22  
Thanks for having me, Lesley. It's lovely to be here.

Lesley  0:27  
And I'm really, really interested in decluttering. And then organising, presumably then, but mainly focused on decluttering. And it's quite a different idea. And so I'm interested in why you started to do it. And the basic premise behind it clear.

Claire  2:00  
So the basic idea began in I think, about June 2017. And I was really kind of having a bit of a rock bottom year, I'd been working in academics studying for a PhD, was working two part time jobs to fund that, and was really, really starting to realise I was working insane hours, really, I mean, think averaging about 90 to 100 hours a week, to buy the things I thought I should be buying to be a success. This is what being successful means is being able to kind of have this disposable income and buy expensive items. And the real crunch point that I reached was I'd gone on my lunch break to John Malone, and bought a 120 pound candle. And I got home with it later that day. And I was looking at it and looking at it and looking at it and thinking, What have I done, I'm working myself to the bone, making myself really pretty unhappy. So that I can buy things that aren't making me happy. And that kind of seed in my brain was mulling away for about a year when I decided, you know, the thing that I need to do work life or work differently, and have less stuff, the stuff that I've been thinking is going to get me the happiness that we all want isn't that it's actually making me pretty unhappy. So I decided, start looking into decluttering start looking into minimalism. Long before it started my business. And I didn't know at that point that professional organising was a thing. And started coming across people who were doing this making radical life changes decluttering their lives significantly. I'm saying they were far happier for it. So I decided that at the start of 2018, I was going to commit for my New Year's resolution to getting rid of 3000 things from my home. The 3000 comes from the 300,000 estimate, which I'm not sure if that's accurate at all. But that was the idea behind it. 3000 things was 1%. And I had a year to do which felt fairly reasonable, felt manageable.

Lesley  4:12  
I think one of the things clear is, you know, it may not be 300,000. But what we do know is that it's a lot and and certainly towards the end of the 20th century in the 21st century, it's got a little bit out of control. So it's an insane amount of stuff that a lot of people are gathering along the way. And a lot of that is aspirational clutter, which is exactly what you're talking about. You're not on your own, it would cover tin, a dome alone candle, which is which was your lightbulb moment, I guess is what we're saying. All of a sudden you thought this has got to stop and this has got to change. I need to find a way then to do that in my own way.

Claire  4:44  
So I think for me it was this kind of moment of realising that the things that are really making me happy are not the material things I kind of had a big thought of when was my last really happy when was my mental health really good. My physical house, everything was going well, I'd spent a few years in my early 20s, living abroad. And I had literally lived out of suitcases for years. Very, very minimalist had owns virtually nothing, which had been a struggle at times. But if I could pinpoint when was my happiest that was it. And it just was like a light bulb moment, like you say that what I was doing now, was what I thought I shouldn't be doing is that kind of a young professional. But it was making me really, really miserable. I was overworked, stressed, my physical mental health was suffering so much. And I thought, you know, I need to make a really radical change. And it's been transformational. I've changed my life completely.

Lesley  5:43  
And it's changed lots of other people's lives too along along with that in the process. So you've said that so you decided to go for 3000 items, just because you would read this statistic from somebody that said the average home was about 300,000. So you went for that 1% idea. So do you think that the number is important?

Claire  6:03  
I'm not necessarily so a lot of people who've taken part have aimed for a lot lower than perhaps aimed for 1000s. They've, they've been people who've gone much, much higher. I was telling Lesley earlier, there are no for people who are in what I call the 10,000 Plus club who have got rid of or decluttered, 10,000 or more things from their home. I'm coming up on that number. I don't think I'll get there. But the number is very flexible. You don't have to do 3000, you have to do what feels right for you. I did have a close friend who kind of scoffed at the number and said, That's ridiculous. And I'm going to prove that that's ridiculous. No one can declutter that. And she called me about two weeks later and said, Well, I'm at 1000 already. And it's two weeks in. I think, for a lot of people, it is achievable. But it does depend. One of the really difficult things is how you count each item. There are some things that are obviously count as one if you're decluttering, one book, it's one thing, but if you're going through paperwork, for example, are you looking at old bank statements? Are you counting that as ones of total? Are you counting every single sheet of paper? Do you want to count every single paperclip in your house? That's kind of I think up to the individual how you feel it works best for you. But it is that's I think we're it does become difficult with numbers like 300,000? How are you counting? To get to that total? That's not clear to me. There's no hard and fast rules, I think people should when they're decluttering, if they are aiming for a target number count in the way that feels best for you.

