Clutterbug - Real-Life Hacks and Tips to Declutter, Organize and Clean your Home Fast - Break Free from the Cycle of Mess and Stress with Julia Ubbenga | Clutterbug Podcast # 270

Episode Date: April 21, 2025

Do you ever feel like you're drowning in stuff... but you still don’t know how to let it go? In this episode, I sit down with the lovely Julia Ubbenga from Rich In What Matters — a minimalist mama of five who transformed her entire life by decluttering not just her home, but her heart, soul, and mind. We dive deep into why we hold onto clutter, how consumerism traps us emotionally, and what it really means to live an intentional, clutter-free life. Julia’s story is powerful — from $40K in debt and postpartum depression to building a simpler, calmer, more joyful life (with five kids, no less!). If you’ve ever held onto something out of guilt, or felt like your stuff is managing you, this episode will hit home. ✨ We chat about: The emotional side of decluttering Breaking the “stuff = love” mindset Why you’re not failing — you’re just overwhelmed Simple mindset shifts to stop the buying cycle Decluttering as self-worth and self-care How to get started when it all feels like too much 🌿 Connect with Julia: → Blog: https://richinwhatmatters.com → Instagram: @richinwhatmatters → Grab her book "Declutter Your Soul, Heart & Home" wherever books are sold! 👇 What’s ONE item you’re finally ready to release? Let’s start there. Leave it in the comments — I’m cheering you on     You can find more Clutterbug content here: Website: http://www.clutterbug.me YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clutterbug TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clutterbug_me Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/clutterbug_me/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Clutterbug.Me/   #clutterbug #podcast #mondaymotivation #intentionalliving RichInWhatMatters   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today I'm going to bring a little more zen and peace in your life while also getting you to make big progress. So instead of the tough love, I am going to bring some soft love. Are you ready for this? Make sure that you are taking action on something while you're listening. Don't just passively sit or watch, get up, do something that's going to make you proud. 30 minutes from now you are going to have learned, you're going to feel inspired, you're going to feel relaxed, and you're going to have something checked off your list. I am so excited to share with you today, Julie Abengay. She is the creator of Rich in What Matters. It's a blog and an Instagram

following that I am pretty addicted to because I'm trying to really break that cycle, that stuff makes me happy. I'm really good at decluttering. I'm not so great at realizing that I reward myself for that little hit of happiness and dopamine, but it's never long-lasting. And in fact, it does the opposite. So we are talking to Julia today, and she is going to share also her new book called Declutter Your Heart and Your Home, How Minimalist Life Yields Maximum Joy. You are in for a treat, because she is zen and relaxed, but also filled with incredible wisdom and actual steps that you can take to get ahead right now. So hi, Julia. Welcome to the Clutterbug podcast. I'm so excited to have you. Thanks so much for having me, Cass. It's good to be here. This is really exciting. I got a

copy of your book. I'm already feeling calmer and I'm only one chapter in. Well, thank you. It's so good. And what I love is you talk about, your struggle, I think almost with consumerism or this trap that we fall into. So because you start there in your book, I would love to start there with you. Can you share a little bit about, I highlighted this thing that you said. It was like, if adulting, if this was adulting, we could play this game and win. Right. Yeah, we weren't winning at all. No. Yeah. So I'm an unlikely minimalist. I haven't always been one really far from it. I grew up close to my grandma, and my grandma loved to shop. She would buy stuff whether she needed or not, whether she had the money or not. She would just buy things because that's what she loved to do. And it was her love language to give gifts. And so I would stroll the malls with my grandma. And I soon learned from her that shopping was fun. It was a way to feel good. It was a way not to feel bad, to cover up hard feelings. In this mindset, it came with me into my 20s. I started making money and I started spending money. And pretty soon I had

all this stuff and $40,000 worth of credit card debt, so much consumer debt. And when I thought about the debt, I felt bad. But when I felt bad, then I'd go buy something new because that's what I thought would make me feel good and make me feel happy. And so I was caught up in this cycle of spending, buying, and it went about until the time our second daughter was born. And I was working outside the home as a speech language pathologist at the time, but I always wanted to stay at home. That was my dream to stay at home with our kids. and my husband, he got a promotion at the time. I could stay home. I was so excited. But I really had this idealic vision of what stay-at-home mom life would be like. I thought we would be, you know, baking cookies,

giggling over tea parties, like in my mind, it was just going to be great. But about two weeks into this stay-at-home mom gig, I wouldn't have even called myself a stay-at-home mom. I would have said a stuff manager, a full-time stuff manager, would have been a better title because that is what I did. I was constantly looking for things and cleaning things and picking things up and tripping over things I hadn't picked up yet. And it was just all consuming. It was exhausting. I was stressed, distracted. I think I was there, but I wasn't really there. I couldn't really be present to the people around me. And I was just overwhelmed. So a couple months into living this way, I was diagnosed with postpartum depression. And well, my faith at the time was something I really leaned into

