My Wardrobe, Myself

Selling Clothing Online – Six Month Update

Debbie Roes

March 13, 2021

It’s now been over six months since I started selling my clothing cast-offs online. Once I got going with it, I experienced some initial success, but then went into a lengthy “dry period” of about three months, when I sold only a few items. During that time, I pondered quitting the whole project, as my efforts weren’t being rewarded and seemed futile. I ultimately decided to keep going, and I also listed another batch of pieces for sale over the past few weeks.

selling clothing on ebay and poshmark

In today’s post, I share how I’m feeling and what I’ve learned after selling clothing and related items online for half a year. I last gave an update on my online sales project back in December. In that essay, I recapped what had sold by that point and on which platforms. I also highlighted my reasons for preferring eBay over Poshmark, and finished with a few observations and lessons learned regarding online reselling. What I’m sharing today won’t be a repeat of that post. Instead, it centers around other aspects of the reselling experience and why I might not be doing a lot of online selling in the future.

A Question of Time

The biggest reason why I might slow down or halt my clothing reselling efforts relates to the sheer amount of time involved in the process. Here’s a list of all of the tasks that need to be completed before an item can be successfully listed for sale:

Take photos of the item (the more the better for photos, so this can be time-intensive)
Take measurements
Crop and edit photos
Source stock images and crop those (technically, we’re not supposed to use stock photos without permission, but most people seem to do it anyway)
Write the item description
Review similar items currently listed or recently sold to determine an appropriate price
Set the sale price
Create the listing (this is a lot faster on Poshmark than eBay, but the other steps take the same amount of time on both platforms)

Sit in the Chair!

Debbie Roes

20 comments

March 6, 2021

Shortly after I published my last essay, I decided to take an intensive writing course. In today’s post, I’ll tell you why I opted to enroll in this class, as well as share some of what I’ve learned thus far. Even if you’re not a writer, I hope that my insights will help you in whatever creative – or other – pursuits are important to you.

We are all creative! What creative pursuits are important to you?

On Writing, Stagnation, and Being a Real Writer

The writing class is called “How to Write Better” and it’s taught by Joshua Fields Milburn, one half of the blogger duo, The Minimalists. I’ve followed his blog and podcast for a number of years and have considered taking his writing class on numerous occasions. I’m not entirely sure why I haven’t taken the leap before, but it probably had to do with both the cost and the projected intensity of the course. I knew it would be a lot of work, and I don’t think I was ready for it previously.

Less is More in 2021: Part Two

Debbie Roes

10 comments

February 6, 2021

In my last post, I introduced my 2021 theme, “less.” I shared my reasons for selecting this theme and highlighted how it’s already helping my husband and me to declutter our home. Last week, we completed “The 30-Day Minimalism Game,” created by The Minimalists, which enabled us to purge over 500 of our extraneous possessions.

In part one of this series, I also introduced the concept of “open goals,” which are focused on progress rather than perfection. Such goals are phrased as aiming to “see how well you can do” in a particular area of your life. I decided to set a few open goals related to my wardrobe and my “less” theme, including seeing how few clothing pieces I can purchase this year and how much I can reduce the size of my “out-and-about” wardrobe.

In today’s essay, I conclude the introduction of my 2021 “less” theme. While part one addressed the more tangible areas of my life – my home and my wardrobe, part two centers around more intangible topics, including my relationships with myself, others, and time. Included below are some of the other ways I’d like the concept of “less” to impact my life experience throughout this year.

less is more in 2021

Less Worry

I have long been what one might consider a “worrywart” (or alternatively, a “worryhorse” – my father-in-law mistakenly used that word in Scrabble once, and it was added to the family lexicon). I worry about what might happen in the future, what might go wrong, and especially about what other people think. I live far too much of my life inside the minds of others, which robs me of my peace.

Less is More in 2021: Part One

Debbie Roes

19 comments

January 29, 2021

The first month of 2021 is almost over. While it hasn’t been the idyllic departure to 2020 that many of us hoped for (how about those three consecutive Wednesdays in January, my fellow Americans?), there are some positive signs that 2021 might shape up to be better than the tremendous chaos of last year. I hope and pray that we’ll see shifts that will change the difficult trajectory of 2020 as we navigate this new year.

There’s only so much we can do to impact the macro, but we can make a lot of progress in the micro world of our own experience. One of the practices that I’ve taken on in this regard for over a decade is to select a word/theme for each new year. While I’ve already been incorporating my 2021 theme into various areas of my life throughout January, I have yet to introduce it on the blog, so now’s the time!

As you probably guessed from the title above, my word/theme for 2021 is “less.” In today’s post, I’ll highlight my reasons for selecting this word, as well as two of the key areas of my life that I’d like to see impacted by “less” during 2021 and beyond. In part two of this series, which will go live within the next week or so, I’ll round out the rest of the areas that I’d like to apply “less” to. Splitting this essay into two parts is part of my effort to publish shorter and more frequent posts on the blog. Hopefully this will be a welcome change for you!

less is more

Reflections on My 2020 “Enough” Theme

Debbie Roes

14 comments

January 16, 2021

Happy New Year, everyone! After the very challenging year that was 2020, I hope that this year will bring hope, healing, growth, and new possibilities for all of us. Before I dive into the new blog content that I have in mind for 2021, I want to take some time to reflect back on my theme for 2020, which was “enough.” I had planned to post sooner, but the events of the past week and a half derailed my focus and concentration, as I’m sure it did for many other Americans (and potentially those in other countries as well).

I am enough

I will be introducing my 2021 word/theme in a separate post, as one of the changes I’d like to make for this year is to publish shorter, more frequent posts (although this post is still quite lengthy – old habits die hard!). Hopefully this will make it easier for you to “consume” my writing and allow for a better flow of content, as well as more interaction for those who enjoy connecting with me and each other via the comments section. I lamented that I only published 20 essays last year (you can check them out via my archives), but I could have easily broken many of them down into two or three separate posts, so that’s what I’m going to try to do in 2021. Stay tuned for additional changes to the blog as the year gets under way.

In preparation for this update, I went back and read the post in which I introduced my “enough” theme (the last post of 2019), as well as all of the comments made by readers. The comments were so heartfelt and thought-provoking that I’ll share some of them at the end of this recap. I’ll also reflect upon my progress in fulfilling upon my “enough” theme in the key areas of my wardrobe, my home, and my self-concept.