New Zealand has some rules on materials and stuff you can’t bring into the country at all. This includes any and all living organisms such as house plants (they wouldn’t survive the boat trip in the dark for 3 months anyway), but also seeds, parts of endangered species, anything with honey or made by bees, Christmas ornaments with natural elements such as pine cones and moss and a whole lot more. More information on this can be found here on the official website of the New Zealand Government. On the New Zealand customs website you can also find more information about what is prohibited and what needs declaring. We’ve found that the rules for shipping our items by sea and what we brought on the airplane are the same.

Identify all this stuff and either give it away or throw it away if there is no use for it anymore, like plant seeds past the expiration date. We rehomed almost all of our plants with friends and family and threw out old Christmas decorations that might not pass inspection.

For the rest of your stuff, including your furniture, consider whether they are worth bringing. Their worth doesn’t have to be monetary, but will often be emotionally or because you use it often and enjoy it. A lot of items will be a little less obvious than that and will require some energy to decide if you want to keep them and ship them, or if they could be sold or donated. If you don’t feel like you really want to bring it, but there is this voice that says “it still works, you don’t have to get rid of it” consider selling it or donating it to charity. That way the item will not be wasted and will make someone else happy or bring good use to them. 

Items that are broken and you meant to fix at some point deserve a moment to decide if you really still want to fix them. Perhaps your plans have changed, which is totally fine, and it is no longer something you want to repair. It might be time to acknowledge your good intentions and then throw it away. Keep in mind you are paying for something broken to be shipped, insured and imported. Is it really worth it?

We all have items in this category right? Items that you haven’t used yet or haven’t used in a very long time, but they might come in handy one day. My general rule of thumb is if it can easily be rebought for less than 20 euros or dollars and you haven’t used it once in the past year, it goes to goodwill.

Besides the obvious decluttering decisions that you instantly make, there will be a lot of decisions that you don’t immediately know the right answer to, or items you can’t easily decide on. For these harder decisions, such as stuff from your childhood or gifts I would recommend reading Marie Kondo’s book on tidying up. This really helped me to figure out what stuff I could get rid of and which I would regret later. The basic idea of her philosophy is that items which do not spark joy in you, are not worth keeping. She has some great ideas on how to go through your whole house, and how to find out how items spark joy. 

Books were so hard to let go of for me. I really enjoy a full bookcase with titles of stories I love, books that have helped me and books I still want to read. I really struggled to go through my books and give them away. I am not sure where I found this advice on books but it sure has helped me a lot to go through them: look at your bookcase as a highlight reel and keep only the best ones, the ones that changed your life in a significant way, and the ones you would come back to time and time again. I looked at my books and now I have 1 favourite cookbook instead of a couple of different ones that I hardly ever use. I have my favourite series such as Harry Potter, the series I’m currently reading, a couple of art books that I just love browsing through, and a few non-fiction titles that really made a difference in my life.

Take your time sorting out your stuff. This is a whole process and requires quite a lot of energy to go through. It takes time to do this properly and to consider what to keep and what not. You will notice at some point that you can’t decide anymore whether to keep something or to give it away a couple of times in a row. Science says we can only make so many good and well-considered decisions in a day, it is probably time to stop and continue another day. It will also take some time to sell the items that are worth the effort of putting them up for sale and negotiating with people online, and it might take a few drives to goodwill to bring the donation items there. Most goodwill places have a website and you can probably find a list on there of items they might not take in. Check that before you drive over there and they only take part of your stuff.

When all your excess stuff is gone, you will feel more organized and you will have a better overview of what exactly will be shipped abroad. As extra bonus, getting rid of a lot also means you have less to unpack in New Zealand when it all arrives. A fresh start with only the essentials and your favorite pieces.