5 Ways to Talk Back to Clutter

March of Trash, day 13

Self-talk, the thoughts you have that are directed at yourself and may seem like voices in your head, can be a problem. One of the most burdensome things about self-talk is the way it keeps repeating, as The Urban Monk author Pedram Shojai tells us:

It loops over and over in your head like a bad mantra.

Deepak Chopra sums it up nicely: “99.9 percent of the thoughts you have in your head today are the same thoughts you had yesterday.”

One of the reasons thoughts can repeat so exactly day after day is that your material surroundings are so much the same day after day. That is especially true if you are living with clutter. All your possessions trigger thoughts in your head. If you see the same possessions in the same spots day after day, they tend to inspire the same thoughts. It’s as if your stuff is talking to you, saying, “Your life doesn’t ever change, does it?” along with other equally negative sentiments.

Clutter-Busting Alone

March of Trash, day 10

I got a question: “How can you take on clutter alone?” The question surprised me, but it shouldn’t have. When you find yourself unexpectedly living alone, it is one of the best times you can imagine for taking on clutter. You have time, and the clutter is right there. Besides your own stuff, there is a strong chance that you are left with some of the debris of someone else’s life, things that can bring you down if you let yourself be surrounded by them. You have a great deal to gain by taking the clutter away.

Yet depending on the circumstances, living alone can also be one of the hardest times to muster the energy to do anything.

Making Change Real

March of Trash, day 7

It is clutter’s inertia that makes clutter-busting so difficult. On days when you don’t do anything with clutter, it stays exactly where it is, and that creates the illusion that you will be stuck with the same clutter forever.

This is only an illusion. Everything in a house got there by being carried in and can just as easily be moved around or taken out. Of course, if a house is full of clutter, the clutter won’t go away in an hour, but it takes only five or ten minutes to make a change that is easy to see and that has an emotional impact.

Refrigerator and Freezer Trash

March of Trash, day 4

We have trash! It’s fitting that March of Trash starts off with a photo of a trash bag. It might not be pretty, but the celery, kale, coffee, coconut, and who knows what else serve as a reminder of how much trash you can find just by opening the refrigerator door and looking inside.

Clutter-Busting State of Mind

March of Trash, day 1

Effective clutter-busting may depend on taking some time to put yourself in the right frame of mind first. Since today is the first day of March of Trash 2016, it seemed the perfect time to look at this subject. Most of all, be patient getting started with clutter, since getting started is often the biggest hurdle for a person to get over.

Introducing the March of Trash Challenge

Join forces with 100-200 other every-day-clutter-busters for the March of Trash challenge. Again this year, the challenge is to throw junk away every day for the entire month of March. Read all about it and download your scorecard here:

The March of Trash Challenge

March of Trash Starts in Ten Days

Space is freedom. With space to work in, you can do the work to make the changes that transform the limiting circumstances of your life into something quite different. Work creates change. Space makes work possible. So where does the space come from?

If you’re like most people, space is the result of taking a careful look at your possessions and making a series of difficult decisions — a process otherwise known as clutter-busting. The hundred or so participants in this year’s March of Trash are setting aside a small amount of time every day in March to clear the decks and create the space for whatever comes next.

March of Trash is in March to provide an early start on spring cleaning. Cleaning a room isn’t half as hard if you can take the clutter away first. Spring cleaning doesn’t have to be so daunting if you divide it into two stages — first, take away the junk and clutter, then take away the dirt and dust. March of Trash helps you focus on the junk and clutter.

Multitasking: More Harmful Than Previously Thought

We’ve all heard by now that multitasking doesn’t really work and can be harmful. I know there are people who are carrying on with their multitasking habits, hoping that brain scientists will change their minds and decide that rapid task-switching isn’t really as harmful as it appeared a year or two ago. Unfortunately, the evidence against multitasking continues to accumulate. If you habitually try to do three or four things at once, you must change your approach as soon as you can so that you can be healthier and get more done. In case you’re not convinced, here’s the latest roundup of what is known about multitasking:

Multitasking Is Killing Your Brain