Five takeaways:
- If you have to move things around to accomplish a task in your home or at your office or you feel overwhelmed by all the “things” in your home– you are likely over cluttered. And the effect on your life can be profoundly negative.
- A study published in Current Psychology showed that procrastination was tied directly with one’s clutter and that both led directly to raised levels of cortisol– the stress hormone.
- Why does clutter elicit such a strong physiological reaction? Experts think that it is tied to the classic representation of how a home should look and function. Think of the classic, bucolic, single family home of the 1950s. A disorderly home fails to live up to such an expectation.
- A main tactic for decluttering, suggested by Dr. Joseph Ferrari, a professor of psychology at DePaul University in Chicago, is to avoid touching the object when considering whether to keep it. Have a family member or friend ask you “do you need this?” as touching an object increases the chance you will remember your attachment to it.
- Another important tactic involves making a conscious effort to acquire less. Keeping objects out of the house is paramount. Once they get in they enter the home they become easier to get attached to.
From Emilie Le Beau Lucchesi at The New York Times:
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