Lesley  7:42  
I think the point for looking at it from the outside in is that it's a personal goal, isn't it? And I know you've you've got a community of people who are each going through Project 3000 in their own individual ways. But if you want to get rid of 3000 items, and that includes 27 paperclips, that's perfectly fine to for me, as a professional organiser, I'm trying to compute what that might look like at the moment. So I think I'd be like, well, well, maybe it's a little bit cheating if you get rid of every bank statement, because you would if you were doing paperwork, you'd easily easily get to 3000 things in maybe in one couple of days. But that doesn't matter, does it? You know, it depends on then you can go again, you know, you can set a personal and interim goal and then have another goal and things like that. I'll see how it goes. Because it is very difficult to quantify numbers, isn't it? I'm not sure I'd know what 3000 I know what 100 been books been bucks looks like and the type of stuff that might go into those. But can I do I quantify by number that's not something that I've really worked with. So it's an interesting concept, isn't it?

Claire  8:39  
Yeah. So one of the things that I kind of when I was starting out, I had no real idea of how much stuff I owned. And so personally, I have countered paperclip by paperclip. And the reason that I've done that is we have in this society, you don't buy one paperclip at a time you buy a box of 1000s. And the reality is, I am never ever going to use 1000 paperclips. That's not going to happen. But they're going to sit there in my drawer for the rest of my life. And then someone's going to have to deal with them when I'm gone. And it's not just paper clips is everything. So a lot of what I've decluttered has been big things. So last week I decluttered three, three D vase to a homeless charity. But that's that counting is one and a paperclip counting as one. Yeah, it can feel a bit silly. But the basic idea is that the quantity of everything that we have, we have too much of almost every single item that buying 1000 paperclips might be the cheap way to buy paper clips, but we have to store them they live in our homes forever. And for me at least, I found that my sessions were taking over my life. I was spending an incredible amount of time I think most people are tidying, cleaning, working around looking for things and even just the mind of decluttering I've done now I clean, so much less, I tidy so much less, but everything is cleaner and tidier, it has made life so much easier. And that's I think, really what we all want not many of us want to spend all of our time tidying and cleaning, even professional organisers, we don't all want to do that all the time. And just having that less of everything has made such a difference in terms of kind of my, my well being my home space, my productivity levels are way higher, because I have less little jobs, if I need to tidy this, I need to sort that. And it's just been really a weight off my shoulders having less stuff.

Lesley  10:36  
So we've talked a little bit about numbers. Clare, can you tell us a little bit about the schedule? So so it's Project 3000? So the idea is potentially that you might do that. So some of the people have gone through project 3000 Do that for a year? Obviously, some people achieve that before the year is up. And that's also fine. So it's, it's something that you can manage yourself, isn't it? But how do you decide on a day to day basis about what's going out? Is it very random? Or do you do it by room? Or do you do it by category? So how did you decide what types of things to offload every day?

