Clutter Procrastination : 4 strategies to Get Your Life Together
Has clutter taken over your home, your workplace, and your life?
Do you feel overwhelmed by the thought of cleaning your home or arranging your belongings?
Do you have a love-hate relationship with your stuff ? You still feel overburdened by them, but have a hard time letting go.
Procrastination is the most likely culprit in your cluttered and disorderly environment. You may be experiencing “clutter procrastination”.
I will provide you with four highly effective strategies that I personally used and have had a tremendous effect on my clutter procrastination.
In this article, you’ll also learn about the connection between clutter and procrastination, the detrimental effects of clutter on your mental and physical health, and we’ll go through some science. Finally, you’ll get your promised 4 proven strategies that, if used properly, may change your relationship with clutter for good.
So, keep reading.
Table of Contents
The clutter dilemma
According to the dictionary, clutter is defined as “a lot of objects in a state of being messy” and “a condition of disorder, or a lot of objects that are in a state of disorder.”
Clutter has become increasingly prevalent and problematic nowadays. With the predominance of consumerism culture, we are acquiring more stuff than ever before in the history of mankind. Compulsive shopping and hoarding are some of the new manifestations of this culture.
Not only are we buying more than ever before, the stuff we collect needs to be stored in a limited space. In addition to that, we are having a harder time getting rid of things. We are over-attached to our belongings and have a hard time letting go.
We have to clean and organize our space on a daily basis. This, coupled with our hectic schedule and inclination to multitask, often leads to chronic stress and procrastination.
We often become overwhelmed by the daily chores to keep the clutter at bay and fulfill all of the demands placed upon us. It is a daily endeavor. Your house may turn into a giant mess if you sit back for a day or two.
Clutter doesn’t take a vacation, but our energy is a finite resource. So, we all tend to procrastinate when it comes to folding our clothes or cleaning the floor. These chores seem very boring, tedious, and sometimes daunting.
Your house was spotless two days ago, but you know that in order for it to stay that way, you need to keep putting things in order, doing the laundry, cleaning the dishes, folding the clothes … It seems like an endless cycle.
It is no wonder we all tend to procrastinate on house chores. Nobody gets excited by folding his underpants or arranging the cutlery in the drawer.
Clutter is part of nature’s own trend toward disorder. It is the second law of thermodynamics or “entropy”. Things have a natural tendency towards chaos and disorder, unless an external factor intervenes to reverse this process.
The negative effects of clutter
It is quite easy to understand why clutter may have a detrimental effects on your mood and overall wellbeing.
Have you noticed how well you feel when your house is clean and tidy and your office is well organized? You have a sense of focus, relaxation, and general wellbeing.
In contrast, a messy environment has negative effects on our mental and physical health. It increases stress and anxiety and affects our motivation and productivity.
Clutter has been associated with an increase in the stress hormone “cortisol”, particularly among women.
Clutter has also been linked to compulsive behavior, such as overindulging in unhealthy food.
Apart from the psychological and physiological effects of clutter, your productivity will definitely suffer in a cluttered environment. You will be less able to focus when you live in a messy house, a disordered workplace, or even a untidy car.
In contrast, a tidy home has been linked to better mental well-being and physical health. Although the cause and effect need to be further investigated.
The burden of clutter is not just in your environment; it is also overburdening your mind and your whole life. “You are a product of your environment,” even without noticing it.
How is clutter linked to procrastination?
The answer to this question seems quite obvious.
Decluttering and organizing your environment should be an ongoing endeavor. If you leave your house or office without proper management, you’ll notice right away how stuff accumulates so quickly.
In that sense, it is simple to understand why procrastination is a major cause of clutter. You fail to immediately place things where they belong. You leave a stack of magazines on the side table, a screwdriver on the counter rather than in the toolbox, clothes on the floor, or toys scattered around.
In addition, going through and discarding objects is a chore that many individuals find unpleasant and often avoid. That’s why procrastination and clutter are very strongly related.
You can call it “clutter procrastination,” but it’s obviously one of the most prevalent forms of procrastination. Like most people, you may not like to fold your laundry or put your dirty dishes in the dishwasher, although you know you should do it.
Some types of problematic clutter have also been linked to perfectionism, which is in turn linked to procrastination, or like one article called it “the two big P’s of clutter: Procrastination and Perfectionism.“
Learn more about the association between perfectionism and procrastination here.
The Clutter-Procrastination loop explained
If you enter your friend’s house and witness clutter and disorder, you can have a good guess that he has some form of “clutter procrastination”.
The problem is that clutter and procrastination are heavily intertwined and linked by a vicious cycle that feeds off itself.
This loop tends to worsen your procrastination and aggravate the mess and clutter.
So, procrastination will make you avoid necessary tasks to tidy up your home, and your home gets messier and more disorganized.
The more cluttered your home is, the less likely you will have the motivation and willingness to clean it up. It becomes so overwhelming that you just abandon the whole endeavor.
In turn, the heavy clutter will affect you mentally and even physically, which will further hinder your productivity, increase your stress and anxiety levels, and lower your mood and wellbeing.
These mental effects have a direct influence on your self-control, so your procrastination will get worse and the last bit of motivation you may have gets crashed by the burden of these negative feelings and your lowered self-worth.
It is no surprise to me that when I see TV shows where chronic hoarders seem out of control and living in horrendous conditions, with mice and cockroaches all over the place.
