What Causes Clutter and How to Overcome It

“This makes me feel like such a slob,” my client said as she grabbed a stack of papers off her desk.

“I guess I’m not supposed to feel that way, but I do,” she continued. 

“You’re not a slob. And it is okay to feel that way. But then you sit with it and figure out why you feel that way. You say goodbye to that story, then move on,” I said. 

The fact is every client I’ve worked with has encountered feelings of shame and embarrassment at some point during the decluttering process. This is why I want to change the way you see clutter. Otherwise, we can try all the decluttering advice there is, but still have clutter.

First, let’s delve into the causes of clutter, starting with understanding what clutter is. 

What is Clutter?

I’ve always defined clutter as ‘anything (physical, mental, emotional or spiritual) that is an obstacle to expressing the truth of who you are.

Lately, I’ve expanded that definition to include: Clutter is neutral. Meaning it’s not good or bad. It’s just a result of life. Clutter serves as information about our lives and can be used as a tool for transformation. 

In other words, clutter is not a problem. Instead, like a lamp illuminating our path, it points to an area of life where we’re stuck, burdened, or overwhelmed, an area of life that needs resurrecting. 

Think of clutter as an umbrella term for:

• Disorganization
• Chaos
• Disorder
• Confusion
• Messiness
• Dis-ease 

And the list could go on. The general idea is that clutter is anything that keeps you from living in the truth of who you’re created to be.

Examples of Clutter

As I mentioned in my definition of clutter, it’s not just the physical messes in our lives. Other types of clutter include: mental, emotional, and spiritual. 

8 Types of Physical Clutter 

Physical clutter is the stuff crowding our homes, offices, cars, or any other personal space. 

• Messes or piles of belongings that are out of place like children’s toys, clean laundry that hasn’t been put away, dirty laundry spilling out of the hamper, dishes in the sink, stacks of paper.
• Sentimental Clutter like mementos, keepsakes, inherited items, or anything to which you are emotionally attached. 
• Misplaced items that are in the wrong room or area of the house like shoes, purses, keys, wallets.
• Stockpiles that you don’t have room for but keep just in case. 
• Pieces of the past such as clothes that haven’t fit in years, craft supplies you no longer use, baby clothes or baby gear you no longer need.
• Broken items or items with missing parts or pieces.
• Donations that haven’t left your home.
• Storage items that are boxed up and kept in the garage, attic, or a storage room. Typically, these storage items haven’t been used or needed in a long time. These can be boxes that belong to you or that you’re storing for someone else. 

Examples of Mental Clutter 

Mental clutter is what preoccupies and tires our minds. Signs of a cluttered mind show up as:

• Decision fatigue or the inability to make a decision because of overwhelm.
• A busy mind that won’t stop.
• Multitasking
• Worrying about future outcomes or things that happened in the past.
• Negative self-talk, or the dialogue we have in our minds in which we put we put ourselves down
• Stress

Related – How to Overcome Negative Self-Talk

Signs of Emotional Clutter

I think of emotional clutter as a stagnancy which stunts our wellbeing and limits our capacity for healthy interactions with people, places, and things. Emotional clutter is tougher to recognize because it’s our normal, but there are signs you can look for, such as:

• dysfunctional relationships
• impulse shopping
• perfectionism
• feeling trapped or stuck in life or in situations
• low self-esteem 
• anxiety resulting from feeling stuck, unseen, or unheard
• mistrust (placing trust where it doesn’t belong)
• distrust (inability to trust)

Recognizing Spiritual Clutter

My definition of spiritual clutter is anything that suppresses your spirit, keeps you from fulfilling your purpose, or otherwise hinders you from becoming who you are created to be. It can show up as: 

• shame
• guilt
• confusion
• feeling disconnected
• aimlessness

Now that we’ve identified the different types of clutter, it’s important to understand how clutter happens in the first place. 

Related – The Most Profound Reason to Trust Your Inner Voice

7 Causes of Clutter

There are a lot of factors that contribute to the clutter in our homes and lives. The following examples just scratch the surface, but hopefully they’ll help you see why and how clutter is showing up in your life. 

Procrastination 

We delay putting things away either because we’re tired or in a rush. 

We avoid hard but necessary conversations, postpone leaving a stressful job, hold off on going to the doctor, and put off projects, chores, or errands until we’re left cramming them in at the last minute.

Sometimes we hold onto beliefs that no longer serve us out of a sense of obligation. 

Passing of time 

Over time, organizing systems can stop working. Typically that happens when the seasons change, or during life transitions such as moving, illness, aging.

Our beliefs, priorities, and values change. People come in and out of our lives. Interests and passions evolve. We gain new skills and talents. Any of those things are good reasons to reevaluate and look for signs of clutter. 

Personality  

We all have an organizing personality. Some of us need to see our things and others of us need everything out of sight. Try switching from clear to translucent containers or translucent to clear, whatever the case may be. 

You might need to try a different type of storage solution altogether, like changing from a shoe shelf to a bin. 

In life, we could be trying to force ourselves into someone else’s routines, systems, or style. 

Unprocessed Emotions 

What we resist persists. Those unprocessed emotions will find another way to show up until they get the time and attention they require. That could be a cluttered room, anxiety, aches and pains…

Place for everything 

If everything doesn’t have a place, then we don’t know where to put them. That leads to crammed closets, stuffed shelves, and bottomless pits under the bed. 

