A Minimal Wardrobe

I don't particularly enjoy shopping.  Nor do I particularly enjoy spending money.  I am also not particularly interested in fashion.  So needless to say, any attempt to improve my wardrobe in the past hasn't really gotten anywhere.  In fact, a significant portion of my clothes were second-hand clothes that I kinda liked and that kinda fitted me, but at least they were cheap!  After once again looking through my full closet and my over-full dresser and once again proclaiming that I "had nothing to wear", I decided that something had to change. 

While many other people may not share my dislikes, I don't think I'm the only person who has piles of clothes and yet feels like they have nothing to wear.  So I thought I'd share the solution that I found: Get rid of most of it!

I began going through my clothes ruthlessly.  Something didn't fit properly?  Gone.  Something wasn't my favourite?  Gone.  Something used to be my style but wasn't really any more?  Gone.  By the end I had a huge pile of clothes to give away, and much less in my closet and dresser.

The result of this purge was surprising: even though I had less clothes, I felt like I had more!  There are several reasons for this.  For one, all of the clothes I have now are clothes that I like, without all of the clutter of things I only half-like.  I also have less choice now.  As much as we are led to believe that since choice is good, more choice must be better, in fact too much choice is paralyzing.  Now, while I still have some choice, I have limited my choices to clothes that I like and want to wear.  My emptier closet and dresser are now able to be organized and tidy, and that helps my bedroom feel more peaceful.  It seems that this is a case where less is indeed more!

I followed my purge by taking stock of what I had, and I made note of a few items of clothing I wanted to get to round out my smaller wardrobe.  But now I have guidelines for when I am out shopping for clothes - anything I get needs to fill in a gap in my wardrobe, and it has to be something I really like. 

Of the clothes that I still have, I am finding that there are still things that I don't wear, so I could probably narrow it down even more!  And there are still a couple of things I would like to add at some point.  It will take a little while, but my goal is to have a wardrobe that has everything I need - and no more.