The modern world is full of distractions, and people are too absorbed in making hay supposedly to build a life. We often fall behind on our housekeeping because we’re all so busy keeping busy. When we spend most of our day preoccupied with work or commuting to and from our offices, there isn’t time to notice the clutter we accumulate. We hardly realize that letting our home get too messy and disorganized can be detrimental to our life in the long run.
Decluttering is the process of getting rid of unused or unwanted items that you own. This can be done by donating, selling, or throwing away items.
Most people only think about decluttering when they’re in the process of moving or when it’s already too late. However, being an active declutterer can help prevent your house from disarray and free your mind from unwanted stress.
Imagine all the time you spend searching for missing items. Many people stress out right before friends or family come over because their home isn’t the most inviting place at that time.
To avoid these issues, you can strive to become much more efficient at keeping your home tidy in its default state. Just a few minutes of mindful cleaning each day can make a big difference.
If you’re already feeling overwhelmed by clutter, you can start small. For example, you can start by decluttering a single room like your bedroom. You can even start smaller and focus only on your desk or productivity space.
Decluttering can be therapeutic for some but disappointing for those who are too busy measuring the progress they’re making or not making; they can’t enjoy the process. This is especially the case with larger homes or families with an abundance of clutter.
The best advice for these people is to set small realistic goals and extend the timeline for decluttering. For example, a person with a three-bedroom home may be unable to declutter their entire house in a day. Meanwhile, someone with a one-bedroom apartment might be able to do it in a single afternoon.
Now that you know what decluttering is, you might be wondering about its benefits. Will decluttering improve your life for the better? The positive effects of decluttering may vary from one person and situation to the next, but it’s always worth trying.
First, decluttering is a time-saver. If you spend too much time every day looking for items, that adds up to hours or even days lost each year. For example, a cluttered kitchen might make it harder for you to look for a particular ingredient or kitchen utensil. Or, perhaps you have a messy closet and it takes you more than ten minutes to look for a certain shirt. These minutes may not seem like much, but they add up over time.
Second, decluttering can help improve your health. This applies to both physical and mental health. Having a more organized and uncluttered home can help prevent stress and can even help with certain allergies. Decluttering could also help homeowners improve their sleep.
Finally, decluttering can bring you more happiness and contentment. When you start to become mindful of the belongings that matter to you, you will begin to feel at home where you live. Decluttering has made many people recover cherished belongings that were once thought to be lost forever.
In the next few sections, we will go over each of these benefits in detail and show you the simple first steps to take in decluttering.
There is simply no place like home. Home is where you should feel most safe and comfortable – a place to make memories and spend time with the people you love. It is a wonder then that so many people treat their homes so poorly.
We all begin with the intent to build a home for living, not for storage. And yet, after some time, many parts of our homes morph into storage spaces. There’s a room, cabinet, or shelf in our home that we dread visiting. These places are a destination of last resort, usually when we’ve misplaced an item or need to hide something away from plain view.
If you keep this up, your house begins to feel uninviting and cramped. You begin to feel overwhelmed and unwelcome in your own home. For this reason alone, it is important to be mindful of how much stuff you need to bring into your living space and where to place it all.
Remember that, when you declutter your home, you are creating an environment that is more conducive to relaxation and comfort. When you get rid of clutter, you are making more space for the objects that matter most to you.
These belongings should be what makes you feel most at home.
Decluttering is not just a way to make your home beautiful; it also makes your home more efficient. Reorganizing and tidying up around the house allows you to create a system that works for you. You will certainly be amazed by how much time you can save by decluttering.
Nowadays, more people require a productive space at home. Many home-based professionals, in particular, have a remote work setup where they spend eight hours or more being productive.
Even if you don’t work from home, you may have a family member who needs that productivity space. For example, schoolchildren will always need the space and time to study or do homework.
When you have a designated space for work or study, it becomes easier to get things done. Having a tidy space can also help reduce distractions and make it easier to find what you need for any given task.
Having too many items on your desk can be very distracting and may make it hard to focus on what you need to get done. You can fix a cluttered and chaotic workspace by simply removing any item that does not immediately help with the task at hand.
Getting rid of unnecessary junk can help declutter your mind, leading to improved focus and concentration.
A messy home triggers stress in different ways.
