FOR most of us, downsizing is an experience we will have to face – whether it is to move into a smaller home or into an independent living unit – there are ways to help reduce the stress of choosing what to keep and what to discard.

By nature, we are collectors of items and furnishings that reflect memories of our lives and those are the ones that really challenge the downsizer – ‘to keep’ or ‘not to keep’ and if the decision is ‘not to keep’, what to do with it.

We offer some tips to help you work through the process and the first and foremost one is planning what furniture, furnishings and keepsakes will go into the place you are moving to.

If it is an independent living unit, you’ll have a solid idea of what rooms and the size of those rooms, exist in your new home.

If you are planning to move from a large three or four bedroom home into, for example, a two bedroom home with much less living space whether you have purchased it or not at this stage you can make some assumptions about its rooms, too.

So, a good first step is to wander through your home and look at the furniture and decide which ones will sit in the keeper column.

Then sit down with your list and furnish your home-to-be.

By necessity, this may result in you moving some more of your furniture into the ‘not to keep’ list. A good column to add to your list at this stage, is one where you note whether the ‘not to keeps’ should be given away, donated or discarded.

Go through the same process with your furnishings and knick knacks.

Planning also involves setting some deadlines.

Our suggestion is that when you start the process of packing up – and much of this can be done well ahead of time - you do it room by room.

If you have a spare room in the house, you may consider going through it first so you can then use it as the storage room for boxes as you fill them.

It is much less daunting, mentally and physically, if you break the task up into small chunks. This way you set a series of deadlines rather than one deadline, which is frightening by the sheer amount of work that needs to be done to meet it.

Start each room by clearing out a bookshelf, a drawer or a cupboard and slowly work your way through.

Make sure from the start that you have boxes, marker pens, sticky labels and some way of attaching a note to each piece of furniture clearly stating its future.

The trick in choosing which of your belongings you are going to keep – beyond deciding if it will fit in your new home – is whether the item is useful or if it will make you feel happy if it moves with you.

Believe it or not, you get better at this as you go along, which means it may be worth revisiting the rooms you have completed for one last decision-making look.

Clothing may be a bigger challenge than you anticipate – a rule of thumb could be to discard it if it doesn’t fit, discard it if you haven’t worn it in the last two years and discard it if you were never really happy with how it looked on you.

Family photographs are another big hurdle to face.

Consider buying a good scanner, scanning your photographs in and collating the digital ones and making compact photo books – the books can be themed on family, holidays, career, friends – really anything that suits.

If you have children you could consider making books for each child, and one to keep yourself, and then parcelling up the original photos and asking them whether they’d like to keep them as well as the book.

Donate what you can to the goodwill shops. The best guideline could be to donate items that are usable, in good condition and fall into the category of ‘you would definitely take them with you if you had room’. Discard the rest.