Decluttering Your Home Can Help You Practice Mindfulness

With the world in the state that it’s in, politically, environmentally, technologically or whatever else, negative distraction is constantly tapping at our windows. There is a consistent pull on us to focus elsewhere, away from our own thoughts and into the next clothes we need to buy, the message we need to answer, or streaming series we can’t miss. The effects can and do become overwhelming, both on an emotional level but also simply as a lifestyle.

Home is meant to provide respite from this. It’s a place to unwind and feel at ease, a haven within which we can turn down the volume on all those window taps. But, too often our sanctuaries are subverted with the excesses of modern life. Our work follows us home. We fill our leisure time with gadgetry rather than growth. We keep up with the Joneses. We turn on the TV just for the noise. With so much stuff around us, we fail to be mindful.

A lot of that probably sounds familiar to most of us. If that is the case, perhaps it’s time to begin decluttering our homes and reclaiming ourselves.

Source: fizkes/Shutterstock

The Connection Between Mindfulness and Decluttering

It’s difficult to be mindful when our lives are cluttered. That’s both mentally and physically. In fact, the mental and the physical world are intimately connected. Cleaning up our physical spaces, then, can help with our mental states.

• Stress reduction – Excessive amounts of stuff in our space is stressful. It means we can’t use this desktop or the pile of mail to open is beyond what we can deal with. This effect becomes cyclical, adding more mail to the desktop, more channels to the TV menu, more pairs of shoes than we have to wear until we can deal with it all. Reduce the stuff, reduce stress.
• Physical benefits – There are physical health benefits to be had from curbing clutter. We are better able to keep our spaces free of dust, crumbs, dander, spills, insects, mice, and any number of things that can cause physical ailments. If we clear our spaces, there are fewer hiding places for these unwanted elements to find their way into them.
• Heightened productivity – Clutter reduces our productivity in several ways. It can literally occupy our workspaces. It can distract us from what we are trying to do. It can add to our list of things to do: got to read that book, got to fold those clothes, got to pay that bill, got to use that exercise machine in the corner. A place to work without distraction, a place to relax without distraction, helps us do what we need/want to do.
• Self-empowerment – The more we allow things into our home, the less we rely on ourselves. We don’t need eight devices to entertain ourselves. We don’t need a dozen electrical gadgets to cook a meal. We don’t need a hundred photos on the walls and shelves to remember our loved ones. We can do it all without all the stuff, and doing so puts us more in control of what we are doing.

Source: Photographee.eu/Shutterstock

Tips for Decluttering Your Home

A life with less stress, better health, more production, and increased self-reliance sounds fantastic, so why does decluttering our homes (and lives) seem so difficult? Perhaps a few tips—not too many, though—can help.

• Notice how rooms make you feel – Perhaps the first step to setting up a home to be more mindful is being mindful. If we want to feel good in a place, we should be aware of how that place makes us feel. What do we like or not like, need or not need. Start from there.
• Room for growth – If we completely fill our spaces all the time, then it can be difficult to let new life in. We either have to get rid of something or create clutter. When rebooting, it makes sense to leave room for growth rather than crowding every shelf or cramming every cupboard full.
• Enjoy the process – It would be easy to look at decluttering as if it would work. It would be easy to become ashamed of the amount of stuff in the house. But, that’s not what this is about. This is about being aware of where we are and what we are doing. If we are decluttering, we are doing something positive, and that should feel good.
• Four walls at a time – While the motivation to declutter a house might be high, it’s good to start the process. However, that doesn’t mean cluttering the process. It helps to take on one room at a time to 1/prevent it from overwhelming us into inaction and 2/mindfully reveal our expectations of what atmosphere each room should provide.
• Time limits – There are certain things that are hard to get rid of. It’s just part of life. Putting a time limit on possessions can help to give us a realistic view of them. If we haven’t looked at, used or appreciated something in the last year…it’s probably just clutter.

Contagious Decluttering

Once our physical space is cleaned up, our mind follows. There is room to breathe, mental space for us to consider ourselves in a new, thoughtful way. When we set the stage, we can begin to act and hopefully discover healthy paths to happiness.

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