Stress and clutter go hand in hand often feeding off each other to create chaos in a person’ life that can lead to the need for professional help if not dealt with at an early stage.

In Warning inner clutter leads to shiny object syndrome, I mentioned that disorganized space is a reflection of stress a person is experiencing and addressed the role of Shiny Object Syndrome in creating more clutter.

Professionals, who want to achieve goals effectively and efficiently need to learn how to manage stress, clutter and break that mutually supportive feeding frenzy.

In this 4^th and concluding post on the topic of Clutter and Stress, we are going to do 2 things – gain an understanding about disorganization and select doable actions to overcome it.

For ease of reference, here is the list of earlier posts

Do You Manage Stress the Clutter Route?

Avoiding Shiny Object Syndrome for Amazing Professional Success

Warning! Inner Clutter leads to Shiny Object Syndrome

There are 2 types of disorganization that can affect us during the course of our life – situational and chronic or challenging disorganization.

An easier way to look at disorganization is from the time period involved.

When your Situation makes you disorganized

Situational disorganization tends to be short-term. Here the clutter is normally the result of life events, transitions and changes.

The chaos is temporary until the situation returns to normal or is brought into control with a deliberate action plan to tackle items that were once useful but now create clutter or require some intentional organizing.

A simple example would be relocating to a new city to begin a new job with no time to unpack your belongings or put your belongings in suitable places.

Or a family member falls ill. You have to tend to them during most of your waking hours at the cost of not maintaining the regular routine you might have followed to get household and other work done.

When life throws us a curve ball, it’s not unusual to accumulate clutter and become disorganized for a short while. It happens to everyone.

This is what we call “Situationally Disorganized”: It is a normal side effect of a life situation.

What makes “Chronic Disorganization” different?

The term Chronic Disorganization was coined by Judith Kolberg author of “Conquering Chronic Disorganization” and founder of National Study Group on Chronic Disorganization (NSGCD), coined the term chronic disorganization to describe people who have great difficulty maintaining traditional organizing methods.

The ICD defines chronic disorganization (now called challenging disorganization) as having all three of the following:

1. A history of disorganization in which efforts to get organized have not been maintained.
2. An ongoing undermining of your current quality of life due to disorganization.
3. An expectation that you will continue to be disorganized.

The term “chronically disorganized” is NOT a “diagnosis” or an “illness”.

It is a behavioural pattern and conventional organizing methods designed by other people for the individual will probably not be maintained.

Chronic Disorganization is different from Situational Disorganization because when life transitions happen to you, instead of “recovering” and “restoring order” after a few months or so, the disorganization does not improve and may even continue to worsen over time.

Clutter continues to accumulate and traditional methods of organizing stop working. If the overwhelm is intense, then a person might start to experience chronic procrastination too.

You might also experience periods of extreme organization and then a lapse into overwhelming clutter – like a YoYo. This is also considered being chronically disorganized.

If you experience anger, frustration, guilt about your situation in life and then follow it up with compulsive behaviour  like emotional eating, ‘shopping therapy’ or other addictive and or escapism behavior, you might want to take a long look at your situation and consider taking positive action.

If the clutter starts to affect your quality of life, emotional state or mental health, outside intervention might be required. This doesn’t mean that you are ill. It means you need more support to get out of the spiraling situation and in some cases on-going help to maintain a reasonable level of organization.

That said, it is quite common for what started as “situational disorganization” to evolve into “chronic” or “challenging disorganization.”

Are You Chronically Disorganized?

There are a number of reasons why you may be chronically disorganized but the signs are similar.

You may be chronically disorganized if:

• You’ve tried to organize many times but have not been able to stick to a routine or schedule
• You find it difficult to let go of things when you no longer need them or keep them thinking you’ll need it ‘someday’
• Areas of your home (even your garage and perhaps vehicle) are filled with clutter preventing you from using your space optimally.
• Your clutter and disorganization are affecting your health, job, relationships and life in general.
• You participate in free challenges or even paid ones for clutter management and do well during the challenge but then lapse back into old habits because you simply cannot work with an organizing system.

