However your mind is, that’s how your home will be.
If you free your mind of clutter, your home will be uncluttered.
–Sister Shivani
I had really thought it was the other way around, that I had to clear clutter in order to have a clear mind, but that’s not how it turned out. Years ago I took a workshop on spirituality and clutter. I took it for my mother, not me. My mother had a problem with stuff. Not me. You guessed it, I learned in that class that it wasn’t my mother that had a problem with stuff, it was me. She was fine with it. She loved her things, her pervasive clutter. And she was not interested in letting go of basically any of it, except maybe papers and certain piles that she had earmarked for giveaway (perish the thought of throwing an object in the trash).
I learned that I was the one with a problem with stuff because a) I was preoccupied with HER stuff and that she needed to do something about it and give it away. And b) I really didn’t stay on top of my own stuff all that well. Maybe I could actually focus on my stuff instead of hers if I thought good stuff management was so darn important.
The teacher gave us a personality test about stuff where I learned that I was a type that is attracted to systems, has good intentions, but then doesn’t use the systems that are set up. As a result, I never have or follow any consistent protocol with any of my stuff. I leave my laundry, clean or dirty, all over the floor. I have drawers and places for it, but if I use them, it’s shoving it in there instead of folding, etc., and then I periodically go on this big tear where I sort through all of it at once and give away huge amounts of it and create a new “system” and then swear to use it. And then I don’t. And I’m that way with every part of stuff, not just laundry, but files, books, food, you name it. I think she suggested that I periodically create a system but make the “system” as simple as possible so that I might have a chance of using it. And then scheduling a quarterly reboot for looking at the “system” (which motivates me) rather than dealing with the stuff (which does not).
Ever since finding out that I’m a person that can’t really maintain a clutter-system, I stopped trying to find “systems” for that. Something about that knowing (and clearing of judgment around that) allowed me to just relax and allow myself to just be the way I am. Since that time, strangely, without effort, our home has become less and less cluttered and more clear and enjoyable for me to live in. What Sister Shivani says has become true. The less cluttered my mind, the less cluttered my environment.
However the converse is also true: the less cluttered my home, the less cluttered my mind. As I started decluttering my mind (particularly of judgments of myself and others), I found myself naturally clearing areas of the home that had gone unattended so long I didn’t even see the clutter any more.
The point is that the more you know about YOU and what your relationship to stuff is, the more you can actually tailor your own system (or lack there of) to what works for you. It’s also entirely possible, and to a certain extent this is true of me, that what you’ll learn is that managing stuff or being the person that keeps a tidy house is never going to be for you. If so, maybe just coming to peace with that is your knowing and journey. Actually, stop beating up on yourself, and expecting it to be otherwise.
Tool of the week: Is it light or heavy?
- Think about your relationship to clutter. Then ask yourself, what will my life feel like in 5 years if I drop everything and focus on decluttering?
- Does it feel like and expansive to have focused on that work now?
- Or does it feel heavy and stuck?
- Then ask, what will your life feel like if you just stop beating up on yourself for having clutter? How does that feel?
- Light and expansive? or heavy and stuck
Reflection Questions
- What did it feel like to consider NOT doing the thing you think you should do?
- What do YOU need to do to declutter your mind?
- Where am I judging myself or others unnecessarily regarding stuff?
- What else is possible?