Declutter Your Life How Outer Order Leads to Inner Calm

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3 Declutter Your Life

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5 Declutter Your Life How Outer Order Leads to Inner Calm Gill Hasson

6 This edition first published Gill Hasson Registered office John Wiley & Sons Ltd, The Atrium, Southern Gate, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 8SQ, United Kingdom For details of our global editorial offices, for customer services and for information about how to apply for permission to reuse the copyright material in this book please see our website at The right of the author to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, except as permitted by the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, without the prior permission of the publisher. Wiley publishes in a variety of print and electronic formats and by print-on-demand. Some material included with standard print versions of this book may not be included in e-books or in print-on-demand. If this book refers to media such as a CD or DVD that is not included in the version you purchased, you may download this material at For more information about Wiley products, visit Designations used by companies to distinguish their products are often claimed as trademarks. All brand names and product names used in this book are trade names, service marks, trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners. The publisher is not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book. Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the publisher and author have used their best efforts in preparing this book, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. It is sold on the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering professional services and neither the publisher nor the author shall be liable for damages arising herefrom. If professional advice or other expert assistance is required, the services of a competent professional should be sought. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Hasson, Gill, author. Title: Declutter your life : how outer order leads to inner calm / Gill Hasson. Description: Chichester, West Sussex, United Kingdom : Wiley, Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN (print) ISBN (pbk.) Subjects: LCSH: Storage in the home. Orderliness. Time management. House cleaning. Classification: LCC TX309.H (print) DDC 648/.8 dc23 LC record available at A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN (pbk) ISBN (ebk) ISBN (ebk) Cover design/image: Wiley Set in 11/14 pt SabonLTStd-Roman by Aptara Inc., New Delhi, India Printed in Great Britain by TJ International Ltd, Padstow, Cornwall, UK

7 Contents Introduction 1 Part 1: Declutter Your Home 7 1 How Do You Accumulate So Much? 9 2 Why Can t You Clear It All Out? 19 3 Think Differently 27 4 Declutter Your Home 43 5 Keep Your Home Free Of Clutter 75 Part 2: Declutter Your Life 85 6 Declutter Your Commitments 87 7 Declutter Your Friendships Declutter Your Work Declutter Information 135 About the Author 145 Useful Websites 147 Index 149 v

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9 Introduction

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11 couple of years ago, we were watching TV when we A heard a loud bang. We rushed upstairs expecting to see that a piece of furniture had collapsed and fallen over, but neither my husband nor I could find anything that explained the loud noise. A few days later, though, I noticed the ceiling was dipping in one corner of our bedroom. We called a builder. When he climbed down from the loft of our three-bedroom semidetached Victorian house, he told us that a rafter had snapped that we were lucky the ceiling hadn t fallen in on top of us while we slept. You ve got so much stuff up there, he said. Victorian lofts weren t designed to store stuff. Of course they weren t. The Victorians didn t have anything to store. We did. Our sons had grown up and two of them had left home. Amongst other things, one son had put a bike up in the loft (which, when I phoned to ask him about it, he told me he didn t want any more. That I could get rid of it. Not him. Me.) I d 3

12 Declutter Your Life kept two large boxes of Lego, a box of trains and train track, a box of Brio, two large boxes of other toys and children s books, the wooden castle my Dad made for the boys and an inflatable dinghy we bought for a holiday in Devon, which they used once 10 years ago. Then there was my husband s large vinyl collection, a stereo, twelve boxes of negatives from his career as a freelance photographer, my photo albums, my wedding dress, my university essays, a box of letters, odd bits of furniture, two rugs, lighting, extra glasses and large dishes for parties. We had lots of camping gear and Christmas decorations. And those are just the things I can remember that we brought out of the loft when we had to completely empty it so that the rafter could be fixed and the loft insulated. We re not hoarders. We re just a normal family. We d lived in the same house for 20 years and brought up three sons. We had all the same type of stuff as any family who have studied, had jobs, been on holidays, camped, gone to festivals, celebrated Christmas, had parties, enjoyed music and books and had a variety of interests. Once we d emptied the loft I realized the rest of the house had plenty more things that we d held onto for whatever reason: in case we needed it, because we hoped we d need it, because it would feel wrong to chuck it out or because we just couldn t be bothered to clear it out. Do you also have too much stuff? Clutter can silently creep up on you and, before you know it, you ve accumulated a lot of junk and jumble and all sorts of objects and oddments. It becomes overwhelming, but for one reason or another you hang onto it. 4

13 Introduction What can you do and where do you start? The key to managing clutter is to get to the root of the problem: your own thinking. Declutter Your Life explains how to change your relationship with the things you own and think about your things in a new light; in a way that is constructive, will help you to identify what is and isn t clutter and enable you to let the clutter go. Most of our things started out as something useful, interesting, attractive. But in time over the months and years the things we ve bought or acquired reach a point where they re no longer useful or enjoyable. They re clutter. Instead of hanging on to and being weighed down with objects and possessions that keep you stuck in the past, you can learn to think about your things in a way that s constructive and helpful to you. There are plenty of tips and techniques and lots of advice in this book to help you. You ll discover how outer order leads to inner calm; you ll feel less overwhelmed and stressed, there ll be less to think about, organize and clean. Instead as I did you ll feel more in control and have more time and energy for what s actually important to you in terms of other people, your work and other interests in your life. Part 2 of this book goes on to explain how the principles and steps taken to declutter and simplify your living space can improve not just your home but also other aspects of your life: your commitments, your friends, your work and the information you take in. You ll discover that, like your possessions, your commitments and friends can also keep you stuck in the past. You ll learn 5

14 Declutter Your Life that if you want to let go of commitments and friendships that no longer fit with your life, you can do so without feeling guilty. Who and what was right for you then is not necessarily right now. Don t let the past dictate the present! What matters is what commitments and friends you choose to keep now. Whether it s too many commitments, friends you no longer have anything in common with, work that leaves you no time to breathe or a bombardment of information, it s time to declutter; to let go, simplify and make room for the new. 6

15 Part 1 Declutter Your Home Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful. William Morris

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17 1 How Do You Accumulate So Much?