Self-Help suggestions for Organizing when you don’t want to hire help

If you are ambivalent or uncomfortable in hiring help or getting professional assistance whether from a coach, therapist or clutter professional, then there are 5 ways that you can help yourself.

You yourself will know what you need to do after that and take the right call.

Use your natural tendencies to your advantage

Even the most chronically disorganized person has areas where they are actually organized.

Think of the times when you were at your organized best and the areas where you are actually organized.

What methods do you use in those areas to stay organized? Can they be replicated to reduce clutter and disorganization right now? What improvisations can you make to help you achieve an incremental positive result?

Make this exercise even more powerful by writing it down. When you see the evidence in front of you in writing, it’s easier to get creative and transpose what works in 1 area to another.

It’s also a good confidence building exercise for the task at hand.

Find the right Support Group

Sitting at home or in the office, we often feel we are alone with our challenges whereas there are others who may be fighting the same battle.

Consider connecting with a group of people who are experiencing the same challenge with whom you can meet offline or online in a community setting to support and be supported as you combat your disorganization.

You never know who has had the same experience and can help you with yours. Do a local Google search or check out Facebook Groups. We can all use support!

Practice being decisive – even if it kills you!

This tip might be challenging if you are in the habit of thinking some article or item might come into use later. For example, the cartons of your computer system which you’ve kept in the garage or storeroom thinking you might need it when you shift home or sell it off.

A good way to get started is by disposing off anything you have not used in a year. In other words, those old clothes (especially the ones you’ll never fit into even if you went on a starvation diet or that are out of fashion), broken items that can’t be repaired and duplicate items that can be resold instead of holding onto them in the event you need it.

Remind yourself that many items are easily replaceable if you need them later.

Schedule de-clutter time into your daily schedule

There’s truth in the saying that a journey of a thousand miles begins with 1 step/

Likewise, pencil in 15 minutes a day to do a spot of de=clutter instead of thinking you need a whole day to do it.

A good way to get into the habit of clutter management is to start small. For example Do a drawer or desk one day, the kitchen shelves the next day and the laundry room the next day.

An even better way is to sign up for the 21 Day Declutter Challenge where we do both the outer de-cluttering and the inner work to make sure you rid yourself of the clutter.

The best part about this challenge is that you can return to it again and again whenever you feel yourself slipping and want to do a spot of de-cluttering.

Learn more by clicking on the image below.

Guard your sacred space from invading clutter

Would you allow anybody off the street into your home? I would think not!

Using the same principle, think twice about what you allow into your home. Wait a couple of days after seeing a new item before you buy it (it helps combat Shiny Object Syndrome too). If and when you do purchase something new, discard another item you own to make room for it.

Master the OHIO rule: Only Handle It Once

This tips works for productive work and fits the bill when trying to organize your home, office and anything that needs to be organized.

If you pick something up, make a decision then and there about it, and either put it where it belongs or discard it. Don’t fall into the trap of moving things from one pile to another, again and again.

Last but not least, learn to honor your space. Treat it with respect and it will in turn nourish you and help you live a peaceful life.

Are you organized? How do you stay on top of your space?

April is the time of year when we usually start our Spring Cleaning with a vengeance. The probability of clutter objects finding a way out of the house increases.

Why not make use of this opportunity to apply some basic Feng Shui tips to provide further stress relief without doing much other than work on our living space?

It is said that the state of our house is a reflection of the state of our mind.

So a cluttered messy home is quite reflective of our stress levels. Even if we deny it with phrases like ‘there’s method to our madness’ until a stage arrives when you need Stress Management Coaching. (Click the link to learn how I can help).

A decade ago, it was trendy in India to gift bamboo plants in beautiful containers. I remember back in my office, the Country Manager’s Executive Assistant received 4 of these plants one birthday.

Looks like we all had the same idea to wish her the Feng Shui way!

You may not know much about Feng Shui but you can learn a lot about it on the internet and the glossy section of newspapers. There are shops both offline and online selling Feng Shui products to help you with your career, marriage, health, relationships and even to protect your car!

What’s Feng Shui?

