“Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.” – William Morris
I have lived most of my life in a cluttered home. Closets were full, drawers wouldn’t shut, things weren’t put away, and unfinished projects could be found in most rooms. That was, unless somebody was coming over. Then, the entire family would pitch in to make sure the house was presentable. Looking back, the problem with clutter wasn’t that we didn’t notice or care. Instead, the problem was we could never get ahead of the mess or ever seem to develop a system that would keep our home clutter-free.
But that is no longer the case. Today, almost every room in our home rests in a state of order – free from the life-robbing presence of physical clutter. Over the past several years, we have found a system that works very well for our family of four. And I am perfectly confident you can do the same… no matter how far away from clutter-free your home may seem.
Consider implementing the four steps found in this Simple Guide to Keeping Your Home Clutter-Free:
1) Believe it is possible. Most of us know it is entirely possible to live in a clutter-free environment. I imagine that is what attracts you to this guide. You are just looking for some extra help to get there.
But some of you are not so sure. Your house has been cluttered for so long, you have given up all hope of ever living any other way. For you, the first step to decluttering your home is to take heart and believe it is entirely possible. Realize that you will never get there if do not resolve in your mind that you can accomplish it. So find some hope and take one small step. Then, take another… and another… and another…
2) Remove the excess. Our homes are full of things. Clutter begins to appear most prominently when we own too much stuff. Conversely, the fewer items we own, the easier it is to keep clutter at a minimum. The first (and most important) step in keeping your home clutter-free is to remove the excessive possessions that are stealing our lives, time, and energy.
In your process of removing the excess, it can be helpful to find a working definition of clutter to aid you in this step. Early in our journey, we began to define clutter as a) too much stuff in too small a space; b) anything that we no longer used or loved; or c) anything that led to a feeling of disorganization. With that as our guiding filter, we slowly moved from room to room, removing everything that fit the definition above.
In some cases, this step is easy:
- Junk drawers full of unneeded items (rubber bands, old batteries, or old keys).
- Closets full of clothes you no longer wear.
- Decorations that are no longer meaningful and/or outdated.
In other cases, this step will take more time and intentionality:
- Large projects such as the garage, basement, or attic.
- Sentimental items that have collected over the years.
- Books.
- Other family members’ clutter that have begun invading common spaces.
The most important key in completing this step is to start with the small and easy projects first. Begin there. As you do, you’ll build up small victories. Then, after the small victories have been won, you’ll find extra motivation to begin tackling the harder cases of clutter in your minimalist home.
If you still do not feel fully capable on removing the excess possessions from your home, find encouragement in an intermediate step. For example, put the items you can’t quite part with in a cardboard box out of sight with a date on it. Getting rid of unnecessary possessions is essential, but it doesn’t have to be a race.
3) Implement habits to manage your clutter. For most of my life, I thought the key to maintaining clutter was found here. Just organize, clean, and organize again. But I was wrong. Because I had not taken the time to remove the excess in full (or in part), I could never get ahead of the clutter in my home. There were just too many things in too small a space – no matter what system we tried to implement. As a result, healthy clutter-clearing habits never had opportunity to emerge. So do not skip the removal step, it is absolutely important. And the more energy you put in removing the excess, the easier it will be to find and develop habits to better manage the things you keep.
Once you have cleared the excess, you will be able to better discover which habits keep your living space free of clutter. And once you experience the freedom and stress-free life of living clutter-free, you will find these habits easier to embrace.
Some of these habits will recur daily:
- Cleaning the kitchen after each meal.
- Placing daily-use items (clothes, books, toys) back in their designated homes.
- Fully-completing projects around the house.
- Developing an evening routine.
Some of these habits will center on specific locations that serve as clutter collection sites in your home. For us, our kitchen counter typically collects items (mail, schoolwork) during the day, our living room sees a highly-volume of traffic each day, and one of the bedrooms in our home finds itself a bit messier than the others. Each of these specific locations requires extra effort and energy than the others.
Some of these habits will center of seasonal needs:
- The changing of the seasons.
- The need to remove excessive possessions after holidays and/or birthdays.
- Significant life changes (birth of a child, new employment) will also require refocusing and adjustment.
