Spring Cleaning: 12 Tips for Mental Clutter Clearing

Mental clutter. We all have it. Our busy modern life creates it. Stress, worries, and too much going on in our relationships, careers, calendars, and home life can create mental clutter. Mental clutter can weigh us down as much, if not more, than our physical clutter. Here are twelve tips for mental clutter clearing.

1. Perspective. Consciously make an effort to keep a perspective when you are worrying about something. Think about all the things that won't change if the event happens. And, consider a thought  my then 99-year-old grandfather shared: "Most of the bad things that we worry about happening don't happen. We expend a lot of time and energy worrying about things that don't happen."

2. See past the date or event you are stressing about. The world and your life doesn't end on that date. There will still be family members, good stuff, and haircuts after that date. Hold that thought when you are worried about something upcoming.

3. Embrace the issue. If something is nibbling away at the edges of your mind and causing stress, bring it front and center for a while (maybe 10 to 30 minutes) and totally focus on it. Sometimes a frontal assualt on a nagging issue helps to take away its power. You could contemplate it or write about it.

4. Separate the feelings from the reality. The feeling may be awful, but it is just a feeling. You are in the driver's seat and control how you act or don't act on that feeling. Reality and the feeling you have about it are not the same. Feelings just are. Feelings come and go.

5. Write it down. When you are feeling overwhelmed and things you need to take care of are falling in and out of your head, it is helpful to put them on paper. Write them on an ongoing prioritized to-do list. This way your mind can let them go because you know they are on the list.

6. Do what you can to deal it. Whatever "it" is, get a head start. Tackle some aspect of it to get unstuck on something that you have been dreading or something that has been nagging at you.You can beat it to the punch by being proactive.

7. Do something else. Get something done on anything except what is causing the mental clutter. Sometimes a distraction will let your subconscious take over and work on the mental clutter while you get a break because you are engaged in something else.

8. Diet.  Don't overlook this. Watch watch what you eat. A sugar rush can throw your body off and make things seem worse than they are. Be sure to stay hydrated. Try not not to miss meals or to overindulge. Keeping your food intake on an even keel will help.

9. Exercise. Exercise is a great stress reducer that has immediate mental benefits. It takes a while to experience  physical benefits like weight loss or muscle toning, but the reduction in stress can be almost immediate. Don't forget to check with your doctor first!

10. Meditation. It doesn't have to be complicated. Meditation can be as simple as slowing down and counting your breaths for a short period, or taking a few deep, slow, deliberate breaths.

11. Tell a friend. Call or e-mail a friend to discuss your mental clutter. You can get a lot of emotional support and a fresh perspective this way. Friends help each other.

12. Tell a therapist or your doctor. They are experts. If there are lingering, recurring, or stressful issues, consider professional help. Doctors and mental health experts can be more objective than friends and have a very large toolbox of ideas for you to try.

Consider printing out this list and keeping it in a drawer, inside a cupboard door, or with your journal if you keep one. The list above isn't comprehensive. Different items above will help for different occasions and times of your life. Consider them to be tools in your toolbox. Keep an eye open to continue to expand the tools in your toolbox to clear the mental clutter. Add to this list when you find something that works for you.

Don't trade clutter for clutter: spring cleaning emotional clutter

One afternoon several years ago I was sitting in the sun out on the deck with my cordless phone, a roll of tape, a chopstick, and my daughter's blaze orange hooded sweatshirt. I was trying to rethread the cord back into the hood. This process just about exceeded my small sewing skills. So this is what I "do all day." It felt trivial, but I knew it would matter to my eleven-year old when she came home from school in an hour. 

I was a little bit surprised that I was being kind to myself by allowing myself to perform this task outside in the spring sunshine. Why can't we be kinder to ourselves more often? Go sit outside. How hard is that?

Maybe I felt I had earned a reward. Earlier that day, I looked at houses  with a realtor. It was a discouraging depressing process. I couldn't help noticing other peoples' clutter. Everyone seemed to have a lot of it. I was discouraged when I learned how little I could get for my money. Trade offs. Trade offs. Trade offs. Cheap millwork, dark paint jobs, abused sheetrock, and ugly wallpaper... 

Was it time to move? Would trading one box with a view for another box with a different view be an improvement? Pay the realtors and the closers and the movers. Pay more. Get less? What was the point?

I think I felt a need for change. I think that is part of human nature. Would we move? Right then, I didn't know. Would a different house be a better house? 

I thought when I came home that I would feel better when I saw our house. All I saw, sadly, were the well-known flaws in our existing house and an eleven-week -old puppy that had been left in her crate all morning. More parental guilt. That was another reason I was outside working on the sweatshirt--for the dog's sake, so she could be outside. So much for taking care of myself.

