Clutter Costs Space

Clutter costs you in space.  A cluttered home has no room to do things, whether routine, or fun things like hobbies.  Treasured items like photos and mementos have no place to be displayed and get lost in the chaos.

When clutter spreads, it leaves you no space to relax.  A cluttered, chaotic environment has no place for your eyes or your brain to be still.  Even though we may not be conscious of it, our eyes and brains see the clutter and try to process it.  If every space is full of things competing for our attention, our brains get overwhelmed and tired.  When decorating, creating an art piece, or designing a print layout, the artist always leaves some “white space,” a calm area to allow your eyes and brain the room to relax and slow down to enjoy it.  One of the many reasons I love living in New Mexico is the wide-open spaces that allow me to relax and expand my horizons.  

Even simple tasks are difficult when you don’t have room to store the tools and supplies you need for the project.  Making a meal takes much longer, and is much harder, when you first have to move things around on the counter to make room for a bowl or a cutting board.  Who’s going to make the effort to cook when you have to hunt for tools and ingredients in the clutter?  Many people with cluttered homes can’t eat at their tables.  They prepare meals not based on their nutritional needs, but on the requirement that it can be fixed and eaten in whatever small space they have available.

A cluttered environment makes doing a complicated and paper intensive task like preparing taxes much more difficult.  Even starting the process is a huge task.  Important papers are most likely lost in the clutter and take a long time to find.  There’s no clear space available to sort papers, and when they are put down in the clutter they get lost again in the chaos. 

Clutter robs you of the space to live the life you want. 

Copyright© 2019 Elizabeth Tawney Gross, Organizing For Everyday, LLC