Claire  11:08  
For me, it was quite mixed. There are certain things that lend themselves really well to doing by category clothes, you do by category very easily. But other things, it was much more a case of maybe on a day where I felt I had some motivation. But I felt kind of I really have the fire in me and I want to go and declutter, I'd open a drawer, take everything I go through item by item and make the decisions. That being said, even I did this over a year, I really did every single thing at least twice. I think probably on average, I was doing four or five over the course of the year, because I was finding them the more and more I let go, the easier it is to let more go. The clearer my decision processes are becoming the decision of what to keep what not to keep it's becoming easier and easier. And the more I'm seeing the difference, feeling the difference. The more I'm kind of I became convinced that this is the right thing. And I could much more clearly ask myself, Is this the right decision? If you don't feel it's the right decision at the time, if you're unsure, it's totally fine to keep something and then go back to it. That's the key I think is going back and keeping going through and I'll be doing this for the rest of my life. I'm not done by any stretch of the imagination, no things I kind of at the start was very adamant. I would never let a book go, ever. That's my big weakness as books. And within I think I think about two months, I had let go 100 books, which would have been unthinkable at the start. I have no, rather embarrassingly, I think total count is close to 1000 books, which I will read in a lifetime. But that was such an emotional trigger point for me at the start, that I knew touching it straightaway was not going to happen. But as it goes on, that category books, again are like clothes and easy category to do at once. I think it's not a once and done thing. decluttering you can go back look again, think to yourself again, right? Can I go further this time, I'm going to change my mind. It's changed my habits on ownership massively. So I no longer have finished a book and then put it back on my shelf shelf. Unless it's a book that I think are top 10. I love it so much. I'm going to read it again. And again, it goes straight into the donation pile, or I think my friend did love it. My sister would love it, but it goes. And that's something I didn't think I would do at all. So the unexpected consequence for me has been that it has changed my patterns, my habits of ownership. I used to be someone who loves shopping, it's probably quite addicted to it. And the first time after starting project 3000 that I needed to go shopping for a dress for a friend's wedding. I went talking about the high street stores, and I hated it. I was miserable. And that was so eye opening that without intending to is become someone that didn't like shopping but shopping wasn't hitting all those endorphins that it used to do when in the end, I bought a dress that I absolutely loved. I still love it. I'm wearing it to two more weddings coming up on I bought it for nine pounds from cancer research. All of these little habits have changed have just been so positive. Mostly for my bank balance. For my mental health for the planet, and huge change. I think

Lesley  14:30  
you're so right there. And I think it even if you don't go for the kind of the numbers game almost let's call it that with a project. 3000 decluttering is always a phased approach, isn't it? And so when I'm working with a client and we do a full house me and you do this as well, cloud, this is not the only way that you work. You also work as a professional organiser, with lots of different people with different levels of clutter. And so it's very much there is a nervousness and emotional attachments things at the beginning it takes you a while To get to a point where you can feel oh, actually, I'm okay with that decision. And it's not something, it's not an easy decision. And so what quite often happens is that we start in one room. And by the time we've done the whole house, we go back again to the first room, and the client finds it much easier then to get rid of stuff from the first room. And so it's definitely a phased approach. The other thing that I want to talk about is in terms of decluttering being is a permanent thing that you have to do, you know, everybody will be decluttering. And through their whole lives, you know, people say to me all the time, but surely once you've done it once, then you don't have to do it again. That's not the case, because we buy things some of us buy more than others. So I still like to shop, I don't do it a lot. But I will go out and I will buy clothes, but but I will make sure that it's replacing something that I no longer want. It's really interesting thing from that perspective that it is very much a phased approach. Just jumping back to the sort of numbers again, so did you find them that there were some days where you'd get rid of 100 things and some days where you might get rid of only one thing?