And so I have this memory of this morning where I was reading the Bible and a couple of verses jumped off the page at me. And they said, your life does not consist of possessions, be rich in what matters. So I paused right there. I was like, am I rich in what matters? Am I rich in relationships? Time for a hobby that I loved? And the answer was no. Absolutely not. I was not. So that planted to see that something in my life around the area of possessions needed to change. But I didn't know what. I didn't know where to go from there. That same week, I had a therapy appointment, and at the end of the session, just as I was leaving, the therapist, she said, Julia, have you ever heard of minimalism?

I'm like, oh, you mean houses with white walls next to nothing in them? And she's like, no, there's more to it than that. Look into it. I think you might be interested. And so I was super curious. I just did a Google search as soon as I got to the car and realized there's a lot of resources out there about minimalism. So I started reading books and blogs about it.

I listened to podcast about it. And this idea that I didn't need all this stuff to be happy. And in fact, I'd be a whole lot happier with less of it because then I'd have more time and intention and energy to focus on who and what mattered. It was a mindset shift that was life-changing. And it finally gave me a vision of how to get out from all this stress and anxiety that I was feeling at the time. And so I went all in on minimalism.

I started a blog at the time. I called it Rich in What Matters, based on that verse that's spoke to me. And we let go of 75% of our stuff over the course of the first year. And then we downsized to an apartment for a couple of years and got rid of all our consumer debt. And then we built our own intentionally smaller new home. And so we've been living this way for six years now as a minimalist family. And we have five kids ages 11, 7, 4, 2, and two months. So yeah, so we are. Congratulations on the new baby. That's amazing. Yeah, thank you. So that's my or I'm an unlikely minimalist, but I've learned that you can just have an abundant life without

an abundance of stuff. Yeah. Oh, man. That speaks to me. I am definitely not a minimalist. I'm more of a maximalist. No, I'm not. But I've learned the life-changing magic of tidying up, as Marie Kondo would say, just having less stuff absolutely had a huge impact on my happiness and my time and where I put my energy, my stress levels. But I will say that as great as I am at decluttering, I'm not so great. I'm getting better, but not great at the not accumulating. And I think this is such an ingrained thing. So if you're listening to this podcast, you're thinking, oh, you're drawn to it. You're like, yes, this sounds so nice. And yet, I don't know if I can do it. I want to say that your consumerism, if you want to say, is

not your fault. This is something that is ingrained in us. I remember as a child going and visiting my grandmother or we would go out with my mom's friends and shopping was a part of that. It's like, let's go coffee and shopping. You're having a bad day. Let's treat yourself to something new. You did something well. Let's reward you with a gift. The happiest time of the year, Christmas, let's give each other presents. It's your birthday. Let's say. Let's say, celebrate with more things. And so the narrative we have lived with our entire life is that new stuff equals joy, happiness, rewards, but also it's how we show love. It's how we receive love. And this is a hard cycle to break. Absolutely it is. Just hearing you talk, I was thinking I was in a

store the other day and walking by that rack of gift cards that they have. And just one of them said, here, retail therapy, you know, $100 at such and such a store. And like, yeah, retail therapy. It's like, give somebody the gift of a gift card so they can go buy something else. And it's just the culture we live in, you know, the average American home now has over 300,000 items in it. We're not made demanded to that much stuff. And we're living at a time in a culture that has more stuff than any society in the history of the world. And I think, like you said, the culture we live in is what is fueling that.

