How to Break Up with Your Stuff
A Starter Guide to Liberation from Consumerism and Capitalist Clutter
Introduction
Before I share my five-phase plan to help you break free from capitalist consumerism and clutter, I need to first tell you the embarrassing story of how I abandoned my deepest values. How I fell into the consumerist hole, year after year, believing in the false promises of comfort, security, and identity. How I formed a deeply codependent bond with my stuff, always trying to break free, only to be pulled back into the same cycle—acquire, accumulate, hold on, regret.
Even acknowledging this reflects a privilege I feel shame about—shame for having had so much to accumulate in the first place. But isn’t this the story of living in a culture designed to tempt us into misplacing what truly matters? We are all susceptible to overconsumption and the lure of filling the cracks in our lives with things when we’re not paying attention or don’t know better. And yet, as Báyò Akómoláfé so beautifully reminds us, it is in those cracks where our aliveness, our wholeness waits for us.
What I’m sharing isn’t a decluttering plan or a quick fix. It’s a messy, ongoing 5-phase process of untangling the patterns we’ve been taught by a Western consumer-driven culture. This isn’t about chasing the “spark of joy” either—it’s about facing how deeply we’ve relied on stuff for validation, comfort, and false control; how we’ve used material things as a crutch for the culture of individuality that emotionally cripples us.
It’s not for everyone, and it might not be for you right now. But if you’re ready to unpack the emotional weight of your possessions, then this might be the deeper approach you’ve been searching for. I’ll be with you in the process, too.
Now, it’s no coincidence that I’m sharing this during the holiday season—the time when corporations are on overdrive, knowing exactly how to keep us hooked. They want our attention but, most of all, they want us to believe that more, or different, things will make our families closer, our experiences more joyful, and our memories more lasting.
We’re all swimming in this system. It’s a collective trap—a whirlpool—and if you find yourself there right now, there’s no shame that you got sucked in. I hope my story helps you say “Enough!”—now, or whenever you’re ready—to this toxic relationship.
My Story
1 :: The “Before Time”
For years, I had a detached relationship with my stuff. I’d watched Affluenza, listened to Noam Chomsky, and knew that the U.S. was full of over-consumers, gobbling up a disproportionate share of the world’s resources. I vowed not to be one of them. "Walk lightly on the earth" became my motto. I didn’t own much—just a few extras: materials for art projects, costumes I’d made, and books I loved. There were also sentimental things I didn’t use—like a candle from my childhood that looked like a hot fudge sundae.
I remember the moment I realized how absurd it was to keep hauling around things I didn’t use. So, I lit the candle and watched it burn. I felt satisfied, even relieved. Each year, I’d do a purge around New Year—old files, receipts, unused items—and didn’t think twice about letting go of things I hadn’t used in a year. Spring cleaning was effortless, and my annual “out with the old” routine kept my space clear and my life simple.
For a long time, it had been easy to say no to things. I was used to waiting. If I wanted something, I’d sit with it. I learned that wants didn’t have to be acted on immediately and needs were negotiable. If I still wanted it after a few days, then maybe it was worth buying. Most of the time, it wasn’t. I could always talk myself out of anything.
It was like the ease of being single: when you don’t have to deal with a lot of other emotional baggage, it’s simpler to stay focused and clear. I remember talking to a Tibetan monk while traveling. He spoke about the discipline of monastic life—hours upon hours of contemplation—and when I remarked that it sounded difficult, his face wrinkled up in a smile.
“Oh no,” he said, “being in the world is much harder. Much, much harder.” And he was right. It's one thing to keep your own space clear and uncomplicated, but being in relationship with others—whether people or things—throws everything into deeper, more complicated territory.
All of this became much clearer when I got pregnant and married, when suddenly, everything shifted.
“It was like the ease of being single: when you don’t have to deal with a lot of other emotional baggage, it’s simpler to stay focused and clear.”
2 :: Compensations & Substitutions
Enter Amazon Mom, and shortly after, Amazon Prime. It felt as if a floodgate had been opened. My once minimalist, organized life was swept away by overconsumption, as I began collecting things “just in case.” Postpartum anxiety, the excitement of new parenthood, isolation, sleep deprivation, and the creeping overwhelm of a mystery illness all converged, fueling a compulsive need to acquire.