Feng Shui means ‘wind and water’ in Chinese. It’s a centuries old oriental art used to balance and harmonize surroundings, to bring good fortune, peace and health. The benefits are also felt by those around you.

Feng Shui is based on the belief that the world around us is filled with energy or Chi, similar to Prana in the Ayurvedic system. For the Chinese, wind and water are symbols of health and good fortune.

Following this premise that by boosting your Chi and by living in harmony with the world’s energy you can bring success and prosperity to your life as well as of those around you, it stands to reason that Feng Shui can also help alleviate stress.

Not everyone is into symbolism or feels comfortable carrying items in their pocket or person or having oriental objects in their home. So how do we work around that?

5 Practical Ideas for Stress Relief – the Feng Shui Way

This week, I’m sharing some ideas of how you can use Feng Shui to relieve stress without going out and buying objects or making it obvious to others what you are doing. I’ve tried all these tips myself over the years and know that they work.

These are all layman tips. If you really want to learn more about Feng Shui, please consult an expert or buy a good book to find out more.

I recommend 2 books. One is by Lillian Too which was published in 2006 but good called  365 Feng Shui Tips

The other is by Karen Kingston, Clear Your Clutter with Feng Shui: Free Yourself from Physical, Mental, Emotional, and Spiritual Clutter Forever 

Back to my own layman Feng Shui tips, you have 3 options here.

You can continue reading to learn the tips or if you prefer  slides, view the slideshare presentation.

As a bonus, I’ve also included one of the first videos I made way back in 2014  (but was too shy to upload) until I wrote this blog post. I was still experimenting and even if it isn’t world class, it’s a good video.

Here goes!

Feng Shui Suggestions for Stress Management

Adjust your lighting: Anyone who has ever had headaches and then gone to the optician only to discover that they need spectacles all because of bad lighting will appreciate this tip!

One of the most important elements Feng Shui involves the lighting of your room. All rooms in your home or office should be very well lit to benefit from a feeling of peace and comfort.

Banish Clutter: This one is easy. In my post Want to reduce Stress? You Need to clear Clutter, I’ve written about the indicators about one’s personality and state of life including stress simply by looking at the composition of the clutter and where it was appearing in one’s life.

In Feng Shui, in order to promote calmness, everything should be in its right place.

In other words, organize your space!

It’s really less stressful to be able to pick up your car keys from its allotted place on the front table in the morning rather than first rummaging through piles of newspaper. Or looking for it all over the place, isn’t it?

If clutter is an issue for you, reduce your stress levels by joining the Clutter Free Movement.

Arrange your furniture and fixtures to support your success: When I first learned about this tip, I wanted to jump up with glee because I knew how to do it.

During my school years, I participated in the Duke of Edinburgh Award Scheme. One of the skills that I had to accomplish was basic interior decoration.

Our guide, who was a well-known Interior Decorator in India, taught us the basics and the first step was how to plan a room. She used to keep talking about easy flow in the room and preventing blockage of movement in a room.

For example, if I walk into the living room, I should be able to reach the sofa without having to zig zag via tables and other impediments.

From a Feng Shui perspective, the arrangement of furniture and decorations is important. It influences your sense of security, productivity and ability to experience calmness.

Another tip my teacher taught us and I should have guessed that she knew about Feng Shui as she was also my Ikebana instructress was to avoid sharp objects and corners in our decorations. These represent harshness and can impede stress relief actions. I practice it to this day.

If possible, do remove any overhanging shelves and objects as these too affect our sense of security.

According to Feng Shui principles, these overhanging objects are like a cloud hanging over our heads. So banish the clouds and let the sunshine in!

Decorate with nature: You’d have guessed this one from the beginning of the post and yes, gifting someone a bamboo plant is a lovely gesture. It indicates that you wish them well. The gentle bamboo plant actually helps to absorb the negative energy in the house.

How do you know its working?

Despite your taking the best care of the plant, one by one, the leaves of the plant will wilt as they absorb the negative energy. All you have to do when the plant is completely wilted is to replace it with gratitude for plant having supported you.