And what I've noticed too a bit with decluttering is that you can get rid of things, but it also can give you a dopamine rush just like buying something new can. And so I got caught up for a little bit in that decluttering, buying it back cycle. And I think that's why I really love this book and why I focused on inner decluttering too, because if you're dealing with inner clutter, like comparison, for example, if you declutter stuff and then you see stuff, stuff on social media or what your neighbor has and you're like, oh, I need that too. Then you're going to go and you're going to buy it back and you're really never going to feel that freedom that decluttering can bring you because you're still stuck in that cycle. That's so good. I want to deep dive because you talk about decluttering the soul, the heart, the mind. I want to deep dive into that. But I do want to hear your thoughts on something that I find really fascinating right now,

helping other people declutter. Something I hear over and over and over again is this guilt and shame of letting go of things that were given to us because we really are wired to see gifts as love. We give gifts to show someone we love when we receive a gift, even though it's something they bought at Walmart. Listen, it's a piece of plastic that they bought at Walmart. It feels like that's their love. Why?

How did this happen? How do we show and receive love with tokens? And now to declutter, there's like we're confused. Our brain is like mingled that it feels like we're giving away the love. This is a real struggle. Real struggle. I think we have to realize, first of all, that we're doing that, that we are, that we think this thing, you know, represents love and that we have to hold on to it to hold that love. we don't. A person who really loves us is going to want what's best for us. And if that is letting go of something they gave us, then they're going to be okay with that. So I think we just have to have this awareness first that, oh, we are doing this. And then just realize that the love has been given, has been shown once the gift has been given, we don't need to hold on to it anymore. Once it's

yours, you're free to do what you want with it. Yeah, that's really good. talking to my friends and family openly about this was really helpful to me. So saying to my stepmom, I'll never forget this, I hate that we're caught up in the buying gifts and that you feel it necessary to show how much you love your grandkids with gifts. Can we show love with adventures instead? Can we? And as soon as I said this, she was like, that feels so much better. But there's this expectation that we have to buy a gift to show love. But when we really, like, let's talk about it. Let's just open the narrative and say, what else can we, hey, I know it's your birthday coming up.

I feel like I need to buy you a present. But I also feel like I don't want to contribute to more stuff in your home. Is there some way I can show you love? Like, is there something else we can do? Do you want to go to a concert? Can we go out for dinner together? Can we see a movie? And as soon as we start changing the narrative, that's where we gain our power back, I think.

Absolutely. We do have that power. We do have that power. People want to show us love, but it doesn't have to be with stuff. Once we give them ideas and permission not to, then they won't. You know, it can take a little while for me, for the grandparents. It took a couple years for them to really realize that I had changed my ways. I wasn't buying a whole bunch of stuff and I didn't want them to buy a whole bunch of stuff anymore for myself or my kids. But once they realized that I was serious and if they brought stuff into my house, I'd probably donate it. You know, they caught on and they started doing the experience gifts and the zoo passes and the climate coffee, those type of things. And what was really beautiful was two Christmases later.

It was, there was resistance at first, but two Christmases later, my stepmom said, this is my best Christmas gift that she receives was giving my children. She would just go away with them for a weekend in a hotel and that hotel would have water slides and they would just hang out and that was their Christmas gift and she's like it is my favorite it is it is her gift as well but it's it's it's tough to change old habits it's it's difficult to like break a cycle that we've been born into that we've always done but it's such a beautiful thing when we can help each other and that's what this is about like all of us are in this trap yes let's talk about it more let's help each other break this cycle of stuff equals happy and stuff

equals love. Let's give each other permission that you can live a different way. And that's a lot of what I wanted to do in this book to show you that there is a lighter way, a different way to live and just kind of raise that awareness around that too. Yeah. So let's talk about laying the foundation, decluttering the soul. Then you talk about decluttering the main floor, which is the heart, decluttering the upstairs, which is the mind. I've never heard this like concept before. And I love this because it's not just your stuff. It's like decuttering all of you. Explain this to me like I'm five. Okay. Well, yeah, like you said, the book, it is divided into three sections. It parallels a journey through an outer home and an inner home. So like you said, it's laying the foundation, decluttering the soul. Then you're journeying up through the home to the main floor. You're decluttering the main floor, letting go of the heart. An example chapter here would be decluttering your wardrobe and letting go of comparison. Then you go on up to part three to decluttering the upstairs and the mind. An example chapter here would be decluttering sentimental items. letting go of fear. So what I realized as I was decluttering my unneeded physical items is that I was

