The Clutter Bug

Clutter usually sneaks in slowly. Then you remember what is in the cupboards. You see piles of magazines everywhere. Bits and pieces of odds and ends, this and that. Old clothes you never wear. Glasses and plates that no one uses. Jam jars that will never be filled again. Well, you know how it is.

Have you heard of that saying - the stuff you own ends up owning you.

So true. If your house is too full of trinkets and things, you feel begin to uncomfortable there, you tend to feel a negative energy overcome you the minute you walk into that cluttered room. It becomes a challenge to stay in a positive attitude when you feel like you suffocate with all that stuff around.

The clutter bug - it’s all his damn fault. He makes you do it. He makes you collect and pile. He makes you hold on to all those old memories which become so extremely impossible throw away and let go. In the end, you compromise your liberated space and your unbounded sanity just because you look at an old boot and say, aw, I bought this at a garage sale when Mrs. Smith was moving. This bloody clutter bug!

I know. Horrendous it is to feel you can move in your own space. Then one day I simply decided to do something about it.

Still, organizing clutter felt too big a task when I looked around. But then, I remembered something. I remembered something I was told as a child. One step at a time and to list it down, tick it off as you go along.

Good idea. I took a notebook, and made a list. I gave title at the top of the page, calling it Throwing it Away on the first page. Then on the empty pages, on top of each page, I wrote the name of the room. And under that all the places in the room that needed cleaning.

Let´s take my bedroom doomed to clutter, for example. My list read.

- wardrobe: 1 shelf a day
- old makeup
- books
- book shelf
- clean all horizontal surfaces
- clean all vertical surfaces

What a doable process! You can only imagine the whole process was now in small, pieces and it doesn’t feel overwhelming anymore. I don’t feel overwhelmed. And as I completed my tasks, I ticked them off as I went along.

Try it yourself. If you don´t have time to go through the whole house, take one room. Make a list of all the places that need your attention in that room. And decide to do one thing a day from your list. And once you have cleaned a spot, stop piling things there anymore. Organizing clutter clears your mind too.