It felt like being love-bombed by a narcissist—the rush of being seen, the promises of relief, care, and control. For a while, every package that arrived felt like a little piece of comfort, a small affirmation of my identity as a capable parent and spouse. For someone who had never had much extra, the high of abundance was intoxicating.
I remember sitting in parent groups where the conversations always revolved around baby gear. I felt desperate—desperate to not feel so overwhelmed, alone, and lost. What I truly needed was connection and support, a damn lifeline. Instead, I turned to stuff. Each new box that arrived became a substitute for the belonging, control, and comfort I was craving. The possessions I accumulated became my relational mask. I couldn’t connect with people about the depth of what I was experiencing, but I could talk about the stuff.
My spouse, too, was swept up in the momentum, caught between the excitement of giving and the ease of consuming. I caved when they scoffed at my desire to buy used things for our kid, their impatience with my thriftiness outweighing my reluctance. We were making up for our losses. I was giving myself away, one choice at a time.
“What I truly needed was connection and support, a damn lifeline. Instead, I turned to stuff.”
3 :: Filling the Cracks
Two years later, we moved into a bigger house. At the same time, my 22-year-old nephew died unexpectedly in an accident, and I found myself drowning in chronic illness and deep grief. For the first time in years, I didn’t purge. There were rooms to fill, rooms to make comfortable for my grieving sister and brother-in-law. And after living with so little for so long, filling the space felt like progress. But without the energy to follow my usual purging rituals, I turned to controlled chaos. Luckily, there was a store for that.
The Container Store became my salvation, offering the illusion of order. It worked for a while, but the stuff kept coming. It was like trying to patch a crumbling relationship with a fancy weekend getaway or expensive gifts—believing that external fixes could repair what was falling apart inside. We all do it. We try to fill the cracks with whatever we have—more money, more stuff, more hope, more distraction. But I would soon learn that it’s going into those cracks that would offer my real salvation.
As my child grew, so did their needs—art supplies, books, toys, clothes, and activities. Both my spouse and I were driven by a desire to give them everything we hadn’t had. We lavished them with love, respect, and attention, but also with stuff. Holidays became explosions of festivity and material abundance, driven by a longing to create the kind of magical memories we never had.
Around us, this holiday consumption was completely normalized. Parents at school would talk with pride about getting their kids to do the annual pre-Christmas clean-out or how they’d secretly remove things to make room for the new. I’d ask for advice, wondering how they managed it all. They seemed unbothered, like they had it all under control. Meanwhile, I felt shame—not just about the clutter, but about my inability to approach it with the same ease they did.
I couldn’t bring myself to throw away my child’s creations either, each one a piece of who they were becoming. I wanted them to have a record of their growth, to see themselves reflected in a way I never had.
My own childhood had been starkly different—my toys and books could be counted on one hand, and no one ever held up a mirror to who I was. I thought I was undoing something from my past, giving my child what I had lacked. But somewhere along the way, we crossed a line, overcompensating without even realizing it.
“It was like trying to patch a crumbling relationship with a fancy weekend getaway or expensive gifts—believing that external fixes could repair what was falling apart inside.”
4 :: A Hail Mary
Two years of pandemic-driven consumption, followed by another move. This time, I was burned out in ways I couldn’t name. Our finances had plummeted, like so many others during that time, yet I was still hooked on the idea that I needed things. I turned back to thrifting, but the cycle wouldn’t break. Now that I was putting my career on hold to homeschool, the pressure to get it all “right” ramped up. We needed supplies—lots of them.
Packing was the only thing I could manage. I had no energy left for purging. Our new place was smaller (I thought that would help), but the garage was enormous, and I had big plans for it. We built beasty shelves—made to crush disorder—heavy and solid enough to hold what felt unmanageable.
I convinced myself this was my shot at control. So, I dove in—hard. It became my special interest. I devoured books, binge-watched documentaries, signed up for the masterclass, and even tried the “spark joy” method, convinced this time it would be different.
