Clutterbug - Real-Life Hacks and Tips to Declutter, Organize and Clean your Home Fast - The Link Between Clutter, Depression and Screen Time | Clutterbug Podcast # 46

Episode Date: April 17, 2018

Is there a direct link between clutter, depression and screen time? Listen to this podcast to hear my take and consider participating in our own little Clutterbug study!  For more tips, tricks and advice visit my website at http://clutterbug.com       Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey guys and welcome back to the clutterbug podcast. Today we're going to talk about depression and clutter and the connection between those two. I have a Facebook group and it's called Clutterbug Organizing Advice. And let me tell you, it's pretty amazing. There is a group of over 60,000 people who are looking for obviously organizing advice, but also posting inspirational pictures of transformations they've made in their own home or helping others with advice and just offering support for people who want to transform their homes and their lives declutter and get organized and just I guess get into a routine when it comes to cleaning all that good stuff so it's a pretty amazing group and today actually somebody just posted

asking if we thought there was a correlation between depression and clutter. So is it that you're sort of depressed, so you're lacking motivation and you're lacking the ability to keep up on things and therefore you get clutter? Or is it that you are living in a cluttered home, which is making you depressed? Or is it both? Is it the chicken or the egg kind of situation? And so I wanted to weigh in on this because the truth is, is I am going through a really low part right now.

And I'm not sure if it's real clinical depression or if it's just a funk. Or maybe that's the same thing. I mean, I'm definitely not a medical doctor. I have no idea. And I'm not here to give anyone advice either. But I can tell you from my own experience that I'm living in a perpetually pretty clean and tidy home. And yet I feel bummed out and tired constantly.

and just not feeling that zest for life that I normally do. And I also know people who are living in really cluttered situations that aren't feeling those things, that are feeling happy and energetic and not having any hint of depression. So I don't think that clutter and depression are mutually exclusive or inclusive. I think that if you are living in a home that's cluttered and you are prone to depression, or you have depression, it can aggravate the, that having clutter can aggravate your depression or make it worse or bring on an episode. Just like I think that the opposite is true. So when you are feeling depressed, you feel a lack of motivation, you feel lethargic, you feel not like doing things

like your dishes and laundry so then clutter can build up. But there is, I think, a bigger issue. And again, this is just totally me giving my opinion. Um, don't, it's not, it's not a medical opinion and I hope I don't offend anyone. But for me, I think that there is a bigger thing that's adding to both of these issues, clutter and depression. I think that there is something that links to both of those. And, and for me in this house, I think what that may be is screen time. What I mean by screen time is surfing Facebook, which is hilarious because I just mentioned this amazing Facebook group, but looking at Facebook watching YouTube, which again is hilarious, because that's how I make my living, is YouTube. Netflix, television, screens, playing games online,

screen time. I think that there really is a direct correlation between screen time. I think that there really is a direct correlation between screen time and clutter and depression. And I know that we've read a lot of studies. My husband is constantly giving me studies showing that how prolonged screen time for children is actually causing like brain atrophy. He showed me all these brain scans today actually of children who are watching a lot of television or screens or playing Minecraft. And it's showing that they're actually having parts of their brain that are atrophying

from staring at a screen all the time. And, you know, there's been countless studies that say a lot of screen time leads to ADHD, depression, mood swings, addictive personalities. But I'm not going to talk about any of that. I'm going to talk about my own personal experience. And what I have found is that the days where I spend a ton of time either watching YouTube or Netflix or just laying around watching television, those are the days that I feel the crappiest and the day after that. And the days where I get up and move and do something, those are the days that I feel the best. And there are times where I'm just exhausted and I'm like, you know what I need? I need a day of just laying around and watching television all day to relax. And the truth is, even though we feel like that's something we need, and maybe

sometimes we do when we're already feeling lethargic and sad and and just not great about life doing that amplifies it and makes those feelings worse i have no idea why but i've talked to lots of people friends and families who are experiencing the same thing even though that rest and relaxation is what we think we want the screen time we can eat hours and hours and hours and hours of our day of our week of our, you know, months, of our years of our life, staring at a screen, which isn't bringing us any extra happiness. It's taking from our happiness. So I need to put the screen down. And I may, I want to encourage you to perhaps put the screen down as well. And it's very possible that it's all this, you know, staring at a screen that's actually a lack of exercise, right? We're not,

we're not moving as much. So that could be adding to depression. And obviously, the screen time is taking away hours of our day, which is leaving us less time to declutter, to do the dishes, to do the laundry, to do the things that we need to do. It's stealing our precious time and it's stealing our motivation. So is it that we're feeling, you know, depressed because we're not moving as much? Is it really, is it not the screen? Is it the exercise or is it a combination? And I think the truth is it doesn't really matter, does it? Does it matter? It doesn't.