actually curating two homes, an outer home and an inner home. And so the outer one housed my possessions. But the second, the home of my soul housed my inner world. And so I started imagining what did my inner home look like. And what I realized was that it was just as cluttered as my outer home. And I actually visualized it with like an inner home with all these boxes and boxes. And they had these labels on them of things like fear and distraction and comparison and hurry and restlessness and reactivity. Those are the ones that I talked about in the book. And what I realized was that if I kept all this inner clutter, I wasn't going to really feel freedom once I had even decluttered my outer world because I was still weighed down by this inner stuff. And so I needed tools to uproot those

type of things from my life too. And so I do think that your environment sometimes can serve as a lens to your inner environment and not that you should look at it in like a shitting way or a judgmental way. That's not helpful at all. But I think maybe just more of a curious and observing way, like, what is my home reflecting back to me? Is it chaos? Is it distraction? Is it peace? Is it calm? and then are those accurate descriptors of my inner home as well. Did you find decluttering emotional in the beginning? Like were you like crying as you were putting things in the in the in the donate bag? Or were you like instantly empowered?

I feel like this is the two kind of sides that we get. We get like the like, oh my gosh, it's so emotional. I can't stop crying. Or it's like the yeah, let's get it out. Empowering. And I think everyone eventually gets to the let's get. it out. But where did you start? Which sort of side were you on? Oh, that's a great question. I love that. I think I was kind of in the middle because it depended on what I was letting go of. Some stuff was

just, I was so empowered. The kitchen stuff was letting go of it. And I could finally manage my kitchen. It felt lighter. But then there was the kid stuff. I was trying to donate these toys that just made me remember playing with our daughter with these different things. And then the sentimental items were really hard and emotional too. But so I think it just kind of depended on what I was decluttering. I want to take a second to let you know that this Saturday coming up is National Get Organized Day. So this is the perfect week to plan an organizing project, get something off your to-do list, and I recommend dealing with the paper. We just filed our taxes. It's such a good time of year to set up a paper organizing system. And you can use incredible products by Mind Reader to set up a system

that is made for how your brain naturally works, for how you naturally pile your papers, whether you need them up on the wall, or you want a desk organizing system to get those horizontal hidden piles vertical and visual. Mind Reader has a ton of different options. And it's designed to work smarter, not harder, which is something I love. So if you're looking for really affordable, simple, but intuitive solutions that seem to read your mind, you have to check out mind reader products. They have a lot of them on Amazon, or you can go to mindreaderproducts.com and check out their huge selection of organizing solutions. Again, that's mindreader products.com. So my listeners at home who, I mean, we all know,

we all want less, but it's really, really hard to get started. I want to talk about something that I'm really passionate about and get your insight. You're so Zen over there. So I feel like you're going to give us some like real chill, cool Zen insight. I love it. There is a scarcity cycle. And I lived in poverty for a really long time. So there was always this feeling of stuff felt safe and money didn't. And so I would buy things when I had the money because I might not have the money tomorrow or next week. And as I'm letting go, it was really hard for me in the beginning because it felt like I was letting go of money and that forced the stuff and I'd wasted it and that felt very unsafe. That felt like, oh my gosh, like it was like a security blanket that I was surrounding my stuff.

Well, if things got really bad, at least I have all this stuff. Right. Which is very difficult to overcome. And I think we do have to do so. we have to change the narrative in our mind as we're letting go. Do you have advice for my listeners on how to get more zen about it and change the thought of like, I bought this candle from Walmart? I hate the smell, but it was $24.

Why did I spend so much on a candle? This is $24 I'm throwing in the garbage. How do we change that narrative? Well, I'm smiling over here because the first thing I think of is actually a quote from you and you are quoted in the book. I don't know if you've gone that far yet. I haven't. Yeah, you're in the wardrobe's chapter. But I'm going to quote you. I'm going to say, you said, remember that the money you spent on that item is gone. You're not any richer if you store this item in your home. And you're not any poorer if you let it go. And so that is the reframe that we need.

And that helped me out so much when I was decluttering my wardrobe because I saw all this stuff with the price tags on it still. I'm like, that is just money that I am wasting. And I know I'm not going to wear that, but I spent good money on that, so I have to hold on to it. And hearing this quote, I was just like, it was an aha moment. I'm like, wow, no, the money is already gone. I've already thrown that money away. It doesn't make a difference whether I donate this or keep this. So I think when we make that mindset shift, it can really let us, allow us to let go of things and not think that they're not, they're not money. The money's gone. I love that. Yeah, I know. I know I said it, But I forget sometimes, you know.

