As I’ve gotten older, I’ve noticed something surprisingly simple about my home:
I keep using the same things over and over again.
The same clothes. The same dishes. The same kitchen tools. The same few things in the bathroom.
Meanwhile, so many other things sit untouched.
They take up space, collect dust, and eventually become something else I have to clean, organize, move, or worry about.
That realization has slowly changed the way I think about my home.
I’m not trying to become a minimalist, and I’m certainly not trying to empty my house overnight.
I’m simply trying to make my home easier to live in.
And in my 60s, that has started to feel increasingly important.
Why I’m Simplifying My Home Now
Part of it is practical.
Cleaning around things takes time. Moving things around takes energy. Looking through crowded drawers to find something I actually need becomes frustrating.
As I’ve gotten older, I’ve become much more aware of where I want to spend my energy.
I don’t want to spend an entire weekend moving things around that I haven’t used in years.
There’s another thought in the back of my mind, too.
Someday, I may want — or need — to move into a smaller home.
When I look around at everything we’ve accumulated over the years, the idea of having to deal with all of it at once feels overwhelming.
So I’m starting now.
Not because I’m moving tomorrow.
Not because I’m in a hurry.
But because I’d rather make these decisions gradually, while I have the time and energy to make them myself.
I Don’t Try to Declutter the Whole House
One thing I’ve learned is that trying to tackle everything at once doesn’t work for me.
My weekends are also my time to rest.
I don’t want Saturday and Sunday to become exhausting cleaning marathons.
Instead, I pick one place.
It might be a kitchen cabinet.
One section of my closet.
A bathroom drawer.
A corner of the garage.
Sometimes it’s nothing more than one drawer that has been bothering me.
I go through it, decide what stays and what goes, clean the area, and stop.
That’s enough.
The progress may look small from week to week, but over time I’ve started noticing a real difference.
My Closet Is Slowly Getting Smaller
My closet has changed quite a bit.
I’ve realized that, just like everything else, I tend to wear the same clothes again and again.
So why am I keeping so many things I never choose?
I’m letting them go, one section at a time.
If clothing is still clean, wearable, and in good condition — not torn or badly worn — I prefer to donate it so someone else can use it.
My closet isn’t empty.
It is simply becoming more realistic.
It contains more of what I actually wear and less of what I imagine I might wear someday.
And surprisingly, having fewer clothes hasn’t made getting dressed harder.
It’s making it easier.
My Kitchen Is Getting More Practical
The kitchen is another place where things accumulate very easily.
We buy a gadget for one recipe.
We keep an extra container.
We put something in the back of a cabinet because we might use it someday.
And then years pass.
I want the things I use regularly to be easy to reach.
If something hasn’t been used for a long time, I ask myself why I’m still storing it.
I’m doing the same thing with food.
If I know we’re not going to eat something, I let it go instead of leaving it there indefinitely.
A simpler kitchen is easier to cook in and much easier to clean.
The Garage: Still a Work in Progress
Then there’s the garage.
I’ve already gotten rid of a surprising amount, and there’s still plenty left to do.
Garages have a way of becoming the place where decisions get postponed.
“I’ll deal with that later.”
Later can easily become five or ten years.
I’ve thrown away many things we no longer use, but I still have furniture and other larger items that need to go.
I’m not forcing myself to finish it all at once.
It’s a work in progress.
And that’s okay.
Even My Bathroom Is Becoming Simpler
I want my bathroom to be practical.
I don’t need counters crowded with products I rarely use or drawers filled with things I’ve forgotten about.
The simpler it becomes, the easier it is to clean.
That’s becoming one of my biggest standards for deciding what stays in my home:
Does this make my everyday life easier, or does it give me something else to maintain?
That’s a very different question from asking whether something is still “good.”
Something can be perfectly good and still no longer be useful to me.
Some Things Are Much Harder to Let Go
Of course, not everything is easy.
My children’s belongings are different.
I don’t want to decide for them that something from their childhood isn’t important.
So when I’m unsure, I ask them before getting rid of it.
Sentimental things are difficult, too.
A practical kitchen gadget is one thing.
Something connected to a memory is another.
I also hesitate over things that were expensive.
There’s always that thought:
“I paid a lot for this. Maybe I should keep it.”
And then there’s probably the hardest category of all:
Things I might need someday.
I’ve learned that “someday” can keep a lot of things in a house for a very long time.
I’m still working on that one.
My Simple Rule for Donations
When I decide to donate something, I try to think about whether someone else could realistically use it.
For clothing, I look for things that are clean and still in good condition.
If something is badly damaged or worn out, I don’t donate it simply because I don’t want it anymore.
Goodwill has become one of the places where many of our usable things go.
It feels better knowing that something I’m no longer using may have another life somewhere else.
The Real Difference — And a Simple Place to Start
I like seeing a cleaner closet.
I like opening a drawer without having to dig through it.
And I definitely like having less to clean.
But the biggest change has been something I didn’t expect.
My mind feels lighter.
Every area I simplify feels like one less unfinished job waiting for me.
There’s less visual clutter. Cleaning is easier. Finding things is easier.
And I’m slowly losing that feeling that someday I’m going to have to deal with an entire house full of accumulated things all at once.
I still have a lot to get rid of. A lot. But I don’t feel like I need to finish tomorrow.
If you’re thinking about simplifying your home in your 60s, my biggest suggestion is not to turn it into another enormous project.
Pick one drawer. One cabinet. One corner. One small section of your closet.
Make a few decisions. Then enjoy the rest of your day. Next weekend, do another.
We’re not trying to create a perfect home. We’re trying to create a home that requires a little less from us.
For me, simplifying isn’t really about having an empty house.
It’s about having a home filled with more of what I actually use — and less of what I have to take care of.
And one small corner at a time, I’m getting there.