Let’s just get the awkward part out of the way—I’m selling some yarns on Ravelry, not because they aren’t beautiful pieces of yarn ready to be used, but because, in part, they’ve lived in my stash for a long time and I haven’t knit with them yet so they should go to someone who is more likely to use them.
Okay now that that is out of the way, here’s why this is this week’s Kickstarter topic—as I was going through my stash yesterday trying to determine what I wanted to part with, it was very liberating to let go. I know that Konmari stuff has been super popular lately and there’s a certain amount of logic to it—an excess of “stuff” can be overwhelming to some of us—but it wasn’t something that immediately appealed to me (and don’t get me started on the book, I made it like 10 pages in before it annoyed me and I gave it back to the library). But it is true that being able to look at a thing and say “this doesn’t bring me the kind of joy that it should to stay in my house” can be a great feeling.
It’s a reflection of my growth and change as a person. Yarns I purchased 8, 9, even 10 years ago are still pretty yarns and they’re still great yarns to work with, but as I am coming to realize, I don’t really identify as a sock knitter any more. Nor do I wear most of the shawls that I’ve knit, so maybe I’m not a shawl knitter anymore—the process of knitting the piece may bring me joy, but the project itself does not (well, it does, but not enough to overcome the fact that I apparently am not much of an accessory wearer). When I look at the projects I’ve knit and used most, they’re invariably my sweaters, and the 40+ pairs of socks I knit and mostly still own (so yeah, knitting more socks does not really appeal to me because I already don’t have enough drawer space for all the socks I have). I still identify as a knitter and I still am knitting but I am no longer knitting the types of projects for which I purchased all that yarn many years ago.
And a lot of the yarn I bought, especially anything purchased during 2008 and most of 2009, inadvertently has some baggage it’s carrying around. I bought that yarn when I was in a not great place. Literally, that is—I lived in a town that I didn’t particularly love and worked at a job that made me miserable, following being laid off from a job that I enjoyed immensely (most days), so as part of my rebound from being unemployed for months and having maybe a little too much money, I bought an insane amount of yarn.
So being able to let go of yarns that come from that era is very liberating for me. And then, on top of that, this spurred a cleaning out of my pattern queue—I eliminated two pages worth of potential projects that weren’t causing any physical harm but had grown and expanded to the point that they became overwhelming. I can’t remember the last time I actually knit anything from my queue.
Anyway, how do you feel about the minimalist thing? How do you go about dealing with yarn or pattern purchases or too many of anything?
I had never really thought about where I was both physically and mentally as impacting my use but I think you’re right. I have definitely gotten rid of clothes because of the associated memories – perhaps it’s time to do that with my stash.