It felt like getting back together with an ex, convinced the third time would be the charm. I’d been burned before, but this time we’d put in the work and track all the pitfalls. This time, we’d heal. But as much as I tried to follow the “right steps,” all I was doing was re-signing up for the same cycle—hoping that somehow, someone’s magic formula would fix what was broken.
For a while, it worked. Then it got more complicated than they ever let on. I blamed myself—my lack of willpower, my ADHD. While that played a part, the truth was that the methods didn’t go deep enough. What I needed to do went beyond even Swedish death cleaning because what I was struggling with was far bigger than me and my stuff.
These methods focused solely on the individual, while I was drowning in things and processes that were just as much cultural and collective. Throw in chronic illness and a dark night of the soul, and my dreams for that garage slipped out of my fingers and quietly sank to a very dark bottom.
“These methods focused solely on the individual, while I was drowning in things and processes that were just as much cultural and collective.”
5 :: The Call from Inside the House
It’s fascinating how quickly darkness can shift our consciousness, drawing us intimately close to our interiority—what poet David Whyte (2) might call the quiet, unseen depths where the real work of living begins.
During this time, the livestreaming of the intensified Palestinian genocide—and with it, other genocides—came into my hands. It was a daily onslaught of raw, unfiltered reality that made everything feel suddenly urgent and immediate. I had always been painfully aware of the suffering in the world, but in my numbness, I had failed to fully see how my own consumerism was tied to it all.
As I watched the violence unfold, I couldn’t ignore the truth that the pain and destruction were linked to everything I’d been living, to every choice I made, every dollar I spent, every piece of technology I used. The enormity of the world’s suffering hit me with such force and intimacy that it became impossible to look away.
For years, I’d heard liberated people say, “The system isn’t broken; it’s working exactly as it was designed.” I’d seen the evidence but kept it at arm’s length. It’s how we’re taught to live in Western culture—to compartmentalize. We’re trained to believe we are separate from the pain we fuel by working, learning, creating, and spending our way through this system. We buy into the myth that politics happen "out there," that the destruction of lives across the globe doesn’t ripple back into our own homes.
I began to examine my habits more honestly—reading, learning, and watching documentaries about the real cost of fast fashion and discount culture, the child labor and land exploitation behind cocoa harvesting, precious metal mining, and agriculture. What the hell had I been doing this whole time?!
In short time, my awareness grew. Then, like a horror movie, I realized: the call was coming from inside the house. The tendrils of the system weren’t just creeping in—they had always been here, in my most personal choices, in the very things I surrounded myself with. I could no longer look away.
I was furious at myself for abandoning my values, for taking more than my fair share, for being complicit in polluting and exploiting people and the Earth. For using so much fucking glitter.
Waking up is always necessary—and rarely pleasant. The shame was overwhelming. How had I been so superficial, yet so deep into it at the same time? How had I become part of the very system I despised? I was angry—not just at the system, but at myself for playing along to get along.
I was waking up to the abusive relationship that had starved me for decades while I feasted on crumbs. I was furious at the manipulation, the control, the gaslighting. Furious at myself for ignoring the red flags, for swallowing the hurt, the lies, the betrayals. At the same time, the illusion that this system could ever be reformed fell apart.
My rage had always been there, flickering in brief, searing moments. But it was never big enough to last. Every time, it was suffocated and iced over—by despair, powerlessness, and the crushing smallness I felt in the face of it all.
But this time, the flame grew, roaring past the despair, burning up the last of my illusions. I had no choice but to find a way out—not just from the system’s suffocating grip, but from the stuff that kept me tethered to it. I felt ready to let go of what no longer belonged to me—and what had never been mine to begin with.
“Waking up is always necessary—and rarely pleasant. The shame was overwhelming. How had I been so superficial, yet so deep into it at the same time? How had I become part of the very system I despised?”
6 : Hitting Bottom
The rage I felt was finally fully aimed at the system—the suffocating, greedy tentacles of Western capitalism that had wormed their way into every corner of our lives, into the lives of everyone. For the first time, I saw it all clearly—not just as the isolated parts I had uncovered in recent years—white supremacy, patriarchy, ableism—but as the whole, profit-driven, connected machine.