Claire  15:59  
Yeah, so some categories were even from the beginning, super easy. And one of the things that I included in my own decluttering that other people might not was digital decluttering. And I find that really easy. So one of the first things I did was I went through the contacts list on my phone. And there are people who I hadn't spoken to in five plus years, and they're never going to speak to you again, I worked with you a decade ago, it's not going to happen. There were people who I didn't remember who they were. And some people might kind of think of digital decluttering a little bit as a cheat, but I think it's a growing problem that we are storing so much digital information. Some people see it as kind of pretty harmless, but the reality is, the energy used to store this digital information is vast, we see it as a no problem issue. But the reality is the environmental impact of the amount of digital information if you're storing 20,000 photos, you do not need that many selfies, you do not need that many landscape shots from that holiday. I think we're all guilty of that. In this day and age, you know, you go on holiday with your smartphone, you come back with 1000 photos. It's one of one of the earliest decluttering digital decluttering things that I shared people got a good laugh out of. I'd been on a three week holiday in France. And I went through the photos coming back. And there was about 150 photos of my feet are accidental selfies whilst I was trying to take videos. So it's photos of me squinting, photos of me walking along photos of the inside of my bag. And that was a really easy wreck the numbers up very quickly go in and delete those 150 Terrible photos and give people a good laugh at me. At the same time. Other things are much harder with the numbers. Again, another thing I didn't initially start out thinking I would declutter was memorabilia, the things that my parents have kept for me since childhood, old school report sold awards. And that has changed, they are now all gone. The only memorabilia kind of that I have are my two degrees and nothing else has stayed. Because at the end of the day, I know I can swim 10 metres I don't need the piece of paperwork from when I was five to say I can swim 10 metres. But that is not something I would kind of encourage people to kind of feel bad about if they if they want to keep that for themselves or for their children. No, don't feel bad about that. That's completely reasonable. But in the future, go back and think about it later. Think about the kind of the legacy of the quantity and the quality of what you're keeping. Absolutely. I'm an aesthetic person, I keep important things. And I always say this to clients, if they came into my house, I can pinpoint things that they would have been immediately as little Why are you keeping that, to me are the most important things I belong, they have no monetary value, but they are very important to me. So don't kind of feel compelled that you need to hit the numbers by doing I need to get rid of all of my childhood memorabilia I need to do this. It's about finding really what's right for you. Not kind of relying on people's assumptions that you're cold hearted if you don't keep every single drawing your child's ever done. Because let's be frank, children produce an incredible amount of terrible artwork. Don't tell my god children, I told you that that I have not kept everything they have ever produced, but I used to. So it's just about gradually changing those behaviours, you're not going to do well perhaps you will do all at once. And that's brilliant bit for most people. It is a much more gradual mindset shift.

Lesley  19:39  
So Claire, it sounds like a really brilliant initiative. And I think it's obviously it's proven that people have really got on board and they've achieved project 3000 And then some. So what are the three main things then that make it so successful?

Claire  19:57  
So I can talk a little bit from from my experience, but It worked for me. And then I can talk about why it's worked for other people, I think the flexibility of having our year to do it in, but at the same time, that kind of rigidity of it's a year, you've got a year to do it, you could do it daily. But the reality is most of us come home from work sometimes, or we've had an argument with a friend or a partner, and we're just not in the mood to think right, I'm going to declutter, or if you're having a bad week, if you've had a bereavement, that's not the time to go through family functions and try and declutter them, I think that flexibility of having a year to do it in has worked for a lot of people that they can do it when they feel motivated. So there, there were days where I would quite easily get rid of 100 plus items. And then there were other days where weeks even or nothing would go, I'm still doing project defects. And I'm actually on my second round, and I have not decluttered anything and about a month and a half. So I've been moving home, that's been my focus about start back up. But that kind of having that flexibility, where you do it when you have the time where you have the energy has been really beneficial. And the second thing I think having that target goal, we were talking earlier, Lesley about one of the people that has absolutely smashed, I think she's done three writers. Now she's a competitive marathon runner, for her at least having that goal to beat and then go even further and wanting to do better and better, that really helped her that won't help everyone. But for her that was a really driving focus. I think the third thing that's helped, I think the most people they start out is quite hard, it gets easier and easier. And the reason it gets easier and easier is you're starting to have these thought processes in your mind, about ownership patterns, you start to realise how much you have, you're starting really to think for most people for the first time to engage seriously in your patterns of ownership, your habits, your behaviours, what emotions you're having, with the things you own. And it's something that most of us give very, very little thought, if any, to we just consume. That is the culture we live in. But I think there's growing concerns about environmentalism, about people wanting to use less plastic people being aware that fast fashion is incredibly damaging for our world. I think doing something like projects these days, and it certainly changed everything. For me, I thought I was quite an environmentally friendly person, because I, because I recycled and then being kind of forced to come into contact. And really seriously think about what I own what I buy and how I buy it. And realising that's not true. I've kind of been fooling myself that while I'm vegetarian, and I do my recycling, and I don't drive so I must be really environmentally friendly. But I buy a lot of stuff that is destined eventually, for landfill. I think that that's probably for me the thing that I find the most powerful the amount of people that got in touch and said that it's changed their patterns on things, the disposable nature of things, there's a quote that I can never remember who it's by, there's no such place as gone, or there's no such places away, every time you throw something away, or even donates it to a charity shop, it's not gone, it still exists. And if you're just buying to replace. So that's, again, something I people ask a lot about the rules of project because there's no say there aren't really any rules. But one of the things I would emphasise is you're not getting rid of 3000 things to make room for 3000 new shiny things. That's not the purpose. So it's much I think, for me, it's switched me and a lot of people on to thinking much more seriously making much more conscious consumer choices. I still buy things, I still buy things from high street shops. Of course I do. I'm not this perfect kind of zero waste, eco friendly person, but I make much more considered choices. Now.

