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Stash Less - For The Love Of Opportunity Cost

November 23, 2018 thecraftsessions
Opportunity cost in action. A stack full of possibility. I purchased them last Xmas and so far have used the bottom check, the pink and the white ikat sitting on top of the pink. And I have in process plans for the top check and the white.

Opportunity cost in action. A stack full of possibility. I purchased them last Xmas and so far have used the bottom check, the pink and the white ikat sitting on top of the pink. And I have in process plans for the top check and the white.

I've fallen off the Stash Less wagon more times I can count, in more ways than I can count. Each time I fall, I simply try to get more aware about why, and not let wagon falling allow me to justify returning to my old ways. I remember that changing any behaviour or pattern takes practice…. and that wagon falling is not an excuse for denial of the truth of unhealthy stashing (ie. hoarding).

I got tagged in a post on instagram recently where someone mentioned that since reading Stash Less they now always buy with a project in mind…. however, sometimes, the beautiful skeins sneak their way in to her bag. Her sweet little comment was "I don't know how?". Which I totally get.

Someone else on that same instagram post stated that even when she purchases special skeins, she doesn’t stash them. Instead she uses them up, as she would rather have special finished objects, than special skeins. What a lovely thought.

Which got me to thinking why I sometimes in the past have struggled to do the same thing. And how it can still be a problem for me. That said I've got better at it, in fact one of the breakthrough moments of Stash Less was when I started using my pretty stuff rather than simply hoarding it. But this is sometimes still an issue for me, and so many of you I suspect. Using the "special".

Sometimes my attachment to the “special” fabric/yarn leading me to purchase something new, rather than using a fabric I love that would be perfect for the project at hand. A weird trick of the mind not allowing me to make the obvious choice.

What happens to me is that I fall prey to the siren song of rolling around in Opportunity Cost; the knowledge that if we use the fabric to make A, then we can’t use it to make B or C or K. And so I enter into a kind of opportunity cost paralysis where I don’t use my very favourite things, the things that would give me the most pleasure to wear…. just in case. Just in case a better idea comes along.

The land of Opportunity Cost is a beautiful place to wander around in. It is full of shiny infinite possibility, each one fully realised in our minds eye. We can see ourselves wearing X and Y and Z, and looking smashing in them. Our future selves joyous in the three different dresses we have made ourselves from our single length of our favourite fabrics.

While using opportunity cost to weigh up our different options is supremely useful, wandering round in opportunity-cost-land is just wandering around in our imagination. You see opportunity-cost-land is a trickster land, a land of distortion. We can get so tangled in the beautiful possibilities that we “decide” that we can’t choose one option - because to choose one would be to deny the others the possibility of every having a life.

Not choosing means we are left with a length of fabric on a shelf or yarn in a (plastic*) box.

Rolling around in opportunity cost is like eating popcorn. It looks like a whole bowl full of goodness but even as you eat it, you know that it never really fills you up. The choice we are making is deciding by not deciding. Denying ourselves the opportunity of getting actual nurturing and joy from a using a thing we made from a fabric/yarn we love.

In contrast, to pick option, to use our special stash, is to acknowledge the opportunity cost of making, and do it anyway. By making a choice we are giving up opportunity and possibility, and we humans don't like giving up stuff. Especially not possibility. It's one of our favourite things.

Choosing is risky - because we might not love the outcome. And it’s brave - not because we are using the fabric/yarn (because lets get real, unless it is our mothers wedding gown, it really is just yarn and just fabric) - but because we are consciously choosing to outsmart our own programming. And that often takes thought, determinations, practice and guts.

I still hold on to special skeins and special fabrics. On occasion I”ve held onto them so long I no longer love them, which is simply a ridiculous tragedy. I’ve held on to them thinking about the many and varied possible projects they would be perfect for - and in doing so have wasted my actual opportunity to love them as a object I could interact with and enjoy.

I’m going to keep practicing how I want to live, and hopefully in time will do this better.

Is this a struggle for you?

Felicia x

*Bloody moths.