Other nature-based Feng Shui items include keeping fresh flowers and plants in the home to create a soothing environment.

One point that I would like to mention is that wilted flowers and plants represent tension. If you like to keep dried flowers in the house, then please reconsider.

Use incense and aromatherapy as part of your stress management tool kit: In Eastern cultures, we use incense and joss sticks as part of our prayer rituals and regularly in our everyday life.

The belief is that our prayers are carried towards the Divine through the fragrance of the incense sticks. We use scent for Chakra balancing too.

The principle is the same for Aromatherapy and complements Feng Shui helping to enhance our mood or rid ourselves of a bad mood.

So, take out your aromatherapy book (if you have one) or just Google and find out which aroma can help with your objective. You can actually remove the negative energy from your presence or uplift your mood by using the right aroma.

I can write on forever about the various ways we can use Feng Shui to enhance peace and alleviate stress, but these 5 simple and practical ideas are a great place to start the Feng Shui way of life.

Did any of them appeal to you or are you using them already? Please do share your thoughts and experiences with me!

Many years ago, when I first returned to India, I wanted to buy a particular Avon cosmetic product. I contacted their head office and was put in touch with my area Avon lady to make the purchase.

Avon Lady had business development ideas/ Despite my pleas, she enrolled me as an agent with hard core persuasion to sell products with the lure of profits. I wasn’t really interested but I wanted to buy the product and keep her happy.

So, I signed up and used my agent status to help friends into Avon place their orders. There wasn’t much profit, but I got the product I wanted.  Avon Lady soon realized I was a useless recruit and stopped harassing me to make sales to meet her targets.

Frankly speaking, selling beauty products is not a skill everyone possesses. One of my friends who used to make a few purchases told me a story that made me count my blessings with Avon Lady.

A couple of her work colleagues who wanted to earn some fast money signed up for a competitor. Their terms and conditions included buying Rs 5,000/- of products up front and then selling them for profit.

They didn’t know the first thing about marketing and sales. Since the products were highly priced, selling was a challenge. Ultimately, they ended up using them themselves.

Sadder but wiser, they stopped falling for the work from home scheme that could lead to exotic holidays. That was an expensive way to avoid Shiny Objects but many times there’s no gain without pain. 

Is your inner clutter manifesting as Shiny Object Syndrome?

Open a new browser tab and do a Google search for Shiny Object Syndrome (SOS). You’ll notice tons of blog posts and experts talk about how to overcome SOS and give lots of action steps.

But what about the Why part?

Last week I wrote about Shiny Object Syndrome and how professionals fall into that trap in pursuit of professional development and enhancement of skills. I touched on how FOMO affects business owners too. Here’s the link to that post.

I have yet to see anyone talk about a core issue and relationship between SOS, clutter and stress. This topic needs to be addressed.

Here’s my personal view on aggravated Stress, SOS and Clutter

The way I see it, when we are stressed out, we tend to look for relief and short cuts to our problems. While looking for solutions if the hook of the marketing message for a product or service hits a raw nerve, we go and enroll for the service of buy the product.

But that doesn’t provide instant gratification. If you don’t use your purchase or free product, then you have acquired a shiny object which lies unused.

Frankly speaking this is nothing but clutter whether it is on your computer hard drive or worse, inside your head.

Let us focus on your core clutter issue with the learning objective of beginning to gain an understanding of the specifics of Inner Clutter.

Why We Have Clutter—INNER CLUTTER

Let me start by asking you a question.

Have you ever noticed that your TO DO list never gets to TO DONE?

And, worse yet, you

a) can’t find your list it when you need it,

b) it’s gotten so long you feel overwhelmed and not much is getting done, and

c) you’ve written the same notes a million times, they’re all over in piles and stagnant places but never completed.

6 Rational Reasons for Staying Disorganized

The reasons for being disorganized are many, but there are some that can be heard anywhere:

1. not enough time
2. not enough space
3. need help deciding or moving things
4. not enough skill (don’t know how)
5. need for the right systems with which to organize
6. not enough money (to buy the systems or pay for help)

And if these don’t keep people from getting organized, there are 3 other “Inner Clutter” reasons – unwillingness to do it, lack of motivation and energy.

