Decluttering Your Mindset FIRST
If you follow me over on Instagram, you may have seen that I ran a poll in my stories a little while ago to see what kind of home content would be most helpful. And it was exactly what I expected. Decluttering.
Does that word send chills down your spine? It doesn't have to! Let's talk about what clutter REALLY is:
Spoiler alert: a clutter problem is not really a clutter problem at all, it’s a mindset problem.
But it’s totally ok! We all have mindset problems! We are human beings after all. Imperfection is kinda the whole deal.
It’s really hard for us to let go of things- even worthless, useless things. Because it’s not really “the thing” we’re attached to, it’s the feeling the thing reminds us of. It could even be a mix of positive and negative feelings preventing us from going through our clutter spaces. The uncertainty of not knowing what we’ll find (or knowing what we’ll find and not wanting to acknowledge it) can be paralyzing. (Paper clutter anyone? ) The physical work of decluttering is almost never the hardest part.
I’ve read a LOT of books on decluttering and most of them don’t talk about why we have clutter (except possibly to shame and/or dehumanize the struggle), they only cover how to get rid of it “once and for all.” But... until we understand the root cause of it in each of our unique situations, it will just keep coming back in various forms. It’s messy work to dig up the roots, but once it’s done, THEN you can work to break the clutter cycle once and for all.
So don’t beat yourself up over something that makes you human. Throwing shame into the mix just muddies up the water and makes it harder to trust yourself. Instead, give yourself compassion knowing that you were not made to be perfect. It’s OK to struggle. I say it’s ok to be a human being.
The first and most crucial step is digging deep to figure out WHY we have clutter. Then we can move on to the practical matter of going through it. I’ll be posting some helpful questions to ask yourself to kickstart the process next week!
If you want to get started NOW (and believe me I don’t blame you), go ahead and join my Inclusive Homemaking FB Group. It’s a 100% FREE resource because I seriously just love talking about this stuff! Go ahead and click this link and request to join! See you there.