Lesley  23:59  
One thing that you said that really resonated with me, Claire is the journey that people go on and the learning that they do about their own behaviours. And I think whether that's a standard if you're if there is such a thing as a standard decluttering process, or if it's a decluttering process that involves a very specific goals, and let's call it that is learning why they're doing things and that kind of light bulb moments of Oh, right. That's why I do that. And that's, you know, and I need to stop that. And recognise in your own behaviours and your own, the own the things that you're doing that are sabotaging things for you. And so I think that's, that's been one of the nicest things about having the members area is all these little lightbulb moments that we as professional organisers work through on an individual basis with our clients. Because we see patterns of behaviour all the time that are prevalent with lots and lots of different people. But it's just always really interesting to see people working out for themselves, which is fantastic. And obviously that's the case with Project 3000 as well. So I'm an absolutely love the idea it sounds fantastic. I just wanted to know that so you talked about the fact that you're on round two at the moment. So in 2019, you're going through round two. So that's your second 3000 items, presumably. So is this something that you're you feel as if you can continue for life?

Claire  25:13  
There's definitely not once I finished this 3000, there's definitely not another 3002 Go in 2020 my shopping habits have changed my consumption, Shabbat habits have changed so much that this isn't going to be kind of an annual thing where I let go of 3000 items each year. I don't own that much anymore. But yeah, absolutely. decluttering is going to be a part of my life forever. I think anyone who says otherwise is deluding themselves, you know, we're all going to have socks that grow holes, and no matter how much you don't them, which is one of my kind of New Year's resolutions, I'm going to learn how to darn my socks, no matter how much you don't, they eventually will wear out human reality is that we do consume products, we're not going to stop doing that. And I think people there is a slight concern that I have, that some of the kind of movements that you see on social media these days are actually quite negative about necessary consumption, that people feel really bad about any form of plastic consumption to the extent that I think people can have saying that we're not going to take prescription medication anymore. I think that's absolutely a terrible idea. We all have to be accepting of the fact. Some levels of consumption are inevitable to human existence, and to human wellbeing. But we have to balance that with environmental goals with our own happiness with our own financial well being, it's not going to be something that you declutter, once you're done. Like you said earlier, Lesl, it is an ongoing thing. And that's, that's okay. But one of the things I try and encourage through Project 1000 is that you declutter sustainably, the tendency for decluttering is that you just bag it all up, and you take it to the charity shop, and everything else, you just stick to landfill. And I try and encourage people to get a bit creative with how they're letting go of their stuff. First thing I would really highly recommend is what I what I called targeted donations, I volunteered throughout university in a Oxfam shop, and I know we got a lot of stuff, or charity shops get a lot of stuff that they cannot sell that easily. And that is stuff that is going to wind up in landfill, unfortunately. But if it was more targeted to kind of more specific charities, it's going to stay around for longer, it's going to get the use that you want, if you're donating. So that'd be things like this time of year, if you can donate winter coats, hats, gloves, you can of course donate them to a local charity shop fits possibly even better if you donate them to a homeless shelter. There's hundreds of examples there that stationery is a big one for me that I've found that local schools are just overwhelmed every time I turn up, whether it's the familiar stuff from clients with bags of half used to post it knows that there's no way a charity shop are gonna sell half used part of post it notes. But the schools are delighted, they don't have great funding currently, they absolutely have the need, and they'll be thrilled to receive it. So that's a big goal, targeting your donations to people who really need it, who are really going to use it. I actually advocate sometimes for selling things rather than donating them for that specific purpose. If you're selling it, you know, it's going to someone who really wants it, who really needs it, who is going to be excited about getting this product. The second thing as well is to get creative with things that can't be donated. It doesn't have to be landfill or recycling. There are other options. My favourite thing that I like go in the first round was a straw hat that was just beyond salvaging, it's been out of shape. And it's went into my parents compost bin, and is now nurturing their apple trees.

