Full Life Reflections

The “Just One Thing” Approach

Debbie Roes

December 6, 2019

As I mentioned in my last post, I’m not happy with how infrequently I have been posting on this blog in recent months. I’ve wracked my brain for a long time to try to figure out what has stood in my way of blogging more regularly. It’s not that I don’t have anything to write about. After all, I have written numerous articles on various topics since I started Full Life Reflections, including intentional living, relationships, technology, self-esteem, and wardrobe management. I thought that maybe I was just experiencing writer’s block, but I recently came to understand that my issue runs a lot deeper than that.

In today’s post, I share the two primary reasons why I haven’t been blogging very often. I then delve deeper into one of those reasons, as it has also been standing in the way of my living a more fulfilling life. I suspect that many of you may also struggle with the same issue, so perhaps we can help each other to make some headway in pushing past it. Most of us connected with each other because we struggled on some level with shopping too much, having too many clothes in our closets, or not being happy with the way we dress (or perhaps a combination of all of these things!). But while such clothing challenges can be difficult and need to be addressed, they often serve to mask or distract us from deeper life concerns. It can be a lot easier to focus on what’s wrong with our closets instead of what’s missing from our lives. I have done just that for many years, but I don’t want to do it anymore, which is a big reason why I started this blog back in January 2018.

I’ve been frustrated about my not blogging, but now I better understand why…

Wardrobe “Half Project” November Update

Debbie Roes

21 comments

November 21, 2019

It’s been a couple of months since I last checked in on the wardrobe “half project” that I kicked off back in May. I have done a few updates since I started the challenge and in tandem with my last update, I also shared my ideal wardrobe size benchmarks based upon an exercise that I did back in August. In today’s post, I will share where I am with the “half project” now and what I plan to do with it moving forward.

As you may have noticed, I haven’t been posting very often in recent months. A lot has been going for me following my mother-in-law’s passing in early August and I have been feeling “blocked” in many aspects of life, including with my writing. I usually haven’t felt compelled to write and when I have endeavored to write a blog post, it seemed to take me infinitely longer than it did previously. It has often felt like rolling a large boulder up a hill, which only served to make me feel worse about myself and my life, as writing used to be something that I enjoyed doing and felt that I did well. I hope this is a temporary state of affairs, as I would like to get back to posting on a more regular basis. I have some ideas that I’m tossing around for 2020 that may help to get me more excited about blogging once again (fingers crossed…).

There Can Be Such a Thing as Too Much Number Crunching…

When I sat down to write an update on my half project, I started to compile information, photos, and statistics as per usual, but it just felt too hard and overwrought. I realized that in an attempt to simplify my wardrobe, I have instead made things more complicated. At first, I loved the idea of swapping things in and out of my “working wardrobe,” but then I just kind of lost track of it all. When attempting to put this post together, I realized that I wasn’t entirely sure what had been swapped in and out – and when!

As my “Half Project” went on, I realized that I had made things too complicated for myself…

At first, I felt that I should double-down and figure everything out so that I could compile a realistic update to post today, but then I had a different thought. I remembered that my theme for the year is “freedom” and all of this navel-gazing and number crunching doesn’t feel very free. I also realized that any wardrobe challenges that I undertake should serve my needs and that the “half project” as it was written was no longer doing so.

Thoughts as the Decade Fades

Debbie Roes

17 comments

October 23, 2019

In a comment on my last post, a reader reminded me that there are only a little over two months left in the decade. Since I’ve been blogging, I commonly reflect on the end of each year, but I don’t think I’ve ever formally looked back on a decade as it drew to a close. I was planning on doing an update on my “freedom” theme for 2019 today, but I’m going to take a bit of a different approach in this post.

Instead of reflecting on the progress I’ve made in terms of my freedom and sharing what else I’d like to shift before 2019 ends, I’m going to highlight the things I do not wish to bring forward with me into 2020 if at all possible. I may not succeed in leaving behind all of my burdens, but I believe in the power of intention to help facilitate positive transformation. So here’s my list, from the easiest to the most difficult…

What attitudes, beliefs, and practices do you want to leave behind in the 2010’s?

On Connection, Technology, and Freedom

Debbie Roes

26 comments

October 9, 2019

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the intersection of connection, technology, and freedom. These thoughts dovetail nicely with many of the themes in Cal Newport’s book, Digital Minimalism, which I wrote about back in June when exploring the important issue of solitude. In today’s essay, I share some more of Newport’s ideas, along with what I’ve been pondering about my freedom theme for 2019 and how it relates to the ways – and how much – I communicate with the people in my life.

My Two Books are On Sale Now!

But before I delve into those topics, I want to let you know that for a limited time, I have reduced the price of my two e-books. If you’re new to the blog, you may not know that I published two books back in 2014. These books encapsulate some of my best tips and strategies for smart shopping and wardrobe management gathered from the hundreds of posts on my former blog, Recovering Shopaholic. My books are available now for just $2.99 each. You can learn more about them via the links below, and you can also purchase them there if desired:

Please note that my books are only available in electronic format, but they may be read on any device using the free Kindle app. I have plans to publish additional books in the coming months and years, so stay tuned for news on that soon. Also, I still consider myself more of a “recovering shopaholic” than an “ex-shopaholic,” but the latter worked better for the subtitle of the first book and I kept it the same for the second book for the sake of consistency. I view recovery as a long-term process with ups and downs along the way, but I’ve learned a lot and I’m definitely in a much better place than I was before I started blogging. I know that I will continue to learn and grow – and I also learn so much from the readers who comment and email and share their own journeys. Thank you as always for your wonderful support of me and my writing!

How Technology Impacts Freedom

Now on to the main topic of this post, how technology impacts personal freedom. I’m 53 years old and I can remember a much different world than we’re in today in terms of technology. Looking back, I can recall having to sit at home when I was expecting a phone call and needing to park myself in front of the television whenever my favorite programs were airing. If I needed a bathroom break during one of my shows, I had to wait for a commercial and then hurry to make sure that I was back by my TV before the show started up again. I remember declining invitations to go out so that I could be home in case a guy I was interested in would call me. If I happened to miss his call, I wouldn’t even be aware that he rang me because this was back in the days before answering machines and caller ID.

Wardrobe “Half Project” September Update and Ideal Wardrobe Size Comparisons

Debbie Roes

14 comments

September 18, 2019

I’m now more than a third of the way through the wardrobe “half project” that I launched in early May. The objective of this year-long challenge is to pare my wardrobe down to half of its original size, to only those items that I feel good in and look forward to wearing. The reason I embarked upon the half project is because my theme for 2019 is “freedom” and having too many clothes feels like a burden and weighs me down. Additionally, since I have become relatively minimalist in terms of all of my other possessions, my overly large wardrobe sticks out as a glaring exception to the way I want to live my life.

In today’s post, I’ll update you on how I have progressed with the challenge since my last update back in July. I’ll let you know what I have swapped out, what has been swapped in, what has been purged, and how I’ve done with the rules I established for the half project when it began. I also compare and contrast how the “ideal wardrobe” numbers I calculated in my last post line up with the initial half project calculations I made for my wardrobe categories.

Moving from overabundance and chaos to a streamlined wardrobe through the “half project” challenge.

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There Can Be Such a Thing as Too Much Number Crunching…

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My Two Books are On Sale Now!

How Technology Impacts Freedom

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