Decluttering Your Personal Space

Posted on June 29, 2020 by Tannaz Hosseinpour, One of Thousands of Life Coaches on Noomii.

The art of decluttering our physical personal spaces and our mindset, is essential for both our mental health, and for our soul to be able to recharge and rejuvenate. More importantly, sustainable decluttering, such as re-using, recycling, and repurposing items, can help us limit our carbon footprint and prevent further damages to climate change. Since we’re all at home, it is the perfect time to de-clutter and organize our space, leaving the previous decade’s clutter right where it belongs, in the past.

Why De-Clutter?
When decluttering, we have the power to lighten our space and make room for exciting new possibilities. Louise Hay, one of my favourite authors, once said that “our closets can be considered symbols of our minds. a cluttered closet could mean a cluttered mind.”

One of the things I’ve noticed is that people are usually putting aside big chunks of their time on the weekends to clean their homes, when really the purpose of the weekend is to relax and recharge your soul and spend time family, and while for some people the process of cleaning is very therapeutic, for many it can feel frustrating, overwhelming and can cause intense stress and anxiety. So the questions remains, how do we remove that feeling from our life and our weekends so that we can truly do what we love to do during our free time without feeling burdened or trapped?

Before we begin, I want to mention that our rooms, homes and personal spaces are sacred spaces and our souls deserve to feel inner peace there. So it is absolutely important to make sure that once we leave our work or school and overall the outside world and step into our homes and rooms, we instantly feel rejuvenated and calm.

Cluttering & its link to Anxiety
While there are a few who thrive in chaotic spaces, the majority of people do much better when they’re in a decluttered, clean, organized and tidy space. They can focus better, and achieve more as their space ignites the creativity within them.

Moreover, clutter or too many possessions can make you feel overwhelmed, as psychologists have linked the need to hold on to possessions to an anticipated pain of loss. In fact in 2012, researchers at the Yale School of Medicine discovered that the two parts of your brain associated with conflict and pain, the anterior cingulate cortex and insula, overreact whenever you try to let go of possessions that you’re emotionally connected to.

For example, a UCLA study of 32 families discovered that mother’s had elevated levels of stress hormones whilst sorting out their possessions in their homes. Another study by the Princeton University Neuroscience Institute, discovered that individuals surrounded by physical clutter in a disorganized environment are less productive and more distracted than otherwise.

So now that you know how clutter can impact your well-being, let’s take a look at how to tackle the de-cluttering process.

Start Small:
For some people, they’ve been hoarding and compiling for so long, that they don’t know where to start. It’s important to start small.
Look around your house and choose one room you would like to work on. For example, your kitchen.
Then take a look at your kitchen and choose one area to work on; a smaller project to work on, such as your fridge.
Put aside a couple of minutes and go through the fridge. Have a recycling and waste box near by.
Take a look at the expiration dates and throw out anything that is expired (If possible, recycle their respective jars & bottles). Then try to create mini spaces; a section for the fruits, a section for the vegetables, a section for dairy products and so on. This shouldn’t take more than half an hour.
Once you’re done with that, move on to another mini project in your kitchen, such as your condiments and medicine cabinet and re-organize it to your liking and convenience.
Do not try to do it all at once. Whenever you have some free time, work on one mini project at a time, day by day, week by week. Slowly, over time, those mini projects will complete your large project and in this scenario your kitchen is completely organized, de-cluttered and tidy. Once you’re done with one whole room, move on to another room in your house. It didn’t get cluttered over night, so don’t expect to declutter it within a night either. Take your time and be patient.

Tip: Tackle your wardrobe and bedroom last. We tend to have more emotional attachments to our personal belongings such as clothes, jewellery and books. If you try to de-clutter your wardrobe first, you might feel discouraged to continue.

Put Things Back Instantaneously
Now that we know why to de-clutter and how to de-clutter, it’s important to incorporate a few practical steps to ensure our space remains de-cluttered. It is obvious to say that if the house is tidy and organized, then you don’t really need to put aside big chunks of time to clean. If we end up putting everything back to where it belongs right after using it, then theres no need to put aside time to tidy that area. Let me get more specific. We’re going out of the house and we’re trying on clothes. If we put back every piece of clothing that we’re not wearing right at that very moment instead of just piling them on the chair or on the bed, then when we come back home, we’re not faced with clothes scattered around the room. Another example could be, you’re on the phone and you need to write something down, so you pick up a pen and piece of paper, but then you forget to put the pen back to where it belongs, an action that wouldn’t have taken you more than a couple of seconds, but because you forget to do so,, you’ll end up having to do it on the weekend as a bunch of these seconds accumulate and turn into hours. Putting things right back in their original spot doesn’t take more than a few seconds but can save you hours in the future.

Assign Areas
It’s important to put things back in their original spot instantaneously, but what happens if you don’t have assigned areas for some items? I’ve entered homes where people just scatter their mail on their dining table, kitchen island or console by the door. It’s all over the place because there is not an assigned area for the mail. So it’s as important to make sure you assign spaces. For example, you can use an empty shoebox and place it near the door for all your mail to be placed in there. You’ve allocated a specific place for the mail. This applies to everything. Let’s consider the doorway and hallway as this area seems to be one of the difficult spots in every household. You can assign a space for the shoes, a space for the dog leashes, a space for the umbrella or jackets. You can use dividers in your drawers for the stationary, headphones etc. Or let’s consider your home office or your bedroom where you have a desk. You can use dividers to categorize your sheets of paper, and your notes. You can use a jar for your pen. You can use a small saucer for your clips, and pins. To summarize, you need to allocate a space for everything and then remember to put back everything where it belongs immediately after using it. Now when you enter your house, you no longer feel overwhelmed, as everything is where it belongs. And if you have kids and it’s a little bit more difficult, research shows that kids tend to learn best through observing. So once they see you do it, they’ll be more inclined to follow in your footsteps.

It’s all about you!
Everyone’s definition of organized is different and that’s okay. For example, for me its absolutely important that all my clothes are organized by colour, whereas for my partner it’s important that all his clothes in his closet are ironed. So as long as you feel at peace in that space, then that’s all that matters because you’ve accomplished that peaceful state of mind. More importantly, when you do something that resonates with you, it no longer feels like a chore. It can even become fun! So ask yourself what bothers you in your own room or space, which spaces drain your energy, and accordingly create a personalized plan and take it from there. Sustainable decluttering can be a very healing process, and is one that benefits the planet, so I encourage you to try it!

More Tips:
Dedicate 5 minutes every morning or every night to ensure that everything is where it belongs. By dedicating a few minutes everyday, you avoid having to dedicate hours on the weekend.
Adopt a more minimalistic lifestyle. The less stuff you accumulate, the easier it will be to keep an organized space.
Donate the items you no longer use
Re-purpose and re-use items to the best of your ability

The truth of the matter is that we currently live in such a chaotic world. We turn on the news and all we see is chaos. We’re working longer hours and we may even feel overwhelmed and burnt out. Therefore, it’s absolutely necessary for us to have a space that allows for recharging and rejuvenation to happen. Organizing and decluttering our space helps us create the mindset we need to thrive in other areas of our life.

If you have any specific questions on how and where to start, please don’t hesitate to message me. I’d love to help out.

By Tannaz Hosseinpour
Founder of Minutes on Growth Coaching,
LLM Dispute Resolution & Family Mediation, Certified Personal Development & Relationship Coach, CBT Practitioner and Podcast Host of Minutes On Growth