Do you sometimes wonder why it’s so important to declutter? How exactly can you find joy in ditching your stuff? After all, you are discarding something that you have paid money for and spent time and efforts to buy. How can decluttering keepsakes – an item of immense emotional value help clear your mind and give you happiness?
Maybe you already know the answers to the above questions. And you understand the many tangible and intangible benefits of decluttering. But you still can’t bring yourself to declutter. Your kitchen cupboards are still overflowing with stuff you haven’t used in ages and your closet is overloaded with clothes that you don’t even like wearing. You probably would have tried decluttering many times by now but without any success.
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Clutter isn’t just a pile of some meaningless items. It’s rather a mountain of memories and tales that make you want to stick to it. Even if an item was bought on impulse, there is a story attached to it that makes it hard for you to let go.
If you believe that it’s your tendency to procrastinate or a lack of time that is stopping you from letting go of things, you might be in for a surprise.
Clutter is not a result of your negligence or procrastination habit or your hectic lifestyle. It’s rather a function of some psychological factors that make you want to hoard or hang on to useless items. There are some items that make you feel secure and others that remind you of a beautiful memory from your past that is hard to let go of.
There are many reasons why you find it so hard to let go of clutter:
1. Fear Of Decluttering The Past
Sometimes, your fear of letting go of the past is what’s stopping you from decluttering. You might own items that have had a huge impact on your life and the mere idea of decluttering them makes you feel like you are letting go of a part of yourself.
I remember how my Mom took years to get rid of the sewing machine that my maternal grandfather gave her as a wedding gift. Although she had stopped using it years ago (mostly because the machine had turned outdated and rusty), letting go wasn’t an option for her. She kept that sewing machine close to her heart even years after my grandfather’s death and never entertained any suggestions about decluttering it until 2 years ago.
2. ADHD Or Separation Anxiety
If you are someone who is suffering from ADHD, it may be a little hard for you to focus on decluttering for more than a few minutes which is why you don’t bother yourself to even start. And that is okay because it’s more important to be kind to yourself than getting rid of stuff in your house. But there are ways to make the best use of your attention span no matter how short it is. If you are unable to concentrate for more than 15 minutes, don’t try to overexert yourself beyond this point.
People with separation anxiety find themselves struggling to let go of stuff that isn’t serving any purpose in their lives. If you find yourself in this boat, you might feel a strange fear of missing out every time you are supposed to let go of something. This can happen due to reasons that are mostly psychological and sometimes emotional. Maybe you’re reluctant to part with an item because you think it might turn useful in future.
3. Unwillingness To Change
Decluttering calls for change. It requires you to play around with the stuff in your home and that is a huge change to make. Change, even if it’s a small one, needs you to step out of your comfort zone and get rid of anything that isn’t adding value to your life.
If you’re someone who is reluctant to make changed to their home, you would most likely find yourself putting off the task of decluttering for as long as possible. Maybe you’ve gotten comfortable with the looks of your home or you don’t want to play around with the spaces.
Whatever the reason, letting go of stuff bit by bit and letting yourself absorb the changes slowly and steadily can help you declutter your home without worrying much.
4. Owning Stuff Makes You Feel Secure
This is the most common reason why people hang on to clutter for years. You are always fearing that you may need an item someday even if it hasn’t been used in a long time. You probably don’t want to regret getting rid of it on a whim. And you certainly don’t want to find yourself running to the store to get a replacement for it.
You hold onto duplicates ‘just in case’ the original items get damaged or broken.
You can’t declutter the furniture in your house because ‘what if you buy a bigger home in future that would be spacious enough to keep all the extra furniture?’
You hang on to your baking dish, cake pan, loaf pan and muffin tin because you are hopeful to start baking real soon even though you haven’t done it in the last 5 years.
But the fact is that if you haven’t used an item in the last 1 or 2 years, you likely won’t be using it again. So getting rid of it might just be the smartest option to pick.
Understanding the psychology of why it’s hard for you to let go can help ease the process of decluttering. When you are able to confront your emotions, you give yourself the opportunity to deal with them in a healthy way. The most effective way to declutter is to know yourself and the psychology of why you have trouble letting go of things. And once you have done that, clutter would stop being a problem in your home.