For so long, I had clung to the fantasy that capitalism could be reformed—made compassionate, kinder, more human. But as I began to hold the full picture, that illusion shattered. I saw it for what it truly was at its core: unyielding, voracious, and inhumane. It was exactly what revolutionary Black and Brown people had always said—incapable of being reformed. For too long, I had been collapsed and frozen by the need to please, to appease, to silence myself. But now, I was finally on fire.
I was angry at the capitalist consumerism that drained us, that stole my spouse’s joy, their intellectual property, and their energy, leaving nothing for our family but debt and burnout. A system that thrives on mediocrity and nepotism instead of aliveness, passion, and excellence—especially when it comes wrapped in Brown and Black skin, which “the market” devalues.
I hated that it threatened our financial security daily with impossible demands, forcing us to play a cog in a machine that ruthlessly crushes everything beneath it, like the treads of a Zionist military tank funded by taxpayer dollars. I was disgusted by the patriarchy that suffocated us—inside and outside my home. It forced me into gender roles I never asked for, roles I despised with every ounce of my being.
I was literally made sick by the medical industrial complex—a system designed to profit from illness while turning my condition into something psychosomatic. It forced me to pay thousands of dollars just to be dismissed, my illness worsening all the while. It was the same system that dehumanized my sister, treating her like a financial burden instead of a person, and turned my father into a profit-driven experiment.
I was enraged at the educational industrial complex that offered no real assurance of our child’s safety, only the theater of active shooter drills. A “free” system funded from the meager pockets and dedicated hearts of teachers, a system incapable of seeing my child as a whole person, unwilling to nurture the autonomy, creativity, and movement their aliveness demanded. Instead, it was designed to shape them into a compliant, patriotic worker—cheap fuel for a machine of exploitation and death.
I was angry as fuck at the systems colluding to declare, “The pandemic is over, go back to normal,” when for me, for my family, for so many families, there was no going back—ever. Furious at how they ignored the growing numbers of healthy people suddenly and permanently disabled by Long Covid, while corporate profits soared.
I was revulsed at how “we're in this together” became a marketing slogan, while masking turned into a ubiquitous hassle. At how they squandered our collective trauma, refusing to use it to create real change—no new air quality standards, no better healthcare, no environmental protections, no humane ways of working. Always prioritizing profit over people.
I was livid that after all the racial reckoning, tearful declarations, and fanfare about how central it all was, it was swept under the rug. Bold statements, shiny new initiatives, and steadfast commitments to diversity, equity, and inclusion were quietly snuck off websites, erased from agendas, as their funding streams mysteriously dried up.
I raged at the food industrial complex that poisoned us, at the plastic-wrapped so-called “food” that destroyed our soil, our waterways, and our immunity. It fed us manufactured dependencies and then blamed us for not making “healthier” choices, all while inflating its bottom line.
And I was furious at the so-called friends and family who turned away, unwilling to face themselves or confront the reality of a sinking ship. They clung to the numbing comfort of blame and distraction, tethered to the lie of individuality, rearranging chairs on the deck instead of seeking lifeboats. To be surrounded by a culture that calls this denial “normal,” while truth-seeking and justice are dismissed as disorder, medicated, and labeled “divergent.” It felt like a betrayal of life itself.
The weight of everything had become unbearable. I had been hanging on by a thread when the full-frontal, blazing genocide of Palestinian people exploded in front of us—innocents literally torn apart while my country called it "self-defense," "fighting terrorism," and "too complicated" to address, brushing it off as “none of our business,” all the while funding nearly the entire operation with billions of dollars. Meanwhile, the people of the United States were left to fend for themselves in their own fascist, terrorist state.
The daily screaming, crying, protesting, and railing against the injustice, while I bore witness to the literal cashing of checks and snapping of necks—the brainwashing, the sick and twisted misrepresentations of truth—was the final straw. I could scream until my voice gave out, but it wasn’t stopping the machine. I could rail against it, but it wasn’t changing. I could not, and would not, take it anymore.
But what did not taking it mean? I couldn’t stop the genocide, but I could refuse to feed the machine that powers it. We had been boycotting corporations, but I wanted to boycott the whole damn country. I wanted to sever its claim on me, leave its citizenship behind, pull my dollars from its poisoned stream, reclaim my agency, and stop being complicit. I wanted to find a country where humanity was upleveled—a place where my values could more align with the systems that governed it.