Over the years, we have found clutter attracts clutter. Once it begins to collect, it requires intentional action to clear it away. Develop for your family healthy habits today to manage the daily use of the things in your home. Once identified, you’ll find them much easier to implement.
4) Slow the accumulation of possessions. To live is to consume. It cannot be avoided – especially in our society and culture. But if the influx of possessions into our homes can be slowed, clutter can be managed efficiently.
To slow the accumulation of things in our homes, we need to change our mindset and begin evaluating our purchases differently. Realize that your purchases cost far more than the price on the sticker. Each one will also require time, energy, and effort once they enter your home. Before making a purchase, begin asking yourself these questions:
- Is this item really needed?
- Do I have a place to store this when I get it home?
- How much extra work will this possession add to my life?
- Am I buying it for the right reasons?
This thought-process isn’t designed to keep you from making purchases ever again – at least, it’s not supposed to. Again, to live is to consume. But these questions are designed to bring intentionality into your life. They raise in your mind the awareness that some purchases take more from our life than they offer. They help you know the difference. And slow the accumulation of clutter-causing items into your home and life.
Again, it is completely and entirely possible to live in a clutter-free home. With this simple guide, you’ll be well on your way. From somebody who has lived both, I can quickly attest that once you begin to enjoy the physical and mental freedom that accompanies clutter-free living, you’ll make extra effort to ensure your home does not slip back into the home it used to be.
If you’d like to know more about the most important principles we learned during our journey into living with less, you’ll find great value in our book, Simplify: 7 Guiding Principles to Help Anyone Declutter Their Home and Life.
Willow says
I’m a long time reader, too Joshua, and a long time simplicity fan. Even so, I got mentally stuck at parts of #3 when I was reading this wonderful post. After all these years, I still have to constantly reevaluate the ‘management’ of our stuff. Thanks for the reminder!
joshua becker says
Hey Willow, it has been a pleasure to have you reading and commenting over the years. When I first started minimizing, I assumed we’d eventually reach a point where all the unnecessary possessions were purged and the clutter would take care of itself. But I have not found this to be the case – that’s why I included step #3. It seems ever-present. After all, to live is to consume.
Ruby says
It does get easier though, right Joshua? I need to know that it does!!
Liz Merrill says
Thanks for this Joshua…I want my sister to read this..I’ve been telling her that the more clutter in her physical life…the more cluttered her mental life will be. The stress of having so much clutter and possessions can make a person nuts!
Michael Hawkins says
Amen! I truly believe that the physical clutter turns into mental clutter. Somewhere in the back of our mind, we are ‘dealing with’ the clutter/stuff/crap and it wears on us.
It’s crazy, but I really think it’s true. Ugg.
Fiona @ everydayspiritualwisdom says
Love it, love it, love it!! :)
joshua becker says
Thanks, thanks, thanks!!
Pony Rider says
Once upon a time we used to have too much stuff in a small space. The problem for me began with moving in with my now-husband. I used to keep my studio minimalist when I was living by myself. I was in charge of everything. But when I was not in charge of, and could not dispose of and organize how I liked, the stuff in our home together, my perfectionist self froze completely. Cleaning time was always stressful, as I hated cleaning when I could not get things the way I wanted even after hours of work. So I rather just let it all hang out. It was only after I came across a book by Karen Kingston, “Clear your clutter with Feng shui” things clicked in my head. I don’t practice feng shui, but the ideas in the book started a profound process. I got my husband to read the book and he was also impressed, and so together we started to pare down. Wit each move we got rid of more things. Sometimes things accumulated a bit, but after years of practicing intentionality and minimalism, and finally also grasping the important point of stopping to shop (I can’t stress enough how important this simple realization was for me.. duh!) we were at a point that we were living comfortably and spaciously in a 600 sf apartment with our child. I was very picky and particular about what entered our home and believed in spending a lot of money i something you love and will use for the rest of your life. Then came a final lesson in simplicity – we lost everything in our home to a bad mold problem. We could not tolerate our old things but got severe reactions to them too. We have only one grocery bag’s worth of stuff each. I have lived for four months with 15 pieces of clothing. We will rent my childhood home fully furnished and equipped. I do not really care about stuff anymore. I certainly don’t want to buy expensive things anymore under the pretense that it’s a good investment. We just never know what will happen, and there are better uses for the money. But I think I have finally found freedom from stuff, I love owning next to nothing. Even if I later have some more stuff again I want to keep this attitude.
joshua becker says
Thank you so much for sharing that story. Would you believe, Clear your Clutter with Feng Shui was the first book that I read about minimalism too? That’s funny.
