30 Things To Let Go Of This Year: Stuff That’s Quietly Weighing You Down

You know that feeling of being weighed down you get when a kitchen drawer won’t close because of a bunch of gadgets you don’t even use? The heaviness of a closet full of clothes that don’t fit the body you actually have? Then there’s the tiredness of carrying a grudge that hasn’t moved in a year, or a “should” that someone else handed you a long time ago and you’ve been dragging around ever since.

Most of us aren’t drowning in big problems. We’re being quietly worn down by small ones we’ve stopped noticing. So, here’s a list I’ve put together to bring these little tiresome things to the forefont, so you can deal with them head on.

I’ve listed thirty of them… five each from six different corners of your life. Some are physical. Some are digital. Some live in your head. None of them are urgent. All of them are taking up space.

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You don’t need to tackle all thirty. You probably don’t even need to tackle ten. The point of this isn’t a productivity sprint… it’s noticing what’s been quietly weighing you down, and giving yourself permission to offload.

There’s a free printable version of this list at the end of the post. Print it, stick it up somewhere you’ll see it easily, and tick things off as you go.

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In the kitchen

The kitchen is where small irritations live. A drawer that won’t close. A shelf where things go to be forgotten. The cumulative weight of stuff you don’t actually use.

1. Chipped mugs. Keep one if it has real sentimental value… the one your daughter painted, the one from your honeymoon. Donate or recycle the rest. Chipped mugs are a daily reminder that you settled.

2. Expired spices. If you can’t remember buying it, it’s done its job. Most ground spices lose their punch after about a year, and that jar of cumin from your enthusiastic curry phase in 2022 is contributing nothing to anything you cook now.

3. Duplicate gadgets. Two whisks is enough. Three is a drawer problem. The same goes for spatulas, peelers, can openers, and those weird single-purpose tools you bought because someone on Instagram said you needed one.

4. Mystery Tupperware. No lid, no future. Recycle it. The orphaned-lid drawer is one of the most pointless storage problems in the modern home, and you have permission to just stop participating.

5. “Someday” recipes. Cookbooks you’ve never opened, recipe folders bursting with print-outs, the third dehydrator-bread book. Pass them on. Someone else will cook from them. You won’t.

In the wardrobe

The wardrobe is the room where guilt lives in cotton form. Almost everyone has clothes hanging up that they’re keeping because of who they used to be, who they’re worried they might become again, or who they think they should be.

1. Sizes that aren’t yours. Dress the body you have today. The clothes from before are a low-grade daily ambush — every morning you open the wardrobe and the first thing you see is a reminder of what you don’t currently look like.

2. Itchy jumpers. Comfort beats keeping them “just in case.” You will not wake up one morning newly tolerant of scratchy wool. The jumper has had its chance.

3. Worn-out basics. Stretched tees, bobbled cardigans, leggings with a thinning seat. They’re not earning their hanger space anymore. Replacing five sad basics with two good ones is almost always the right trade.

4. Occasion outfits you’ve outgrown. Style, not just size. The fascinator from a wedding in 2017. The going-out top that belongs to a version of your social life you no longer have. Let them go.

5. Shoes that hurt. They will always hurt. Always. There is no future Sunday afternoon where you discover you’ve finally broken them in. Donate them or bin them and free up the floor of your wardrobe.

[IMAGE: Capsule wardrobe or neat clothing rail. Caption: “A wardrobe should make getting dressed easier, not harder.”]

In the bathroom

Bathrooms accumulate. Half-used products, hopeful purchases, things that smelled nicer in the shop than they do at home. A small space gets cluttered fast.

1. Hotel toiletries. Decant the good ones into a travel pouch and recycle the rest. The drawer of tiny shampoos isn’t a stockpile, it’s a graveyard.

2. Half-used products you didn’t like. Stop saving them out of guilt. The £24 you spent on the serum is gone whether you keep the bottle or not. Keeping it just means you also lose the shelf space.

3. Old makeup. Mascara expires. So does that lipstick from 2019. Most makeup has a discreet little symbol showing how many months it lasts after opening and almost none of it lasts as long as we keep it.