Do you ever have days where nothing seems quite right? Maybe you don't like the clothes you put on this morning. Maybe you changed clothes and still don't feel quite right. Nothing satisfies. Spring is in the air. Spring is the season of change. Will change, just for the sake of changing, fix anything? If you are having one of those days, here are my suggestions:

• Go sit outside.
• Contemplate the pros and cons of the change.
• Above all: Don't change anything when you are having a bad day.
  
  
  
  
  
  Change for change's sake isn't change for your sake. You deserve better. What do you do when you feel like this?

Clutter clearing for garage clutter and shed clutter

It is time to clear clutter in the garage and shed. We have had the whole winter (in Minnesota, anyway) to ignore the garage and shed areas of our home. If you are like me, those areas sometimes become dumping grounds for things you don't want to clutter up the more lived in areas of your home! Don't have a spot for it? Just take it out to the garage or put it in the shed...Here are some things to consider when clutter clearing the garage and shed.

First, let's sort out the problems with shed and garage clutter. To start with, it is important to recognize that we often aren't the only ones contributing to the clutter problems in those spaces. The garage and shed are often used as a dumping ground by everyone in the family!

Tip 1: You didn't get into this clutter trouble by yourself, so let's all get together to unclutter these areas. If you weren't the only one putting things there, it isn't fair that you be the only one deciding what gets tossed, donated, or relocated. Besides, it is really difficult to decide what to do with someone else's stuff (it often is hard enough to make those clutter decisions about our own things).

Second, people often dread this chore for a variety of reasons (some of these are addressed below). It can be hard to get other family members to commit to helping you. You may be dragging your feet on this one yourself! Who wants to organize a damp, dirty, messy, awkward place?

Tip 2: With garage clutter (and you already know this), it doesn't make sense  to park a vehicle, worth thousands of dollars, out in the elements because of maybe a few hundred dollars worth of clutter in the garage. It also helps to take a positive approach to clutter clearing these areas! Start with a plan or goal of what family members want to use this space for! In the case of a garage, this is the last place you see every time you leave your home and the first place you see every time you come home! Make this a pleasant location for you and everyone else in your household. You deserve that!

Third, items thrown in these areas often aren't small and manageable. Bulky, awkward items often wind up in the garage or shed because, well, they don't store easily and they take do take up a lot of space.

Tip 3: Pick a sunny warm day when you, and the other family members helping you, can pull these items out into the driveway or yard where they will be easier to sort, clean, and organize. This won't work very well on a rainy, muddy, or cold day.

Fourth, it does take a lot of time to deal with the awkward clutter that winds up in the garage and shed. Things tend to be bulky, dusty, dirty, or broken. Sometimes there are chemicals that have been kept in these spots too. Clutter clearing is making a lot of decisions that have been postponed, and these decisions have already been postponed at least once--that's how they wound up in the garage!

Tip 4: Allow a large block of time to deal with garage clutter. It takes time to wash, repair, and haul away items or figure out how to properly dispose of any paints or other chemicals. If you set aside at least a half day, maybe more, you won't get frustrated at a job that only gets partially completed.

Finally, after the garage or shed has been emptied out, take the time to dust and sweep before organizing and putting things back. Knock down the cobwebs. Sweep out the sand and dirt! Clean the bugs out of the light fixtures. When things are back in place, go out for ice-cream! Give yourself credit for a difficult job well done.

Spring Dusting?

If there is dust on the coffee table but everyone is outside enjoying the beautiful weather, is the dust there to see?

Living clutter free is about living our priorities. Is your priority achieving magazine cover sort of perfection in your home or getting outside to enjoy spring?

Maybe your dust bothers your visual peace. Maybe someone in your home has allergies. I wouldn't presume to tell someone what to do. I am suggesting that whatever you decide to do about the indoor clutter or cleaning right now, it could be a conscious choice. We can all make more conscious clutter clearing (or not) choices!

Spring Clean: Declutter & Get Organized!

10 minutes per day. Really. Set a timer and tackle a clutter clearing task that you have been walking by and fretting about instead of solving. You can do it!

We create stress for ourselves when we fret rather than solve things. It often takes less time to resolve something than to repeatedly worry about it.

Spring is in the air. Clear the clutter so you can get out and enjoy it. Yes, you can!

Spring Cleaning Thoughts

"No matter how large a home you buy, keep donating!"

"Just because you can store it, doesn't mean you should keep it."

In tough economic times, donating clutter is a win-win situation. We can make our homes less clutter and more peaceful and we can help those who are in need.

What do you think?