We can take each one of these obstacles to task and choose to override it and get the job of organizing underway. This is where the converting intention into action comes in.

If we really want to do something, we’ll find the time, energy and if required, money to get the work done.

But instead of taking action, we decide to find a short cut. We add to our list of outside products or services without stopping to think if all that is required is action on our part.

Clutter is a symptom of stress

We often think of a person who is surrounded by clutter as being disorganized.

Did you know that this is a sign of stress? 

Left unattended it may also become the manifestation of more serious issues. Such as depression, overwhelm and complete lack of focus.

Stress is caused by many factors, but when it comes to being disorganized it’s caused by a few targeted things:

1. Lack of focus (letting yourself get distracted)
2. Not scheduling the time to deal with it
3. Not understanding how to organize
4. Not deciding what to do with it
5. Lack of action

A life without focus and clarity—Inner and Outer—is a life easily distracted and drawn off course and off center.

Stress is going to happen—that’s life! However, constant and ongoing chaos, indecision and disorder pull us off center and away from all that is truly important in our lives.

When “stuff” happens, and our emotions and thoughts start going wild, we need to detach and keep our inner-self—our mind and thoughts focused and clear under any and all kinds of stressful situations “no matter what.” Then we can more easily stay focused and connected to the important doing of the next step, and the next and the next.

This blog post is not focused on your stress management techniques or how to handle stress. It is a first step to getting yourself organized which in itself will reduce some of the stress. This will give you back control over your life and possessions.

An easy clutter and stress management technique 

When you see a neat and tidy room, broken things thrown away, items that you don’t need either sold or gifted to a charity, it raises your spirits.

That in itself is a stress management technique. The positive feeling will flow into other areas of your life too.

There is an emotional and psychological element in our tendency to acquire SOS and hoard them. Clutter and hoarding have been studied in great depth by clinical psychologists. Often what appears to be a simple mess may actually be an indication of more serious conditions.

To gain a better insight into our clutter and to take steps to prevent it from emerging, preventive steps are important. Sometimes we acquire stuff that may really serve no purpose.

This is where our emotions come into play. If you’re brave, ask yourself some hard questions before jumping into acquiring something which is otherwise useful but is a SOS adding to clutter for you.

Maybe its FOMO (Fear of Missing Out)?

Eating fish Shiny Object Syndrome

I saw this played out when I hosted a pilot of my 21 Day Clutter Challenge for free with the caveat that I wanted feedback to fine tune the program. Of the 25 sign ups, only 5 participants stuck to the full program and benefited. Their feedback was priceless.

Of the others, maybe 5 more stayed on track but didn’t complete the program.

15 never bothered to even open the mails with the modules! One of the participants was a member of a mutual Facebook Group. I wrote to her asking for feedback since I could see her activity and knew that she was downloading all the handouts. Presumably, she did the work.

I was stumped by the feedback. While she downloaded everything, she had signed up for quite a few free challenges and hadn’t done any of the work. So, she couldn’t give me the feedback I needed.

It goes without saying that this is, in my books a classic example of Shiny Object Syndrome!

What next?

I discuss more practical steps in my Kindle ebook Cure Shiny Object Syndrome.

The truth is that once we take the sting out of the decision, it is much easier to take the right action. Understanding ourselves helps us to understand why that item became clutter in the first place and how to prevent it in future.

So, what’s the state of your clutter and acquisition of shiny objects? Want to take charge of your situation and make the required changes?

If yes, then I recommend enrolling for my 21 Day Clutter Challenge where we address both your Inner and Outer Clutter. We’ll also take a look at Shiny Object Syndrome too.

Click the image below to enroll in the challenge if your answer is in the affirmative. 

Last weekend I decided to combine a spot of dusting with rearranging my bookshelves. True to habit, I started perusing through a couple of old treasured book. I came across a book I’d purchased almost a decade ago out of sheer curiosity called Spiritual Housecleaning by Kathryn L Robyn.

