Gotcha! with Marie Kondo

Just to be clear, I had my spur of the moment room de-clutter two summers ago in 2017 when I was experiencing my first quarter life crisis. Since then, I've accumulated . . . . more things. I write this as I'm one day into my second quarter life crisis; one entire dresser is already cleared out.
It would be two dressers except I have one drawer that's entirely riding clothing. Nevermind the bridle that’s sat dormant in my closet for four years. Let’s not even talk about my basket of mostly unused saddle pads. In my defense, I collect breeches as a form of self care.

Remember when I rode in jeans? Y'all wanna go back to this?

Truthfully, I haven’t accumulated that much stuff, it’s just that I don’t use these things as much as I used to. What I like about the method is the part where you give thanks to items that you plan to get rid of. It does feel weird to part with things that I genuinely bought with good intentions, like my 2 for $22 baby pads that I purchased specifically for Music. It’s even harder to part with things that are attached to good memories. I won a saddle pad for my first Medal Final. Never felt right about using it, but it’s something that makes me feel a sense of pride.

Inadvertently compared this to the last photo and . . . wow.

Some things are completely useful. My bridle is in fine shape, and my brushing boots are pretty well taken care of. But both of these carry some baggage. I bought the boots to protect Baby when I wanted to move up to showing 3’. The sidepull was to protect her mouth since I was struggling with heavy hands.

I mean, she looked cute in them.

I guess it comes down to Marie’s key question of asking if an item sparks joy. I haven’t looked through everything, but off the top of my head, yeah, a lot of these things do spark joy. Which is great when you’re trying to consolidate . . .

I’ll eventually get through it all and probably make a post on here to let some items move on. Until then, maybe I’ll put some of these barely used items back into work.

My obnoxious baroque saddle pad sparks joy. Maybe not for Lilly, but it does for me.