Lesley  29:00  
There. It's an interesting one, as I've been sitting here listening to you in the last five minutes, I can feel so many more podcasts coming on with Claire, talk to you about minimalism. I'd like to talk to you about targeted donations, because that's really interesting, because it's kind of I wouldn't say it's at odds with what Ingrid and I would normally talk about, but it's certainly something because we struggle with the idea I think of if decluttering is your goal, then send it to somebody somewhere more generic. And because I feel that often with targeted donations. It's another barrier that stops people from getting things done. And so it's finding that balance, I think, isn't it. But I think that's a topic for a whole nother podcast. I was like, Oh, now we can get into the nitty gritty of chatting about that. But I come I'm completely on board with everything that you have said. I think it's really interesting. I think it's something that people get involved in if they want to. So where can we find find out a little bit more about that Claire?

Claire  29:56  
So you can find me on Instagram at the Heidi life project. My blog will be launching on the tidy life projects.com On January 1, and there will be a Facebook community page launching on January 1 as well.

Lesley  30:13  
So we're gonna put all of Claire's details in the show notes for this podcast as well. So thanks so much for taking the time to listen today. If you've enjoyed this podcast, please leave a review and tell us what you think about the show. If you'd like to get more tips and advice, please follow us on social media. You can find us on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook as declutter hub. We've also got a lively supportive Facebook group where we chat all things clutter, just search for the declutter hub community, we'd love to see you there. Also, don't forget to take a look@members.declutter.com To find out more about our lovely membership. If you don't want to miss the next weekly episode, please subscribe to the declutter podcast on Apple podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and I Heart Radio, and it will pop into your net notifications each Friday. See you next time.

Outro  30:58  
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Useful Links and Resources

PROJECT 3000 – A GUEST BLOG BY CLAIRE BIRNIE

Claire Birnie is an Edinburgh based Professional Organiser who undertook Project 3000 back in 2018. Claire set herself the challenge of getting rid of 3000 items in a year. Here she explains all.

The Problem

There is a trap that many of us fall into in the modern world. We have been taught to associate happiness and success with material goods and consumerism. Advertising inundates us with the message that our problems can be solved by simply buying more.

It is a trap that I see with my clients on a daily basis and it is one that I previously found myself stuck in. I realised that I had to make a major change.

The Solution

On New Year’s Day 2018 I set about changing my life for the better. I decided that in just one year I would declutter 3000 items from my home - that works out as almost ten items per day and was an ambitious goal. I had previously read that the average family home contains as many as 300,000 individual items. While I haven’t been able to verify this statistic since starting my challenge, I am convinced that the average home is stuffed full of far more stuff than is necessary or cherished! Letting go of some of these unneeded and unloved items can be a huge relief.