Nothing along the lines of a rocket science manual or New Age remedies, but full of simple details on systematic housecleaning.

It incorporated spirituality and practical rituals for making one’s home a sacred space while helping to de-clutter the mind, improve energy levels and organize thoughts.

(You can click on the book image to find out the contents of the book)

As I skimmed, it struck me how clutter can actually create more stress and the need to be organized.

I mean, how many times have you gotten irritated because you couldn’t find your pen, paper, an important document or even your car keys?

Your office space, whether it is a home office or in a corporate office represents your area professional growth. Too much clutter and disorganization indicate a sense of lack of control over your career path including being overwhelmed and job dissatisfaction.

Your vehicle is symbolic of your progress and movement in life. Even in dream analysis, the vehicle is symbolic of your body, which houses your soul. Clutter in this area could indicate that you are subconsciously not willing to move ahead and are restricted by the past or personal limiting beliefs.

Financial clutter

–  If they are objects that need to be thrown away, just throw them away;

–  Are there items lying around that you don’t use but can be useful to others? Donate them to a worthy organization that can use them; or

–  Sell your usable clutter on the numerous websites available for resale. Convert your clutter into good cash. (I have yet to meet a person who says they have enough cash or don’t need more cash!)

On a more long-term basis, address the emotional issues that underlie the clutter in the first place.

If you can deal with it yourself that is great. Otherwise consider seeking help from family, friends and, if required, even professional help whether it is a coach, counselor or therapist.

Is clutter the bane of your life and are ready to do something about it?

I invite you to check out my 21 Day Clutter removal challenge where we do both the Inner and Outer Work for tackling Clutter.  Click on the below image to learn more.

Written By: Vatsala Shukla

This post was originally published on 16 October 2011. It has been updated in April 2024 for new information.

One of the best things about rainy Sundays and waterlogged Delhi is that it compels you to stay at home and look around to declutter your sanctuary. The Friday edition of my subscribed newspaper carried an article on Feng Shui and career progression and spoke of removing clutter to make space for positive Chi.

Not in the mood to declutter physically (where would I put the stuff? Its raining and the ragman must have run home to get away from the torrential rains), I decided to innovate and declutter my email Inbox which with over 5000 emails accumulated since 2005 required some serious positive Chi.

Glad I did because as I pressed the Delete button with glee for emails, jokes and chain letters thinking MORE POSITIVE CHI,  I came across one from November 2009 which got me thinking about how busy we tend to be just living to not take pleasure in what makes our lives meaningful and wonderful to live.

It says the story is true… not sure because I get a lot of true stories and I have a friend who is an expert at  using Google for research  who always finds out that it is a fabricated one. Nevertheless as a friend of almost 2 decades, she never puts me down and always admits that the stories are nice.

So here I share the story inside an email which will not be subjected to the Delete button and ask that you reflect for moment just the way I did.

4 minutes later:

The violinist received his first dollar: a woman threw the money in the hat and, without stopping, continued to walk.

10 minutes:

A 3-year old boy stopped but his mother tugged him along hurriedly. The kid stopped to look at the violinist again, but the mother pushed hard and the child continued to walk, turning his head all the time. Several other children repeated this action. Every parent, without exception, forced his or her children to move on quickly.

45 minutes:

The musician played continuously. Only 6 people stopped and listened for a short while. About 20 gave money but continued to walk at their normal pace. The man collected a total of $32.

1 hour: 

He finished playing and silence took over. No one noticed. No one applauded, nor was there any recognition.

No one knew this, but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the greatest musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate pieces ever written, with a violin worth $3.5 million dollars. Two days before Joshua Bell sold out a theatre in Boston where the seats averaged $100.

This is a true story.

Joshua Bell playing incognito in the metro station was organized by the Washington Post as part of a social experiment about perception, taste and people’s priorities.

The questions raised: in a common place environment at an inappropriate hour, do we perceive beauty? Do we stop to appreciate it? Do we recognize talent in an unexpected context?

One possible conclusion reached from this experiment could be this: If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world, playing some of the finest music ever written, with one of the most beautiful instruments ever made….

Violinist by George Hodan