Decluttering With Kindness

Hi,

It's Brooks.

Thanks for joining me.

I wanted to share with you a story from the clutter busting front lines that I think could be very helpful in understanding clutter.

Some years back,

Well let me just tell you,

For about 20 plus years I've been helping people let go of clutter from their homes,

Their offices,

And their lives.

And my definition of clutter is anything in your life.

That includes tangible things,

Activities,

And relationships with people.

Anything that's no longer serving you.

It means it diminishes you,

It hurts you in one way or another.

And clutter busting is the curious look at everything in your,

You know,

All the things in your life to determine whether it supports you or doesn't.

So I was working with this couple and they were having a hard time.

The wife was feeling really stuck.

She was having a hard time making decisions.

And the husband was being really critical of her.

And he would say like,

Why are you having such a hard time?

Why don't you just get rid of that?

And then he would look at me like,

She has way too many things.

Just tell her to get rid of stuff.

And the more he said that,

The harder time she had.

She was just collapsing in on herself.

And he was not helping in any way whatsoever.

Even though he probably thought that he was.

So finally I said to him,

Because what happened was,

She,

The wife had a bunch of those kind of expensive shopping bags.

Those Neiman Marcus kind of very slick and thick shopping bags.

She probably had a couple hundred.

And he was saying to her,

Get rid of them,

You don't need them.

And then to me,

Like tell her to get rid of them.

So I said to the husband,

Don't say anything anymore.

And then I said to the wife,

And I really wanted to know,

It was a very curious question.

I said,

How many shopping bags do you think you need?

And she got this look of clarity about her.

She said,

I've never thought of that before.

How many I need?

I don't know,

Like five?

I said,

Great.

Let's go through them and pick the five that you want and let the rest go.

And she said,

Okay.

And the really interesting thing was,

Her husband's experience,

His reaction to that.

It was like a cartoon,

Like his jaw was dropped.

It was like just hanging open,

His jaw was hanging open.

And it stayed hanging open.

He couldn't believe it,

You know,

He just couldn't believe it.

And I said,

This is the way to talk with your wife.

I told him,

I said,

When your wife is stuck like that,

She's in pain.

And when you're harsh with her,

It just adds to the pain.

And pain is very overwhelming.

And what she needs is compassion.

She needs help.

It's like if she had fallen over,

You wouldn't be critical over,

You know,

Why did you fall over?

Like,

She tripped on something and fell over and her knees were bleeding.

It's like,

Why,

Why,

You know,

Why didn't you do that?

You wouldn't say that.

You would help her.

And she needs help.

And it's a very sobering experience for him.

So,

I bring this up because I think it's important to know.

It helps with our relationships with others.

The people that we're close with.

It really helps to be kind to them when they're having a hard time.

I think a lot of us have been brought up that criticism is the way to get stuff done.

You know,

Like bombastic criticism.

Whether you do it for,

You know,

Towards somebody else or towards yourself,

It's a common occurrence.

It's often the go-to way of like,

How do I get through a difficult situation?

You know,

I'm going to berate myself.

I'm going to really be really harsh with myself and not even get something done.

And it's violent.

It's a violent way of doing things.

But because it happens so often,

It doesn't get questioned.

So we do it with ourselves.

You know,

I've heard it over and over again from clients.

People will say,

Am I your worst client?

Or,

I can't believe I didn't do anything about this for so long.

Like,

What's wrong with me?

I should have done this a long time ago.

And when people say that to themselves,

They look paler.

They look tired.

They look exhausted.

And they're diminished.

So basically,

That criticism is clutter.

That relentless,

Harsh criticism,

Whether it's towards somebody else or towards yourself,

Is clutter.

Because it doesn't serve.

It doesn't actually create positive change.

What it does is kind encouragement.

And I've seen that over and over again.

Whenever a client starts to be harsh with themselves,

I'll bring in kindness.

I actually had this running joke for a while where someone would say,

Oh my god,

I'm such an idiot,

Or blah,

Blah,

Blah.

