Mention you’re moving to most people and you’ll get the following guaranteed reactions: groans, eye rolls, and/or pity – and all with good reason. Relocating your entire household can be a monumental task, especially if you’re downsizing. Picking through all your belongings, moving each to their rightful place, protecting breakables from damage, selling or giving away what you no longer want, and calculating your new storage space is enough to send anyone into a tailspin. So how do we mitigate the macabre murkiness of moving? By finding a roadmap that makes sense to you, and sticking to it, of course! We borrowed the following tips from Passions Magazine Autumn 2018 issue, and they are just as relevant and helpful today as they were then.

Prepare
Think about most projects you’ve embarked on: painting a room, going on a road trip, opening your first business. If you fully prepared for these endeavors, you were ahead of most others. The majority of us tend to overlook the preparation part of most of our endeavors, jumping right to the part with the action. As we almost always find out the hard way, the first step is the most important. Careful consideration of your move, such as giving yourself a good window of time, what your new home needs, and what you can do without. Preparing for your move starts before you even decide on your new home.

Plan
This step happens after you have found your new home. Planning is different from preparing, in that it forces you to consider the two spaces you now have, how you use them, and how you will fit what you have into where you will be living. Is your furniture the right scale for your new place? How will living in a smaller home impact your lifestyle on a day-to-day basis? Will you be able to move what you are already storing in your current home? There are many ways to plan furniture placement – you can use an old fashioned graph paper floor plan and cut shapes to scale in order to explore furniture configurations before the move, or you can use one of many room-planning apps that are now available.

Passions
Marie Kondo, eat your heart out! One could easily replace the question “does it bring me joy?” with “does it help me with my passions?”. It should go without saying that you won’t be able to continue your large-scale vegetable gardening passion when living in a condo, but as long as you’ve prepared and planned for your downsizing move, differences like that will come as no surprise. But, for goodness sake, hold onto the things you love. Do not get rid of items that allow you to pursue your passions. Quilting, a large collection of books, your golf clubs – these are all passions that must be catered to in your new home for you to truly enjoy it. Find creative solutions that allow you to keep doing the things you love in a smaller space.

Purge
There are a number of ways to rid yourself of items you no longer want or need. The easiest way to purge things that no longer serve you is to give them away. There are many organizations that will even pick up your unwanted belongings from your home. However, if you’d like to make a bit of pocket money, nothing beats a garage sale to help you ditch things quickly for a small profit. Of course, garage sales aren’t always possible and that’s why online selling can be so wonderful. Although it requires more effort, these can be an efficient way to sell items at slightly higher prices. If you have belongings of higher value, it might be worth seeking the expertise of an auction house.

Professionals
Coming up against roadblocks? No worries! Literally anywhere along the way in the moving process there is a professional who can come in and help. Whether you need guidance with what to keep and what to kick to the curb, how to pack, how to protect your fragile items, moving day itself, unpacking and organizing, or all of the above, there is someone out there who has a passion for it! Don’t hesitate to call in the pros – they will make your life infinitely easier and your move far smoother. It is certainly worth the extra cost to hire help.

Peace
The last cardboard box has been broken down, the packing paper has all been recycled, your belongings are all in their rightful places, and you can now enjoy living in your new space. This is the moment we all look forward to in a move. The sense of renewal and peace that comes with uprooting, dusting off the old, doing some thoughtful pruning, and then replanting yourself can really do wonders. Congratulations – you’re now home.