Is it too sentimental to organize it? Let's start here.

Kim Allen doesn't like clutter. However, when it comes to some of her most sentimental items, she finds it difficult to let go.

At the top of the list is a ceramic creature my daughter created years ago. It has a harvest of one eye, tongue and blue hair. She displays it in a prominent place near the sink in her bathroom, as it always makes her smile.

However, there are other key cakes that only take up space physically and emotionally, and do not bring about the same joy.

“Hopefully I'll retire at 67,” said Allen, 52, who lives in Cheryl, New York. No, I want to have fun with friends and family and enjoy the life I worked so hard. ”

Still, for a long time, Allen felt uneasy about abandoning her family heirloom.

Sentimental items are one of the most difficult items to carry, including some. Memorial items can be felt intertwined with our identity. Especially if they once offered us comfort or belonged to someone we loved. Removing them can show that certain chapters of our lives have been closed, Ontario's grief and trauma therapist Serena Jones said he is mentoring older people in the art of organizing.

“People get caught up in the fear that if they let go of something sentimental, they'll forget their memories,” she said. But our memories live within us, she added.

If you want to cut back on some of the most meaningful items, there's a gentle way to start with an organizing expert.

Building 'muscles' to keep things organized

Looking back at why you want to sort it out in the first place to begin with the process, said Carolyn Rodriguez, a storage disorder specialist and professor of psychiatry and behavioral science at Stanford Medicine.

“Why” acts as your motivation. For example, you might want to prevent your child from leaving a lot of items to organize after you die. Maybe you just want to make your room or space more functional.

For 50-year-old Lee Schuer, who lives with symptoms of hoarding disorder, choosing to reap his sentimental items was a major challenge at first.

His willingness to collect things began as a child. When he got his space, things filled his home in Northampton, Massachusetts, spilling on his porch and suffocating the hallway. He eventually finds himself clinging to something that reminds him of people, places and experiences from the past.

“I wanted to create room for my future,” Schure said. He imagined having a space to welcome friends, family and, ultimately, romantic partners. Now he helps people organize their homes and leads the workshops he has developed for people with hoarding disabilities.

Once your motivation is clear, Dr. Rodriguez recommends working on low-figure fruit, the common areas you use every day.

For example, focusing on tidying up your living room and bathroom will make your efforts visible and rewarding, Dr. Rodriguez said.

After that, you will proceed towards the items you find most difficult to throw away.

Prioritize items that “amplify joy”

After his mother passed away, Joshua Fields Milburn, host of the podcast “Minimalist,” learned that the less sentimental items he had, the more valuable he gained from them.

“Because if everything is sentimental, it's not sentimental,” he said.

So, rather than putting everything in “Clutter Spirits us,” he said, he chose several things to amplify your joy and consider displaying them.

Also ask yourself if you'll pay for a particular item again. If not, that's a sign you should let it go, Milburn said. If you want to see it again, consider taking a photo and saving it in a special folder on your cloud or on your computer.

Having whittle down some of her more sentimental items, Allen faced a tougher challenge considering holding the hand of the deceased relatives, but in the end she had to admit that her daughter didn't want.

At first, this made her feel guilty.

Such feelings “can lead to us stuck and procrastination,” she said.

Do it little by little, but consistently

To avoid being overwhelmed, Jones suggested you make your work as small as possible. You might choose one room. One type of item, like a large stack of paper. Or use your time pocket, such as 3pm every Saturday, then stick to it. Even if you only have 10 minutes of tidying up, you can see progress.

Susan Litt, 49, of Richmond, Virginia, continues to sort the artwork accumulated from her two children. “You can't have ten things for your child,” she said. “That's overwhelming.”

As her children become teenagers, she asks for opinions on what makes sense and what can be done. She also avoids trying to sort everything at once. “That's too dramatic for me,” she said. Instead, she returns to the same pile in a few months.

Try these decision making techniques

If you are unsure where to start, Dr. Rodriguez picks up the item and asks himself two questions. 1) What comes to mind when you hold this item? 2) What would you do if you removed it?

Dr. Rodriguez added that sharing your answers with friends and family is often helpful. She added that simply talking about the item and the period it represents can help people let go.

You can also ask friends and neighbors to keep what they think they're spared for a week, Schuer suggested. Next, check when this week grew up. Was it as difficult as you expected?

Steve Wobrak, 67, of Latrobe, Pennsylvania, said the strategy helped him eventually pass on one of his daughter's many elephant figurines.

“I shed tears,” he said. Aside from one sentimental item, I could have removed the others a little more easily. He soon realized that even if the items were, memories never faded.

“It's okay to have emotional attachments,” Dr. Rodriguez said. “You can't keep everything.”