It is. It's changing our thought patterns. And we can do that through repetition. Just repeating the same thing, even if we don't believe it at first, just really repeating the same thing. For me, I was emotional when I first started decluttering. And what I had to do was fake the empowerment part. So I spent a lot of time saying, my happiness is worth more than this.

I would literally pick, I'm going to look, I have shampoo for some reason. on my desk, I would pick something up and I would feel that twinge of, oh, what if I run out of shampoo and I should use this up first or maybe I could use this for cleaning the toilet? It would be such a waste to just put this in the garbage and you can't donate a half a bottle of shampoo and my mind's going crazy. And I would have to stop and say, listen, your happiness, I'm worth more than you. I don't care what you cost. A little bit of peace is worth more than you. I am better than you. I am and then I'm like, you know, getting fired up and I'm crying for some reason as I'm telling this bottle of shampoo that I'm better than it. Because it feels really hard sometimes to love yourself like that, to stand up for yourself like that, to feel like I deserve better.

Yes. Because deep down inside, I think sometimes we think we deserve the mess and chaos. That's a little bit. And so you are just like, poor in love. Look at you. And Zen, how can we have more of that? Were you always Zen? I'm asking a lot of questions.

No, I wasn't. Like six years ago, before I got into minimalism, no. I was a totally different person. I have a chapter called decluttering kids' toys and decluttering reactivity. That's one of the chapters because you'll see at the beginning, I used to throw toys. I would stuff kids' clothes in the trash so I didn't have to fold them anymore. No, I was a reactive person. I have changed so much from just being able to get the mess out, the clutter out, and focus

on what matters. It's changed me a lot. Yeah. All minimalists are so zen. Listen, I want a piece of this. I want a piece of your chill. I declutter a lot, but maybe I haven't decluttered enough to feel super zeny and chill. And I think it's the mind thing for me. I don't, my first thought is not what can I focus on that makes me happy. My first thought is what can I do today to make me happy, you know? Dole me, don't with me, don't with me, don't me, don't me. Sure, some of that's ADHD.

So let's talk about decluttering the mind and soul. And what is your tips for being more chill and Zen? Well, I would say, so in the mind section, one of the areas that I go into is decluttering reactivity. And so what I've learned is that when I react or when I'm triggered, what I need to do is pause and put space in between the trigger and my response. So I have learned different ways and I have different tools that I've developed when I'm at home that I can just get myself back into that rest or digest nervous system state, not the fighter flight mode. So I can get out of fighter flight. And the tool that I use is called the happy box. And it's just this little box that has things in it that really will reset your nervous system. And so they usually engage the senses.

They can be like essential oils that you smell or drawing, coloring, maybe a little piece of candy. or a cold rock. You can put that on your neck right here to stimulate the vagus nerve and to have a relaxation response. And then I learned things, too, that I could do if I couldn't go get that little box, you can sing, you can pretend to gargle. Those are all things that will reset your nervous system. And so I think that just having those tools and being so on top of, okay, I'm starting to feel triggered. I'm going to do this instead. And that has made such a change also in the way my kids are in the home. There's so much calmer if I'm calmer, it's like we have one nervous system, honestly. And so it's just helping the people around me and helping me just to be able to live

more deeply and more calmly to. I mean, yeah, I still get riled up at times. I'm human, but now I have some tools that I know how to kind of bring it back down if I need to. Oh, I love the happy box. That's so good. Oh, I love that so much. I was just at a conference this past weekend and someone talked also about how, having an anchor. So something, whether it's a bracelet or something on them that they look to when they want to, it's decluttering the reactivity. Look at you, you smarty pants. It's like decluttering that space from one moment to the next to give you pause, to give you breathing room, just like when my shelf behind me is way too cluttered. It's taking some things off.

It's sort of doing that to your brain as well. So you have that space. in between to like compose yourself. At first I was counting to five, but then I found myself doing this in stressful situations. One, two, three, four, five. One, two, three, five. One, two, three, five. Less than helpful. I'm going to skip right to the chapter for you of decluttering upstairs, the mind to work on decluttering my reactivity. So, so good. Okay, what's your favorite part of your new book? My favorite part of my new book. I don't know if I knew that that before. Oh, I'm so sorry. I'm putting you on the spot. Oh, no, it's fine. You did send me a list of questions, but listen, friend.