Power of Persuasion

Occasionally we’re influenced to purchase things we don’t actually want or need. Those things can pile up, especially if we feel obligated to keep an item we spent money on.

Someone may manipulate us into staying in a toxic relationship, you feel obligated to keep gifts or hold onto your parent’s belongings, creating a house full of things we don’t even really like. Sometimes we say yes to plans or make commitments to things we don’t really want to do. We fall for the status symbol that is being “crazy busy” leaving no margin in our lives.

We take on inherited or passed down beliefs without examining them for ourselves. When these beliefs don’t align with the still, small voice within, it causes angst. 

Impulsivity

We make purchases on a whim or buy temporary fixes for our wardrobe or home, and are left with items we no longer want or need.

We overeat from boredom or because we crave comfort. We make life decisions in low or weak moments and are left to pick up the pieces of regret. 

The reality of clutter is it gives us an opportunity to practice self-awareness. Knowing who you are and how you want to show up in the world makes it easier to set boundaries around what you will and won’t keep in your life. 

Reasons We Ignore Clutter

As you can see, clutter can show up in many ways and in all areas of our lives. 

It’s so much easier to stay in the comfort of the familiar, even if we wish circumstances were different. In our humanness, our tendency is to live with the clutter until the thought of that existence is more unbearable than the idea of change. 

My hope is that clutter becomes far less overwhelming as we remove the shame barrier and view it as a kind and caring guide, so we can experience what I’ve coined The Clutter Effect™.

How to Identify the Root Causes of Clutter

As I’ve mentioned, clutter isn’t bad. In fact, it can be used as a tool for transformation. When we finally reach for that tool, we will experience the growth clutter can usher in. I’ve summed up the transformative process of getting to the root causes of clutter into the acronym RISE UP:

• Recognize clutter
• Identify the cause
• Sit with the emotions
• Examine the old stories, erroneous beliefs, or behavior patterns
• Uncover the facts/truth
• Put the truth into practice and watch The Clutter Effect™ unfold. 

Let me give you an example from my own life. 

Recognize the clutter: I let certain types of laundry sit in the laundry basket, unwashed for months on end until the day I saw it for what it was: clutter. Not just physical clutter, but mental and emotional clutter as well. 

Every time I saw that pile of laundry, I’d tell myself I needed to wash it. And every time, I felt like a failure because I hadn’t washed it yet. Not having these clothing items clean also meant sometimes not having an item I really wanted to wear, keeping me from wearing an outfit that reflected my style and boosted my confidence. That’s a lot of clutter coming from one seemingly small pile of laundry. 

Identify the surface cause: When I realized how this laundry pile was affecting me, I finally took a moment to ask myself why I let it sit undone. My answer was overwhelm, but overwhelm is just what sits at the surface. There’s a root cause hiding under it. 

Sit with the emotion: I accepted the overwhelm without self-judgment or criticism. Then, I got curious and kept asking questions until I got to the root of it. 

• Why does this particular pile of laundry overwhelm me, especially when other types of laundry are no big deal?
• Because these items require special care and that intimidates me. 
• Why?
• I might ruin them. And if I ruin them, I’ll have to replace them. 
• Why does replacing them concern me? 
• I can’t afford to replace an item, or I may not find another item I like as much. A-ha! I just identified the culprit: lack mentality. 

Examine the root cause: Now that I’d identified this story of lack mentality, I dug a little deeper.

Where did it come from? 

Why do I hold this belief?

In my case, it came from the early days of my childhood when my parents had little. I internalized the idea that resources were limited. There is no blame in that. It was just the circumstances. 

Uncover the facts: I asked myself if these circumstances are still true. The answer: no. 

If they’re not true, then what is? 

The truth is I probably won’t destroy the item. If I do, I probably will find something I like just as well, maybe even better, and I likely can afford to replace any items that get damaged in the wash. 

Put the truth into action: I get to remind myself of what is true every time I find myself avoiding special care laundry. The more I put it into practice, the more the truth takes root in my soul, replacing limiting beliefs and lack mentality. That is The Clutter Effect™.

The Clutter Effect™

To apply the Rise Up Method and experience The Clutter Effect™ in your own life: 

• Be aware. Practice mindfulness by paying attention to where you feel stuck, burdened, stressed, or overwhelmed. The more you do, the more you’ll start to recognize clutter in all its forms. 
• When you identify clutter, start examining it, asking yourself why until you feel you’ve reached the root issue. 
• Identify contributing shame stories, erroneous beliefs, or old behavior patterns. Acknowledge and process any emotions that arise. 
• Change the narrative. This is what I call renewing your mind. Hold onto what is true and rehearse that truth every time you catch yourself reverting to old stories and behavior patterns. 
• Then, watch the transformation happen. It usually doesn’t happen suddenly. The change is more of a gradual process with plenty of opportunity to practice. As you do, you’ll start to recognize the clutter and be able to course correct much sooner. 

Just remember to RISE UP:

• Recognize clutter
• Identify the cause
• Sit with the emotions
• Examine the old stories, error beliefs, or behavior patterns
• Uncover the facts/truth
• Put the truth into practice and watch The Clutter Effect™ unfold. 

Once you’ve incorporated this practice into your life, you’ll have more success decluttering and organizing. Eventually, you’ll feel less encumbered and notice your days are characterized by simplicity and ease.