Apart from the pathological aspect of what is known as “hoarding disorder”, the task of decluttering becomes so daunting and unbearable for these people that they end up choosing the easiest option, surrendering to the clutter.
What does research say about procrastination and clutter?
Many studies have found strong connection between procrastination and clutter.
A 2017 study found a strong correlation between the two, and showed that clutter frustration tends to get worse with age. Moreover, clutter has been associated with life dissatisfaction among older people.
A growing body of research shows that clutter can have a harmful impact on mental health, especially among women. Additionally, clutter can trigger a negative physiological reaction, including an increase in the stress hormone “cortisol”.
In these studies, women exhibited more psychological stress than men. Women are believed to be more prone than men to worrying about clutter and having unfinished chores.
Researchers at the University of Minnesota found that people who spent time in an unorganized room were twice as likely to choose a chocolate bar over an apple.
An Indiana University study found that tidy homes are more of a predictor for physical health than neighborhood walkability.
4 highly effective strategies to beat clutter procrastination:
I will provide you with 4 strategies that I personally used and have benefited me immensely, as they helped me beat my procrastination towards decluttering and organizing my home and workplace in a reliable and sustainable manner.
1. Buy mindfully
Compulsive shopping is one of the major factors contributing to clutter and the accumulation of stuff, usually stuff you don’t really need.
I wouldn’t urge you to live a minimalistic lifestyle, but let’s find a common ground between minimalism and hoarding.
So, one strategy that I discovered to be beneficial for both clutter and my wallet is to buy mindfully rather than compulsively.
So, one simple thing I do before buying something, especially when shopping online, is to ask myself two questions:
- Do I really need it?
- Don’t I have an alternative to it?
Before you buy, you should answer “yes” to both questions. If one or both answers is “No”, then you may want to reconsider your purchase.
2. Establish a "cleaning ritual":
Ritualizing and automating tasks is one of the best and most effective strategies to build good habits and beat your clutter procrastination. There is immense power in incorporating important tasks into your day-to-day routine.
Find a specific daily routine and incorporate your cleaning task into it. It may be when you wake up, right after dinner, or even when you come back from work.
What is important is to find an already established routine and include your chores in it. Now, if you plan a big cleaning or decluttering task that may take a lot of time, you can choose to implement it during your weekend. There is no excuse for you.
For me, my cleaning ritual starts when I come home from work. It seems counterintuitive to do that after a long, tiring day at work, but I learned to make it a ritual, so I really don’t feel the heaviness of the task. Here is my ritual:
At home → put off my clothes and place them in the closet → put on more comfortable clothes → put the dishes in the dishwasher → clean the table and position everything in its proper place → fold clothes and sheets → clean my cat’s litter → wash my hands → Now I can have my well-deserved hot milk-coffee with a banana 🤗
Usually, it takes me less than 30 minutes, but I try to do it every day.
We often exaggerate the time we spend organizing and cleaning our homes. It is understandable that cleaning or decluttering is not something you are excited to do, so the endeavor appears to last forever, as opposed to good moments that seem to go by so fast.
Thus, you should put your theory that cleaning up the mess is a time-consuming endeavor to the test. Use a stopwatch and find out how long it takes and how much you can get done.
You will often be surprised by how much you can achieve in a relatively short time, and you will also notice how much more focused, relaxed, and well you feel afterwards. It is definitely worth the effort.
You can also use a Pomodoro technique, which is, in my experience, one of the most effective anti-procrastination tools. The Pomodoro will set a specific time for your cleaning activity, followed by a period of rest. It will help with your productivity immensely.
4. Get rid of unnecessary items.
Procrastination is one facet of the clutter problem. Another aspect lies in your excessive and unreasonable attachment to your stuff. You are still in the mindset of:” I will need this later”.
You may be emotionally attached to your possessions. We all do towards certain things, but it is time to get rid of the unbearable heaviness of clutter. You should put your mental and physical wellbeing above the items you’re holding on to. You need to focus on the long-term benefit.
So set a specific time and go through your stuff; into the garage, into your basement, into your closet, or wherever they are stored. Then, for each item, ask yourself two simple questions:
Do I really need this?
When was the last time I used it?
These two questions will give you some insight into what you really need and what you can let go.
If it’s been years since you wore this pair of shoes that has been sitting in the closet, then maybe it is time to sell it or give it away.
Takeaways
Clutter has become increasingly prevalent and problematic nowadays, as people are acquiring more things than ever before in human history. Some people are also too attached to their belongings that it becomes very hard to let go.
Research has shown that clutter can cause mental and physical problems, especially for women.
Many studies have found a strong link between procrastination and clutter.
Some effective solutions would be to buy mindfully, to create a cleaning ritual, to set a timer or pomodoro for decluttering and to get rid of things you don’t need.
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About the author
My name is Sam David. I am the founder of "Proactivity Lab," a website that provides comprehensive strategies and resources for understanding and overcoming procrastination.
The website's resources are the culmination of more than 20 years of research and experience, during which I embarked on a long and gruelling journey of study and self-discovery.
Being a former procrastinator myself, it took me years of investigation and numerous trials and errors to gain a clear understanding of the underlying causes of procrastination and the most effective and scientifically supported strategies to permanently conquer the vicious cycle of procrastination.
I would like to share my knowledge with you, for free.