Well, let me think of one. I'll tell you one. I'll tell you one of my favorites. Mine was the chapter on letting go. I think it's chapter four, because what I found is that I was really attached to my stuff when I was trying to let go of it at first. And I realized I needed to shift the way that I was seeing it. And again, my faith played a role in this too. but what I realized was that our stuff here is really temporary. It is not what matters most. And that the things of the world can be good. They can be beautiful, but the truly good, the truly beautiful. They belong to a higher world.

And so I can sense the goodness and beauty in these things, but none of them lasted. And so I started viewing my stuff more as transient passing things like fireworks or bubbles or ocean waves. So things that you could observe in a moment, but then you could let them go. And none of it was really what mattered in the first place. And so I love that chapter four about letting go and just shifting the way we're seeing our stuff that we don't need to attach from it. We can detach from it. And then that can actually help us let it go.

Oh, yes. Okay. I love asking minimalist this. So I'm going to listen, I'm putting you on the spot. Go for it. Is there something that you have too much of? Come on, come on. Yeah, plants.

I have too many plants. I don't know that there's such a thing, though, as too many plants. I don't think there is. So I have a lot of plants, but not too many plants. And also, can you be a minimalist and still have a lot of stuff? I mean, is minimalist a, what's the real definition? Is it like not having too much or is it not having what doesn't matter question mark? Yeah.

I don't think it's ultimately really even about our stuff. It's more about just making space for the things that actually matter by letting go of the things that don't. And that can be our stuff, but that can be our thought patterns. That can be our calendar commitments. So it's not having too little, but not having too much either so that you can focus on the things that really matter. I think I want to be a minimalist, but I think I want to identify as a minimalist, but not in the way that I want like a stark white. I love throw pillows. I'm just going to say it.

You can have throw pillows. I recently decorated for Easter. I opened up. I have two bins just for Easter. That is not minimalist. But hear me out. Okay. I put my bunnies all over my house.

not like a hoarder's amount, but more than a minimalist amount. And I put out some new spring throw pillows. They're not new, but they're from my bin. I'm getting better just using the covers. Stay with me here. I have a point. And I walked into my living room and I feel like, makes me really happy to change up my space a little bit,

to have something new that I find beautiful to look at. And then in the summer, I'll do a little swap out again. And that is a very anti-minimalist thought. Everything I see, it's like don't engage and indulge in that type of stuff. But the truth is, that makes me very happy. And because I don't have a lot of other clutter, it's those seasonal things that pop to me. And I'm able to really see them. So give me permission, friend. you have complete permission to keep what gives you joy. Absolutely. Yeah, and it's because you don't have a lot of other clutter that that stuff could really pop and give you joy. I think if your house was completely cluttered, then you wouldn't really notice it as much and love it as much. And you wouldn't notice those subtle changes in your environment like that. And obviously, decorations don't bring everyone joy. Is there something in your home that you look at and feel that like joy? Or are you getting it from something? something else? Is there something else that gives you that, oh, I'm so, I just love this. I do think our homes can be an expression of ourselves, though, and I like that idea. So I think

that my home does bring me joy when I look at it. I love the plants. I love the natural colors, like the browns and the whites and like the wood that I've brought in into the home. Like, that's grounding for me to have those earthy things in the home. I love that. There's a time our walls were white for a while, and I didn't like that. I needed to get some pictures up on it, pictures of our family, things that were more meaningful to me. So yeah, I don't think it's about just, you know, making the house as bare as possible by any means. I think it's about making it a reflection of you, but not a cluttered, cluttered space or you won't be able to enjoy what you've put in it. I met someone this past weekend. She was a doctor, a therapist,

and she came up to me and said, I don't like decorating. She was almost like shameful about it. because she watches my content and she said, and I, I don't know, like, you talk about your home should be a place that brings you joy and happy, but it doesn't matter. All I care about is smell. She's like, all I care about is I walk in and when my house smells like oranges, I'm like, ah, when my house smells like, sometimes I'm like doing jasmine or like lavender. I'm like, well, that's the same but different. Like, it doesn't always have to be what it looks like aesthetically. it could be the sound, the music that's playing in the background, or the smell. I do think that there are ways that we can get that feeling every time we walk into our living