We had been talking about it for years, preparing as best as we could, though things were far from perfect or fully set. We knew the road ahead would be a hard one, but we decided we’d rather face that struggle than the daily one we were enduring in the U.S. Leaving wasn’t a cure, and we knew not everyone had that privilege. It was a privilege we didn’t take lightly. But deciding to leave felt like the choice I had made years ago to leave an abusive relationship. It was an unshackling, a breath of clean air, and a reclamation of my humanity—a step we could take, so we took it.
This decision propelled me into hitting bottom with my stuff. We offloaded 90% of it in under six months and left. The process was messy, difficult, cathartic, and beautiful. I grieved, I celebrated, I reconnected with who I had been, who I was now, and who I wanted to be. I rearranged my priorities.
I’m just at the beginning of my journey, and I’m aware of how many others have been walking this path much longer than I have. My story is simply one of having crawled out after being swallowed up by it all. That’s it.
The next chapter introduces my process—the way I broke through the heaviness of what I’d been holding onto. It’s how I’m now here, ready to guide others through their own path to liberation from the clutter and conditioning.
This process has been a weaving of the threads I've gathered along the way—decluttering methods, lessons from recovery, guidance from trusted friends, and the embodiment practices, psychological insights, mindfulness, and trauma-informed tools I've cultivated. I hope it serves you.
“For too long, I had been collapsed and frozen by the need to please, to appease, to silence myself. But now, I was finally on fire.”
7 :: More than Methods
I have deep respect for all the decluttering methods and their creators. I borrowed pieces from many of them to navigate my own process. But let’s be honest—they don’t often show how hard it is to let go. We hear about the end result: You'll feel lighter, freer, with more time and space. Great. But what about the part where you freeze with overwhelm in the middle of it all? Or the part where you sit on the floor, holding something you know you should let go of, but can't?
The methods teach the mechanics—the "how" of sorting, categorizing, and discarding—but they often miss the deeper "why." Why does letting go feel impossible, even when we crave change? Why do we cling to things that no longer serve us? Why does it hurt to part with something we barely even like?
This is where the dismissive mantra, It’s just stuff, falls apart. Yes, it's just stuff, and at the same time, it’s so much more. These objects carry our stories, our identities, our connections to people, places, and moments that shaped us. Sometimes they carry our hope for the future. Trying to convince ourselves they're "just stuff" bypasses the very real emotional weight they carry. It's like trying to convince ourselves that someone’s hurtful behavior isn’t personal—it may not be, but the impact on us sure is.
In a culture that mocks vulnerability and pathologizes attachment, we’re urged to rush through this process, to skip over the emotional labor it demands. But skipping it doesn’t work. If we don’t pause to unpack what’s behind our attachments, we risk dragging the same unresolved baggage into new cycles.
If we clear out the stuff without confronting the deeper needs we were trying to meet with it, we risk filling the void with the same behaviors that left us stuck in the first place. In any type of recovery, we know that removing something without replacing it with something real doesn’t free us—it leaves a gaping hole, one that will be filled with whatever’s familiar, no matter how unhealthy. Just like in relationships, the patterns we avoid don’t disappear; they follow us, growing heavier over time.
Breaking up with our stuff is like ending a relationship that’s suffocating, but oddly comforting. The discomfort of letting go often feels more painful than the slow drain of staying stuck. Again, this is nothing to be ashamed of. It doesn’t make us bad or broken. It makes us human. Fiercely loving ourselves, not shaming ourselves, is the only way through.
For some of you, my story might be enough to light your fire, showing you the path clearly. But if you'd like structure, to closely or loosely follow, I've outlined an embodied, trauma-informed approach to help you confront the sticky emotions, reclaim your energy, and build more intentional ways of relating with yourself and the world.
This process will help you clear out illusions and replace them with something real: community, connection, and reciprocity. It's a living amends to yourself and the world. I wish you well on your journey, and please feel free to share what you discover along the way.
“If we don’t pause to unpack what’s behind our attachments, we risk dragging the same unresolved baggage into new cycles”
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