First, it may be difficult for you to relax when you’re performing simple tasks such as doing the laundry or cooking a meal when something you need is missing. You may get frustrated with the delay when you can’t quickly find it. You could also develop anxiety from being overwhelmed by the number of places you need to look to find what’s missing.
Second, a home full of clutter can be a source of embarrassment, especially if you have guests over. Imagine having to worry about how your home looks every time someone asks if they can visit your home. This could lead to anxiety and stress from being unprepared.
Finally, a messy home is a breeding ground for germs and bacteria, which can cause illness. This can also lead to stress as you worry about your health and the health of your family.
Decluttering will be a huge relief for any homeowner. A tidy and organized home can take a lot of stress off of your shoulders and give you the confidence of having a comfortable space to live in and visit.
A quote says, “Outer order contributes to inner calm.” The act of decluttering can be a calming activity once you get the hang of it.
Some people even find decluttering therapeutic and satisfying once they realize they spent a lot of hard work making sure that their home is neat and organized. Research has shown that in times of high stress, people often default to cleaning because it allows them to have some sense of control.
The most common allergies are caused by dust allergens. These allergens are a mixture of small particles including dead skin cells and pollen.
If you suffer from allergies, decluttering your home can help in a few ways.
First, when you declutter, you decrease the number of items you have sitting around collecting dust and dirt. In doing so, you remove any potential allergens from your home.
Second, organizing and getting rid of unnecessary clutter will make it even easier to regularly clean your home. Having fewer items will give you more space to vacuum properly.
Most people take sleep for granted. However, studies show that a good night’s sleep is crucial for your overall health and well-being. A sleep study has found that people who stay in cluttered rooms may be more likely to have sleeping problems.
Decluttering your home can improve your sleep quality. While it may not feel like it, a cluttered environment is mentally stimulating. This stimulation could make it more difficult to fall asleep.
By decluttering your bedroom, you will be able to create a more peaceful environment that is conducive to sleep.
Having an organized and tidy home will also allow you to find everything you need quickly and will allow you to build a routine schedule in life. This will prevent any delays with your bedtime.
Investing in a good night’s sleep is surely a positive life change that decluttering can help you achieve.
While decluttering your home, you will most likely stumble upon long-forgotten belongings. The decluttering process will naturally lead you to items that you simply did not think about for a long time. These items may have been kept in storage away from plain sight.
For example, you might declutter an old storage box and come across letters and photos that you’ve received from friends over the years. Since you’d completely forgotten about the sentimental collection, you could spend the next hour or so reading through them.
After decluttering your home, you’ll become more mindful of these items and where you place them. You could start keeping these personal items in a single storage box labeled “Memories.” Whenever you receive an item or gift that you want to treasure, you can simply place these new items into your “Memories” storage box.
Like most people, your home is probably full of sentimental items. These items could be anything from souvenirs from trips abroad or even an assortment of gifts and knick-knacks from friends and families. Sentimentality leads to a cluttered and messy home.
While there is nothing wrong with being sentimental about your belongings, it’s still important to keep sentimentality in perspective so that those belongings won’t take over your home where you might forget about them anyway.
Remember that not every item needs to be kept forever. It’s always a good idea to be selective about what you keep. Ask yourself if the item in question is something you love or will use.
You may also opt to keep items in a photo album or scrapbook instead. Alternatively, you can record some of these items in a personal digital album on your phone as well.
Nobody wants a mess. For that matter, it’s hard to thrive in a mess. However, not everybody realizes how a messy home can deny you the life that you want for yourself. A disorganized home, when left unchecked, will surely negatively affect your mood, productivity, and even physical health.
Decluttering can be difficult to start because figuring out where to begin and what to keep is always a challenge. If we’re honest, it’s hard to let go of things that we have been holding on to for a long time. If you are feeling overwhelmed by the amount of unnecessary junk in your home, remember to start small and work your way up.
In this guide, we’ve enumerated many benefits of decluttering your home. These include reducing stress, improving your productivity, and creating an environment that makes you feel at home. However, decluttering can be more than just a way to improve your home life.
The act of decluttering may begin with your physical environment, but it also extends to other aspects of your life, like your emotional and mental health. For example, we can apply the same philosophy to our relationships or habits. You can put the same principles into action and start keeping a neat workspace in the office or making sure that your car doesn’t pile up with random junk throughout the year.
By decluttering your home, you’ll start becoming mindful of everything you value in life, allowing you to truly focus on what’s most important.
