Practical Tips to Declutter Your Life

Many people might not realize it but the sole source of your stress may stem from the excessive clutter in your life. And it can affect so much of your life without you even realizing it. Clutter has a way of inviting mayhem into your life; from being unable to find your socks or keys in time in the morning to your finances being a complete disaster.

It doesn’t just stop at making your house a mess, it creeps into all of your other surroundings; workplace or school, your car, everywhere and everything, including your relationships sometimes. Somehow, you may not even know that you have excessive clutter in your life so I’d help you out with that first.

Do you ever find yourself losing things? Are you unable to keep track of appointment dates or important dates? Do you find yourself constantly losing track of time and feeling like you don’t have enough time to do things at the same time? Are you almost always late to things? Are you constantly stressed out, sometimes in advance? Do you procrastinate a lot and find yourself failing to do tasks you have been assigned?

If you fall into any of the categories above, you most likely have some clutter taking up space in your life. Unfortunately, clutter isn’t something that we can just wave a magic wand and have it all disappear, you have to take conscious and intentional steps to sort through it.

The key rule to decluttering is “If it brings you joy, keep it. If it doesn't, out it goes.” So if you ever find yourself stuck while trying to declutter your life, repeat this to yourself to put things into perspective.

These five steps will guide you in decluttering your life;

Prepare yourself mentally

Before you begin decluttering your life, you have to first clear your mind and prepare to let go of things that are no longer of use to you. Take a look at yourself and identify whatever habits or behaviours that may be causing the clutter in your life. Then ask yourself why exactly you want your life decluttered. Is it that you want to not be as stressed as you currently are or you’d like to make time for other things in your life? Whatever it is, constantly remind yourself of it as you work to declutter your life.

Reduce your commitments

Most times, you find that you have a lot to do for your home, for work or school, for friends and family, etc. So you need to carefully evaluate each of these areas. Write down all of the commitments you have, you’d be surprised how many they are. Now, looking at each of them, remember the key rule stated above; “If it brings you joy, keep it. If it doesn't, out it goes.” Then eliminate the things that are not worth the time, energy and effort you invest in it.

Also, going forward, learn to say “no”. Decline to participate or take up things that do not bring you joy or value. You have the right to so act on it. You aren’t a bad person or selfish or anything like that for saying no.

Create routines

There’s a sort of calm that comes with having a routine. It usually sets things straight for you and you can always fall back on it whenever you are feeling overwhelmed. Routines are stable and help to give you direction whenever things seem to be going haywire.

So make a list of things that you have to do daily or weekly and then plan your time around them. You can put your list up on your vision board or anywhere you can easily see it, while you try to follow it. You’d find that routines help bring order to your life.

Declutter your friendships

No, this isn’t like the pretentious thing people do every start of the year when they say they’re “cutting people off”. This is more strategic and intentional. When you spend time with your friends, you are meant to feel the love and joy that comes from people who want to see you grow and be accomplished. They are supposed to be positive lights. So, you need to get rid of people who are toxic, breed negativity and just want to cramp your style. It’s not cruel, you’re just choosing yourself.

Speak to a professional

If you have issues with decluttering your life, there’s nothing wrong with asking for help. We at the hub are always ready to help and guide you through the process of decluttering.