Cutting your losses - Topic of the day 8/23/24
Nothing lasts forever, including your clothes (sorry r/buyitforlife) When is it time to cut bait and get rid of clothing you own? How exactly do you get rid of things? If getting a replacement, do you wait for the replacement first or live without? What difficulties exist in getting rid of your stuff (physical, emotional, social, environmental) and how have you dealt with those?
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21 Replies
one thing i've had to learn is to be okay with letting stuff go that i either can't fit or suddenly dislike or can't seem to pair. admittedly difficult because of many factors (broke, wild fluctuations in weight, using clothes as a status symbol or for validation) but it's been helpful to say "it served a purpose and now it doesnt"
i also had to accept until recently that i could not mend clothes so it's not worth buying fixer uppers (now i do lol)
general cycle for getting rid of stuff is : give it to mr zeo - sell/trade with friends - sell/trade on ebay or through resellers - using TRR - donating
Seconding what Zeo is - it's a learning process to accept what doesn't fit how you'd like anymore (style/actual fit).
I've also started to categorize things into 3 boxes: Keep, Store (Things I waffle on), Sell.
Store I treat as a "shop my closet". If I pull it out of that twice and have it go back, it gets sold. Have a ton of things on ebay from that pile right now and there hasn't been a piece I sold that I ultimately miss
Also embrace that by the time I want to sell it, I'm generally more than happy to give it away if I can find someone who has any appetite to try the thing
I struggle a bit with getting attached to some clothing, and the hardest part is letting go of stuff that I don’t use anymore either because I did use it and liked it a lot or sometimes the idea of it.
Once I do decide something has to go it’s usually offered to friends, put in consignment and if it doesn’t sell, donate it.
It's pretty clear when I'm not gonna wear something, but I think it's also vibes based. I have a tendency to be a outfit repeater but that doesn't mean I'm not gonna wear certain garments either
Like I'm honestly wearing like the same 2-3 tees rn but if I trimmed my tees to just that it'd honestly be a net loss because it's not like I'm using up any storage space and I'm instead losing a easy way to modify my outfit if I wanted to
To me it often comes with frustrations and a bad conscience. It feels like I wasted money and (more importantly) resources on something that I did not end up liking.
I rarely get rid of stuff because I have a very “everything is material for the next thing” brain
And sometimes it’s true sometimes it’s not
But I do love to make something new from something old
I have nothing positive to add i’m a clothes hoarder
taking "cutting" literally
One day I will finally have the time and energy to learn sewing and embroidery
I struggle with getting rid of something I’m not wearing anymore if I either wore it a lot at some point or if there’s good memories attached
Alas, I now have no more space for new clothes so I should fix that soon :/
that's right go to containerstore and buy a new rack
You’re so right
I have the most cooked bape tshirt from like 2005 and it is getting buried with me
Theres a big difference between end of life and end of interest, if its the latter and kinda nice, I see if someone I know wants some free stuff, or sell it. If the latter.. Well I have a pile of odd fabric and no idea what to do with it
this is my probably my biggest hangup; I do tend to operate near the 80-20 principle (80% of my fits coming from 20% of my clothes or so) but there's enough usage for each thing to potentially justify it staying unless you're going full on kondo or "goodbye things" level of decluttering
I stopped looking at clothes as investments. If I enjoyed wearing something, if I got a few good wears, it's ok that I "lose money" when I resell. Even if I get burned by a wrong size or something I'd rather pass the savings on to someone who will love it, instead of letting it sit for months for the chance of getting money back.
I enjoy getting rid of stuff. I usually try to sell a few things of lesser quality and replace it with 1 item in nicer quality, so downsizing but improving. I got pretty lucky and moved on from certain brands quickly before buying too much. I try to always keep my wardrobe to 1 clothing rack and 4 or 5 totes, but I haven’t explored shoes yet! That’s next.
only stopped growing a couple of years ago and since then I've kept pretty much every piece of clothing,
Those I don't wear anymore are at my parent's while I have my current stuff in my small apartment
Eventually I'll donate some of it
i don't get rid of a lot of things
but i feel like i put a lot of consideration into what i add to my closet
and i really like every piece that's in there
i feel like i mostly end up selling things when i go "ok i'm only allowing myself to buy this thing if i sell another thing"
also sometimes stuff just isn't above the price threshold where it feels worth it to me after all the fees are taken out
so i've sold a lot of shoes and a few jackets
shoes are also a thing where when they don't fit right, they're miserable to wear
so the fact that you should sell them is just staring you in the face
I got rid of most of my designer stuff by donating it to a local homeless shelter/job placement program
Lotta dripped out dudes in Gucci suits hittin the interview circuit post 2022
Based as fuck