room or kitchen without it having to be about what it looks like. I agree completely. And I love changing up things like that, like the smell for different seasons. Like maybe you're putting your funny decorations out and maybe, you know, I'm changing up the different smell in the home for Easter or for Christmas for sure. sure, when you get into the later months, but I think you can definitely change the feel of your home in other ways than adding more possessions to the home. And do you also agree, I'm a big component of this. Your home is such, like, it's like a foundation for your life. So as you can see, I'm a hot mess,

okay, but I was a really big hot mess. And the only thing I focused on first was getting my house under control, basically just decluttering, decluttering, and then organizing. And it affected the other areas that I wasn't even trying to work on. And that, to me, I felt like that was the ultimate life hack. Like, I could do this one thing and everything else improves instead of having to focus on improving everything. Does this make sense? Like my finances got better and I started saving more money and my relationships got better and I was I had more time and I was happier bonkers bizarre. How does this work and did you have the same experience? Absolutely. I think I think that putting your life in order by putting your home in order, it was one of the most healing things that you can do.

And you talked about more time. You get so much more time and then you can invest that time and things that actually matter. There's one study, I think, that said that by decluttering your home, you get 40% or you save 40% of the time spent on housework. So you're doing 10 hours of housework a week. Now you get four of those back simply by owning less stuff. And so that's so much time, extra four hours a week that you can invest in actually looking at your finances and knowing where your money's going or in your relationships with people or the things that actually matter. So yeah, definitely by putting your house in order, you can feel like you just have more control and more time and more peace in your life.

My friends listening at home right now, they better be up doing something and not just passively. They better be doing dishes, laundry, decluttering something. Let's inspire them right now. So they're looking around their house and they're not feeling right now. They're feeling ah right now. What is something they can do in this moment that you recommend to jumpstart them forward? They are listening to this podcast. They are stressed.

They want to just fast forward to you. I want to be zen tomorrow. Can I just push a button and jump ahead? No, no, friends, you can't. But we can take a hop forward. What can they do right now? I would say that one thing you could do for a quick win as you're listening is go declutter the front of your fridge.

And the reason I say this is because there was a study done at UCLA that showed that the amount of things you have on your fridge often reflects the amount of clutter in your home. And so the average fridge had, I think, 52 items on it. And what you can do is, yeah, and so if you can take the things off your fridge, maybe keep it one or two of your favorites, then that sets the tone for the rest of your home. You see your fridge all the time. And that can be just a reminder that, hey, I am not going to live a cluttered life anymore. I am going to make a difference in my home. And then you can start, you know, 15 minutes a day, just every day. doing some decluttering. And you're right, it doesn't happen overnight. But when you're consistent,

15 minutes a day adds up to seven and a half hours a month, which is 90 hours a year. You can get so much done in 90 hours. So those small, consistent efforts, they lead to those big changes. So start with the fridge and then every day, just a little bit, 15 minutes. Okay. This is good because what my visual listeners are going to say is, but I have important things on the fridge, but what I'm going to challenge them and say, is you can't even see those important things because there's every magnet from every place you've ever been and there's photos and there's kids' artwork and there's things that you don't have to remember that you did that has already passed. And all of that is taking away and making you blind to the important things anyways.

Your fridge is such a good place to start. Oh, yes. Get it right now, friends. Get in there. So if their fridge is clear, I'm going to put you on the spot because you are good. Is there another space where we can get a quick win that took, like, because I'm, I'm feeling pumped. I'm going to be a minimalist. I just need to take one foot in front of the other step.

Is there another spot that we can do for a quick win? No pressure or nothing. Just save our lives here. Man, there's lots of spots you could go next. I don't even go to your purse. Your purse gets so cluttered easily or a diaper bag, depending on what season of life you're in. It just fills up with all the spots. random stuff, receipts and paper, and you don't even probably know what's in there. So it's something

that you use, though, every day and you see it all the time. And so it'll make a difference. If you can go declutter that, you will feel lighter just by having more order in that little purse of yours. Yes. I'm done. Mine's filled with so many receipts crunkled up for some reason. I'm really trying to go like, when someone hands me, I'm like, I don't need it. I don't need it. I don't need it. Because it will just become trash for six months into my purse until I donate the entire. bag and then just dump, you know, I do that. Like, this person is really bad. I should just donate it. It's bad. This is bad. It's a garbage bag with straps. So good. Inside your fridge is another. I was just thinking, we have leftovers for some reason that no one ever eats and expired things.

