We live in a very confused culture. On the one hand our economy is driven by how much is being bought and sold, and on the other, there are TV shows about hoarders, who are literally being buried alive by their junk. Where is the happy balance? How much does one person need? Does the clutter add to our ill health?
Ask
yourself- “Who is Going to Clean Up After Me?” Look around your
house and ask yourself the question, “if something should happen to me today,
what would I be leaving my family and friends to deal with?” This can lead to
all sorts of other questions-“but I wouldn’t want my mother (brother, Aunt Jane
etc.) to see this.” I had a friend that made me promise that if she should get
sick or worse, I was to remove certain personal items from the bottom drawer of
her dresser before her parents arrived.
Pose this question to friends, family members as well as
support group participants. You’ll find the results interesting.
How Clutter Impacts
Health. For starters the more clutter you have the greater the chances of
falling or tripping over something. You don’t know where things are so you can
easily skip medications, exercise or even eating properly. You can spend more
money as it becomes easier to “just get a new one,” then looking for the five
you already own. The clutter, the inability to find things etc., can quickly become a major source of
frustration, which feeds into anxiety and stress. There is also the germ factor
and, depending on the level of clutter, you may start to become anti social as
you don’t want people to see how you are living.
Those with excessive clutter, such as “seen on TV” A.K.A.
hoarding shows, often have very serious
issues and many in the mental health profession view this as a diagnosis in its
own right.
Where Do You Fit on
the Clutter Scale?: The National Study Group on Chronic Disorganization has a very intensive scale, which
you can read on-line, but for a quick assessment, check out the 7 Deadly Sins that Lead to Hoarding.
Benefits of De cluttering: Besides more physical space, people who
do a good job of decluttering feel calmer, are less stressed, spend less money,
find it easier to clean, are more productive, have the time for doing what
matters the most and, in general, fell better and are healthier. One
interesting side effect is that it seems to help with weight loss.
One woman wrote the following about adopting a
minimalist lifestyle. It
feels good. It feels good to not buy, to not shop, and to not worry about what
to buy and where to shop and instead, to simply go without. In fact, it feels
better than what you feel an hour or a day after you buy something, you know,
the low after you’ve come down from the high of shopping, the unfulfilled
desire nudging you to go out and shop some more to feel better, the
never-ending cycle of high-low from never quite having bought enough.... Now I understand the irony that
our stuff, which was supposed to bring us happiness and joy, finds a sneaky way
of trapping us. And our freedom, which we cherish and protect so much, gets
silently trapped in all the mess. Unless
we pay attention because true freedom, it turns out, is in the intangibles that
we can’t see or touch but feel. The stuff that we can’t put on shelves, but we
can put in our hearts. And there, it can stay safely for a long time without
taking up much space at all. Falling into Minimalism: How I Became an AccidentalMinimalist
In their efforts for clean, many don’t realize how much
bleaches, and general household cleaning products contribute to poor indoor air
quality and can make you sicker. I wrote about this a year ago-Are Your Green Cleaning Products MakingYou Sicker? -so
start there to determine if your current cleaning products could be a factor
health problems you are experiencing. Save money and help your health by
only using baking soda, vinegar, salt, sugar, lemon, fragrance free liquid soap
and good quality cleaning clothes. Natural oils, such as olive oil, are far
better for your home, health and furniture than what you spray out of a can.
Please note that air fresheners are bad news. Want clean
smelling air? Open a window, slice up some lemons and leave on the counter,
open a box of baking soda, take out the garbage, and check the nooks and
crannies for items that could be rotting or worse.
The Less You Own, the
Less that Owns You: Just say no to bringing stuff home. Avoid impulse buying by
doing the following:
• Make a list of what you want to buy from which stores and
take the list with you.
• If you have to take kids shopping with you, just say
“no” to their urge to impulse buy. Involve
the kids in list making and tell them they are in charge of helping you stick
to it.
• Don’t shop on an empty stomach as there is a greater
chance of impulse buying when hungry.
• The quicker you can shop, the less chance of buying things you don't need.
• Use cash instead of a card.
• Turn off TV commercials
• Don’t go to stores to hang out
• Buy only to replace items.
How to Declutter: There
are many excellent websites on how to sort, remove and reduce the quantity of
stuff in your life. My current favorite is 40 bags in 40 days. Basically, write
down 1-40. Each day for the next 40 days, put down what you’ve tossed, recycled
or gotten rid of. In my case, I’m in day six of the “40 bag” program and found
that I’ve bagged up way more than six bags. However, getting them out of the
house is a bit of a challenge since the transfer station (dump), library,
thrift store are only open a few days each week. The good news is that by
staying on task of at least getting stuff sorted, when I can get to the
recycling center, library etc. I’m actually unloading a lot more than six bags.
It’s very helpful to have a friend, or even a professional,
help you de clutter. They may be able to throw out things you are holding on
to. If you weren’t around, your stuff would be sorted into one of the following
piles: sale/auction/; donation; recycle;
goes to friend/family; and trash. The trash pile is often the largest of the
group.
To help you de clutter, check out the following:
• Deciding What Stays and What Goes: This is an excellent
chart to help you decide which pile to put an item in.
• Throw Out Fifty Things Workbook: Very helpful.
• 10 Creative Ways to Declutter Your Home: I really like a
lot of the suggestions offered here-particularly the hanger test.
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