I think if we eliminate the screen, we are going to fill that time with more productive, more fun, more beneficial things for us to do. And I know even for myself when I'm sitting in crafting, you know, listening to music and just doing a craft, even though I'm not physically moving, I feel so much more energized and happier creating, crafting than I do watching a television show. So maybe it isn't the exercise. Maybe I'm making an excuse to not want to exercise, but it's that brain stimulation. And we're not getting that brain stimulation, that brain exercise when we're watching another episode of, I don't know, America's got talent or whatever it is that we're staring at

at a screen. We're not using our physical muscles in our body, and we're not using our muscles in our brain either. And, and maybe, I mean, they've only done studies with kids who are watching a lot of screen time to show that the brain is atrophying, but maybe that's happening to us as adults, too. And let me tell you, for a really big part of my life, when I was the most productive and getting the most done and just crushing it, I look back on that time, and there was no screens. in my life during that time. I was running a daycare. I was doing a blog. I didn't have the time to watch television. We didn't have cable. There wasn't Netflix back then. And so there was hardly any screen time. And I was happy. And I was accomplishing 10 times what I'm accomplishing now. And if you look at my

sort of pattern of happiness, if you were to zoom out and look at it, I know for a fact it's those times where I'm crushing like an entire season of something on Netflix or I've fallen down the Facebook rabbit hole for you know 15 hours straight which is totally I'm embarrassed to say actually happened it's on those days where I have not really accomplished much but it's also those days where I'm feeling the worst and so I have made a commitment to myself to really limit my own screen time and my kid's screen time and I want to challenge you to do the same and it's a habit it's a habit it's a habit for us. I know maybe you come home from work and you, you know, relax by sitting in front of the TV and watching a show or, you know, surfing Facebook or looking on YouTube, but I really want

you to challenge yourself to not. And it is an addictive thing. It gives us those same sort of dopamine and other chemicals in our brain that people get from drugs. It's a milder amount. Don't get me wrong. But it's still giving us that calming, happy feeling that we're craving, but in the long run, it's taking away from our happiness and our productivity and it's stealing our motivation and it's making us feel bad about ourselves. Let's be completely honest. So I want to challenge you to turn off the screens and I'm going to do the same. And what I'm going to do is go Monday through Friday with my kids too.

We've done this before with them. but I haven't always done this. And if I'm going to make them do no screens Monday through Friday, I'm going to have to have no screens Monday through Friday as well. Now, of course, I work online, do social media for a living. So I am going to be replying to comments and checking Facebook for those work reasons. But as soon as I'm done my work day, I'm done and I'm not going to fall down the rabbit hole or watch Netflix or do any of those things between Monday and Friday.

And I'm going to give, it's an experiment. I'm going to see. I mean, I'll go one week and see how I feel and if I'm starting to get more motivation back. And so you're probably, if you're like me, you're a little addicted to the screen. You might be like, what the deuce? You know, what am I going to do with myself? And so I do recommend, you guys know I'm going to recommend audiobooks. An audiobook gives you that same sort of escape from the mundane that a screen does, if watching television or something like that.

but it still allows you to move around. So get that physical exercise and be productive and give you that brain stimulation at the same time because it's an actual book that you're listening to. So your brain's working a little bit more there. So I really recommend trying the audiobook. You can still do the relaxation. Maybe you're just sitting on the couch, but instead of watching and staring at a screen, listen to an audiobook,

the odds are you're going to get up and move around while doing it. And your local library will rent you audiobooks. for free. I'm also going to recommend that you not do like some self-help book, that you get something that's like exciting and interesting, something you actually want to listen to. I really loved the girl with all the gifts. I thought that was an excellent, excellent audio book. And I totally listened to like Y-A vampire type or like some dystopian book, dystopian world where there's like a 16-year-old girl that somehow becomes the person that saves the entire world for some reason, you know, even though she's whiny and has no talent or education.

Somehow she's the leader and saves the world. Those are the type of ridiculous books that I listen to. But they're fun and they're exciting and they're easy reads. And yeah, I just get more done when I listen to them. So I'm going to take my own advice and I'm going to do the no screen time through Monday through Friday. It's going to be hard. But I am going to challenge myself and today is Monday. So let's start now.

Let's meet tomorrow. Let's say that we're not going to watch television, Netflix, or look at Facebook or any other social media sites for fun. We are not going, if we have to do it for work, that's totally different. But we are not going to surf it for fun. We're going to give ourselves a break. We're going to ground ourselves from it to see if it affects our mood, to see if it affects our motivation and the way our house looks and the way we feel. so we're going to give it a try and I hope you do too. I'll keep you guys posted.

I'll let you know in the next podcast how it's going. And I'd love to know if it's working for you as well. If you see a correlation, we'll do our own study. We'll do like our clutter bugs study to see if there is a really direct link between screen time, depression, and clutter. Thank you guys so much for listening. I hope you enjoyed and I'm going to see you next time.