Kara says
Wow…. That is the very first book I read too in regards to clutter… Then fly lady, then I found out about blogs and like minded minimalism… That’s pretty crazy. In the two years of purging and moving and then purging again. It is one of 8 or so books I continue to keep. It is Full of great info, much like your blog.
Karen Dubrinsky says
The Karen Kingston book is amazing! One of the first I read, also. Joshua, I love this post because you really get to the roots of the steps, instead of just prescribing them and leaving us to figure it out. Thank you!
Karen
Megyn @MinimalistMommi says
Thank you for this! I often get stuck on step 3. Although we have comparatively less than most, we have the hardest time keeping up with it all. Reading this inspired me to do some work on our yard reno’s and tidy up once kiddos went to bed. Thanks for that!
joshua becker says
Go get ’em Megyn!
Alice says
Great post. I love how in-depth you get. I remember when you decided to write fewer posts so they could be better and it is working. I am patient and excited when you have something new to share. Thanks for your dedication.
joshua becker says
Well Alice, you make the dedication easier. I remember that intentional change as well. Sure, sounds like you’ve been around for quite some time… through the short posts and the long ones. Thanks so much.
Diane Balch says
I’m totally with you on this post and I love William Morris. You might enjoy my post about his ideas: http://simplelivingdianebalch.blogspot.com/2012/06/minimalist-dilemma-utility-vs-beauty.html
joshua becker says
Thanks Diane. I’ll check it out.
Annie Kip says
Great post, Joshua. I love how you lay out easy steps to getting where we all want to go – to live in a home that makes us feels good!!! Instead of beating myself up (which wasn’t working as a motivator), I have tried to take the William Morris quote and approach my house by giving extra appreciation to the things I do really value. I created “Favorite Things Friday” to do just that – and to help me create contrast to see which things I don’t really value and can let go of. This summer, I will be referring to your really helpful post many times as I try to cull my possessions down to things which are really my favorites. I really appreciate your encouragement. Thank you.
Alexm says
When I am tempted to buy something I have to stop myself and think about the “design” I have for the space I am thinking the item will go into. After taking design courses many many years ago, that philosophy helps me bring my mind back to what the original intention of a room, my wardrobe, my backyard, etc. was conceived to be. That probably sounds flaky…. When did the world start thinking it had to decorate its home like TGIFridays?
Brooke {Slow Your Home} says
You’ve nailed virtually every reason for either having clutter in the first place, or for allowing it to accumulate again over time.
I’m finding that getting clutter-free certainly not a one-time solution, but rather many steps need to be taken over and over to keep our home (relatively) clutter free. I think it’s also more challenging when you have young children – if for no other reason than the constant mess factor and the toys (which often come in sets/hundreds of pieces).
I know I’ll be referring back to this many a time. Thanks Joshua!
joshua becker says
I agree Brooke, many continuing steps. I have also found that young children make the decluttering process more difficult… but they also make it more important.
Beka says
I totally agree with both of you. I have a 2 and 3 yr old and live in a small space, so it makes it VERY hard to stay on top of those things. But after living with two parents how were hoarders and once upon a time I was going down that path myself, I vowed I’d never let that happen to my kids. I clean out, give away, and organize every three months, otherwise I feel myself starting to lose my grips on my house. But it’s easy to forget. I will also be referring to this periodically, especially about what purchases are brought into my home. Thanks so very much!
Ruby says
It helps to know I’m not alone with the fears of my toddler becoming a hoarder like her grandma!! We have a large home, so there is a temptation to fill it, but since its not our permanent home I am refusing to do so—and recognizing that with a child comes a whole lot more ‘stuff’ for mommy to process through!! And I love how Joshua reminds us children are the reason to make change & teach them to value relationships & experiences not stuff, especially with all the media they are exposed to indoctrinating them with collection of material crap—for lack of a better word:)