In Stash Less, Thoughts On Craft Tags opportunity cost, stash less
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Welcome! I'm Felicia - creator of The Craft Sessions and Soul Craft.

This blog is about celebrating the connection between hand-making and our well-being. These posts aim to foster a love of hand-making and discuss the ways traditional domestic handcrafts have meaning and context in our everyday lives.

I love the contributions you make to this space via your comments and learn so much from each and every one. x

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The Year Of The Scrap - One of my favourite uses for a couple of balls of dk/sport weight yarn is a baby version of #grannysfavourite by @tikkiknits. I’ve made this little sweater so many times - because the result is something really special and it’s such a fun little knit. ✨ This is the 3rd size which is a 3-6month size and I’m using one 200m stray ball I had. The reason this is such a good scrap knit is that it is top down and seamless, and looks super sweet sleeveless if I run out of yarn. ✨ How to make the most of your scraps? I knit the yoke, then the body before using my kitchen scales to weigh what yarn I have left for the sleeves. I then divide it into two balls based on weight and knit till I run out of yarn. When I get to the end of the first sleeve, I leave it on the needles without casting off, and knit my second sleeve to make sure I haven’t weighed it wrong. I cast off when I have two sleeves the same length. ✨You can knit this pattern with as little as a ball and a half. ✨ Even if you don’t have babies in your life this is a wonderful charity knit for organisations like @knitonegiveone, especially if your scraps are machine washable. ✨#theyearofthescrap On the blog today: How Artefacts (Craftefacts) Elevate Craft (and our lives). ✨This is one of those posts that I’ve been pondering for an age. About the super power that craft has to elevate our lives by providing us with a visible representation, an artefact, of the process. How these “craftefacts” capture our history, our feelings, our capacity and our values, at a given point in time. Living among them adds a richness and depth to our lives that is incredibly special and life elevating. ✨ The experience of living with the things we have made doesn’t have a word, and so I created one - craftefact! A little silly and clunky perhaps but the only way we can talk about ideas is if we have language. I’d love you to read the post and let me know if you can come up with something less silly😊. And I’d love to hear how living among the things you have made affects you. ✨This photo is of my biggest two wrapped up in their quilts on a lazy school holiday morning. ✨#craftefacts #craftasanelevatedlife This Sunday just gone was my beautiful friend @faragoanna ‘s  exhibition opening of her #daddyasbirds exhibition. I know many of you have been following along as Anna has created these paintings over the last year, since the sudden passing of her husband Adrian. The opening was a chance for us to come together to celebrate his life but also to celebrate this incredible project Anna undertook in part to sit with her grief. What she did was incredible, and if you’d like to see it the exhibition is on at Monsalvat until March 3rd, so please head on out there. I was taking photos in the day with my real camera so I stole the first photo from my lovely friend @_jay_emm and the second from my lovely friend @twinklettes. X I’ve been a little quiet in this space because of some life stuff (and I’ve been in this stunning place), but I’m still checking in when I can, still listening and still learning alongside so many of you. I’ve been pondering the incredibly simple but profound idea of when you know better, do better. What’s become clear to me is that doing better is a ongoing process, not act. So many resources have been shared but I wanted to highlight a couple that I’ve found incredibly helpful recently... Firstly everything from @wherechangestarted. In particular there have been some super clarifying posts over the last few days about what our responsibilities are, about the important distinction between anti-racism work and activism and what “doing enough” looks like. Please also watch the saved stories on @astitchtowear ‘s feed if you haven’t seen them. And head to @sophiatron and @tikkiknits and @yumichild ‘s feeds to bear witness to racism in australia today, and to hear their wisdom. I’m away from this space again this weekend so I’m turning off comments as I can’t check in. Hope your weekend includes a little craft! X
Blog
How Artefacts - Craftefacts - Elevate Craft
How Artefacts - Craftefacts - Elevate Craft
about 2 days ago
Thinking About Combining Yarn Scraps
Thinking About Combining Yarn Scraps
about a week ago

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