And I would say,

Okay,

If you continue to criticize yourself,

I'm going to charge you three times the amount per hour that I normally charge.

And they would laugh.

They'd start to laugh.

Because it became clear,

Like,

Oh yeah,

It's not helping me.

The criticism's not helping.

And you don't want to criticize yourself for being critical.

Because it goes on unconsciously.

It just seems that's a normal way of doing things.

But clutter busting's really taken a kind,

Curious,

And honest look.

Not only at the stuff in your life,

But your behaviors.

How you act.

How you think about things.

How you react to things.

And it's not noticing these things,

Like,

Oh my god,

I'm so critical of myself.

What's wrong with me?

It's like,

Oh,

That's really interesting.

I'm very critical of myself.

I'm just having these really harsh thoughts.

That's really interesting.

No.

It's not replacing.

I mean,

I don't think they need to be replaced with anything.

Just noticing them has a way of diminishing those thoughts.

Making them weaker and weaker.

You know,

The critical thoughts.

They go off into the distance,

And then eventually they fade out.

So it really helps to be open and kind with yourself in these situations.

Because clutter busting is a difficult situation.

Clutter in and of itself is very overwhelming.

Its presence reduces us.

It makes it very hard for us to think clearly,

Just being around clutter.

So sometimes just starting to go through your clutter can be really hard because of that daunting effect.

That debilitating,

Stagnating effect of clutter.

So we need to be really tender with ourselves.

Or if we're helping someone out with our clutter,

We need to be really tender with them.

Because they're hurting from the presence of the clutter.

If you're working by yourself,

It's good to know that,

Alright,

I want to be really extra kind to myself as I go through this clutter.

And it makes a difference.

It makes it such an easier process.

And that starts to extend in other areas of your life.

When you start to be kind to yourself in a difficult situation like this,

Like going through your clutter,

You find yourself starting to be kind to yourself in other places in your life.

Learning to accept yourself for as you are in the moment.

This is how I am.

I'm overwhelmed.

I'm tired.

I'm stuck under clutter.

Okay,

Great.

Great.

Good to know.

Good to know.

Another thing I wanted to bring out about clutter busting,

Which I think could help,

Is that we've all been taught since we're very young that things are more important than us.

That the things in our life are primary and nor secondary.

So it can be hard to even start questioning the things in our lives because it seems like blasphemy on some level,

You know.

I can't question my stuff.

If things are more important than me,

Then I certainly can't go through my stuff and even think of getting rid of things.

It's not our fault.

We've been brought up that way.

We're constantly seeing ads that tell us there's something wrong with us,

That we're not enough,

And if we get this product or service,

We're going to be enough.

And that message is repeated through television advertising,

Internet advertising,

Ads of magazines,

Newspapers,

On billboards.

It becomes part of our lives.

And so as you start to go through clutter,

You might have this feeling that I shouldn't be doing this.

And you might even bring up criticism that might be part of it.

We're critical of ourselves because we're angry at ourselves for even considering going through our stuff,

You know.

So there's a lot going on.

There's a lot going on.

And it helps to recognize that when you go into a clutter bust.

When you start to declutter.

So again,

Being tender with yourself.

Making sure you set aside a certain amount of doable amount of time to work on a clutter.

Whether it's a half hour,

An hour,

15 minutes.

Whatever's going to be a kind way to begin the process.

And I encourage you to do the process.

I encourage you to move forward with kindness.

Because when you start to discover that clutter and when you start to remove it.

Whether it's a tangible item that you don't like or use anymore,

Or it's a behavior that you recognize this is hurting me.

When you discover that and you begin to remove these things,

You get your life back.

You become primary.

And everything else becomes secondary.

And you begin to tend to yourself.

And there's freedom in that.

And it's a wonderful experience.

I've seen a lot of people go through it.

And I never met anybody that couldn't go through it.

So I encourage you because I see it happen.

And I see the positive results.

So I wish you the best.

And thank you.

Thanks for listening.

Take care.