The Rules

Set a decluttering target and a timeframe to achieve it in (I recommend 3000 items in a year but you can aim for more or less). Having a targeted quantity and timeframe helps keep you motivated.
Only declutter your own possessions or ask for permission when decluttering your partner or roommates’ belongings. Involving children in the process is a great way to teach them to declutter and donate.
Aim to donate or recycle whenever possible. Landfill is unavoidable in some cases, but ideally should be seen as a last resort. Get creative - I was able to compost an old straw hat!
Go back to areas you previously decluttered and have a second, third or fourth pass. The more you declutter, the better you get at making decisions on what you truly want and need to keep.
Share your successes and progress to social media, using #project3000 if you choose (this is completely optional) or check out the hashtag for inspiration and accountability.
If you don’t reach your target in time, don’t be hard on yourself. Celebrate all that you have achieved and the space that you have created in your life!

The Experience

When I began the challenge in 2018 I could have never imagined what was about to follow. Within weeks people from around the world were participating in my New Year’s resolution. The hashtag was cropping up on social media posts in languages I didn’t speak, participants were messaging me from around the world about their successes and journalists were contacting me for interviews.

The growth and success of Project 3000 confirmed to me what I already suspected: many of us are overwhelmed by stuff but don’t know how and where to start tackling the problem.

By November 2018 I had met my target, with a whole month to spare. I quickly realised that I was not finished and as of December 2019 I am less than 600 items away from completing my second - and likely final - round of the challenge. Other participants have made it as far as 10,000 items decluttered from their homes.

Is it for you?

Having too much stuff is a nice problem to have, but it is still a problem. Living with less can be a transformational experience. For myself and other participants, Project 3000 has improved our lives in ways we never expected.

1. Less time cleaning and tidying

2. More money to put into rainy day savings or to help pay off debts.

3. A clearer focus on the things that really matter.

4. A greater sense of calm and contentment.

5. Fewer arguments with spouses and children.

6. Increased gratitude for and appreciation of the things we are blessed to have.

7. Enhanced awareness of the environmental impact of consumer culture.

8. Significant reduction in the desire to and enjoyment of shopping.

9. Less time spent searching for things.

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Recent Posts

Episode 312 – 10 clutter hotspots and how to fix them

Episode 311 – How to declutter when everything in your home feels sentimental

Episode 310 – How to choose what to wear with Jennifer Mackey-Mary

Episode 309 – The evolution from chaotic to calm

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Jane says:

7 June 2023 at 12:07 PM

This has really struck a cord with me. I’ve done a rough calculation and I think I’ve decluttered around 330 items from my home in 6 weeks. I am now keeping a tally to see how much I manage to declutter in 1 year. I’d like to achieve the Project 3,000 in 1 year if possible.

Reply
1. Ingrid Jansen says:
  
  7 June 2023 at 2:41 PM
  
  Glad you enjoyed this podcast Jane. Thank you for letting us know and good luck decluttering.
  
  Reply
Ann says:

24 December 2019 at 9:01 PM

Hello Lesley, as most are busy on Chrismas Eve, I sat down and listened to your Project 3000 interview. Then the lady singing about her clutter which made me smile. I now have incentives for the New Year. Merry Christmas.

Reply
1. Lesley Spellman says:
  
  29 December 2019 at 9:01 PM
  
  Hi Ann, try it’s taken so long to reply! Hope you had a lovely Christmas and we are so happy you took time out to listen on Christmas Eve. The video was hilarious wasn’t it? Best of luck with your decluttering in 2020 and we’ll see you around!!
  
  Reply

Episode 62 – Project 3000 with guest Claire Birnie

PROJECT 3000 – A GUEST BLOG BY CLAIRE BIRNIE

Claire Birnie is an Edinburgh based Professional Organiser who undertook Project 3000 back in 2018. Claire set herself the challenge of getting rid of 3000 items in a year. Here she explains all.

The Problem

The Solution

The Rules

The Experience

Is it for you?

Episode 312 – 10 clutter hotspots and how to fix them

Episode 311 – How to declutter when everything in your home feels sentimental

Episode 310 – How to choose what to wear with Jennifer Mackey-Mary

Episode 309 – The evolution from chaotic to calm

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