And, oh, how wonderful is it just to be able to put things in the trash without the shame and guilt because it's expired or it's bad and it kind of gets the juices flowing. Like you said, you're worth it. You're worth living in a home that supports you, not one that stresses you out. We weren't made for survival mode at all. So yes, take the steps now and you're worth it. I love this. All right, my friend, are you still decluttering on a regular basis or have you really got to the point where you have overcome the need to buy. And if you've overcome the need to buy, do you have tips for us at home who have not, who have an Amazon cart open on the computer right beside this tab right now? Yeah, well, I am decluttering on a regular basis because I have kids. And somehow they bring in so much that you don't know where it comes from. And so, yes, I am decluttering. I have a bag in our hall closet. I call it, though, what if we didn't own this bag? And so I, I,

I'm constantly grabbing things from the home and putting them in there. And if nobody asks for them, they're not important things. They're just like the random happy meal toys, those type of stuff. Nobody asks for them, then they get donated. But yeah, I would say I've overcome the need to buy. I buy when I, you know, need things. One thing that's helped me is to change my language from saying that I need this to I want this. Just try that on when it's when you're about to buy something like, oh, I need this new pair of jeans.

Well, I actually already have three that are going to be. great. So I want this new pair of jeans. Okay, yes, I do want this new pair of jeans. And so then that can, you know, that can shift our behavior when we shift our language. And also I think, you know, pausing before spending, it's kind of nice to have a guideline too, maybe for every $50 something costs, wait 24 hours. So if it's going to be a $100 purchase, wait 48 hours. That'll just give you, you know, a little bit more time to actually process your, if you're really needed or not. And if you really want to invest in that or not. That's so good. 24 hours for every $50. Wow. I mean, that's a rule I can get behind. Absolutely. This is something I've been trying to do is

the wait a day. So I'll see something and I'm like, oh, I love this. I'm like, you know what? If I still love it tomorrow, I'll treat myself to it. And I know. And I know. never want it tomorrow. Bizarre. Or very rarely. Right. Yeah. I'm doing that with my kids right now, too. They'll ask me for things, but I'm making them wait like a week. And by the time a week's past, they're asking me for something else. I'm like, huh, good thing we didn't get that other thing that you wanted a week ago. Yeah. That's a really good rule that you can follow is like in the moment you see it. Yeah, yes, you can have this, but only if you still want it tomorrow. Because 99% of the we'll forget we even wanted that thing. But the one time we still want it, we know that that's

worth it. And it even feels more special because we're going back or we're, or, you know, because we've had that pause. Oh, that's such good advice. I love that. That just gives us that pause, that decluttering reactivity. Oh, I feel zenner already. Okay. How can my listeners first follow you to learn more and just become part of your community and also how can they order your new book declutter your heart and your home so you can find me on my blog rich and what matters.com I'm on Instagram at rich and what matters and then the book is available anywhere books are sold your favorite bookstore you can go grab it there. Oh thank you so much. You're so you're so relatt you're just like ah it feels nice.

You should do meditation. You could just talk to me while I sleep and be like, you don't need the stuff. Stop going to the store. And I'll be like, yeah. I'll make a tape for you. How about that? I need it. I need that.

I need some of your Zen energy. It's lovely. It's been so lovely talking to you. I'm feeling so inspired. I hope my friends at home have cleared off the fridge, have gone through their purse or diaper bag, and are doing these small little wins because it is repetition. that builds skill. That's really the secret to life.

You're never good at first. Just keep doing it. You'll get better. It will get easier. And one day we're going to wake up and we're going to be like Julia, just chilling with our plants, feeling nothing but love and lightness and happiness with five freaking kids. Exactly.

Look at your zenness. You're like, yeah, I got an army of small children. But like, my house smells like. whispers in happiness. I love it. I love it so much. Thank you so, so much for being here. And thank you everyone at home for listening. I hope you're feeling inspired.

I'm going to put links in the show notes so that you can follow. And, of course, order this incredible book. Thank you so much. And I'll see you guys next time.