4. Worn-out towels. Demote them to cleaning rags or donate them to an animal shelter (most are grateful for old towels, even threadbare ones). Your face deserves a towel that isn’t medically thin.

5. Broken hair tools. If you’ve replaced it, the old one can go. The cracked straightener “in case the new one breaks” is just a future problem you’ve already solved.

For storage that genuinely earns its space, a few good labelled bins, I have a set of these white ones — under-sink, in the linen cupboard — make an enormous difference.

In paper and admin

Paper clutter is uniquely heavy because it always feels important. Most of it isn’t.

1. Old manuals. Almost all of them are online now. The thick wodge of appliance manuals in your kitchen drawer can almost entirely go, search online for the model number plus “manual PDF” if you ever need one.

2. Warranties that expired. They’re not protecting anything. They’re filing-cabinet ballast.

3. Receipts older than a year. Unless they’re tax-related or for something still under warranty, recycle them. The shoebox of curling thermal paper isn’t a financial archive, it’s just procrastination in receipt form.

4. Birthday cards you’re keeping out of sentimentality. Photograph the ones that genuinely matter — the funny one from your sister, the last one your grandfather signed — and let the rest go. The love isn’t in the card. It’s already happened.

5. Newsletters you never read. Unsubscribe. All of them. Today. Every email you ignore is a tiny daily decision you’re making — and tiny daily decisions add up to the diffuse, low-grade mental tiredness you can’t quite explain.

In your digital life

The phone in your pocket is the most cluttered room in your house. We just don’t think of it that way.

1. Apps you opened once. They’re costing you battery, attention, and a small amount of background anxiety every time your eyes pass over the home screen. If you haven’t opened it in three months, it goes.

2. Screenshots you’ll never use. That folder is an archive of nothing. Recipes you screenshotted instead of saving. Outfits you screenshotted instead of buying. Tweets you meant to think about. Bulk-delete and feel the room get bigger.

3. Drafts in your email. Send them or delete them. A draft folder full of half-finished messages is a low-grade haunting. Either you owe someone a reply or you don’t.

4. People you follow who make you feel smaller. Mute or unfollow — no announcement needed. You don’t owe anyone access to your attention. The most underrated form of self-care is curating your feed.

5. Ancient group chats. It’s not rude to leave. The school PTA chat from 2021. The hen-do chat that never quite ended. The work group from a job you don’t have anymore. Tap “leave conversation.” Nobody will be hurt. Most of them won’t even notice.

In your head

This is the section that nobody else can see. Which is exactly why it gets the heaviest.

1. Grudges that haven’t moved in a year. They cost more to carry than to drop. A grudge is a small daily payment you make to a past version of someone, in the currency of your own peace.

2. Apologies you’re still waiting for. They may not come. Free yourself anyway. Holding out for an apology is handing someone the keys to your peace of mind and asking them to please remember to lock up.

3. “Shoulds” you inherited from someone else. Whose voice is this? Half the rules we live by were handed to us — by parents, by teachers, by a culture that no longer applies. Some are still useful. Many aren’t. It’s worth checking which is which.

4. Goals that no longer fit who you’re becoming. It’s allowed to change. The career goal you set at 28 doesn’t have to be the career goal at 38. The fitness goal from before the injury doesn’t have to be the fitness goal now. Outgrowing a goal isn’t failure — it’s evidence that you’re alive.

5. The story that you’re behind. Compared to who, exactly? There is no schedule. There’s no one keeping score. The race you think you’re losing isn’t actually being run.

How to use the printable

Get the free printable here → 30 Things To Let Go Of This Year” PDF

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The printable mirrors this list… six sections, five items each. Stick it somewhere visible. Tick things off as you go. Ignore the items that don’t apply to you. Add your own in the margins.

You don’t need to do this in a weekend. Some of the easiest wins on this list take five minutes (unsubscribe from a newsletter, leave a group chat, throw out the spices). Some take more — the grudge, the inherited “should,” the closet of sizes that aren’t yours.

The list isn’t a to-do. It’s a noticing tool. Most of what’s quietly weighing you down has been there so long you’ve stopped seeing it. The printable’s job is to make it visible again, one small category at a time.

A few related reads

Easy Ways To Sell Clutter — for the things you let go of that are actually worth something