Clutterbug - Real-Life Hacks and Tips to Declutter, Organize and Clean your Home Fast - The Shame, Guilt and Self-Hate Caused by a Messy Home | Clutterbug Podcast # 142

Episode Date: September 19, 2022

is your front door just barricaded with too much stuff? Do you have "pathways" around your home by the items in your home? In today's podcast, I help you see the light and motivate you so that you don't have to live that way any longer.  You deserve a home that makes you feel relaxed and proud of yourself!   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 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We're talking about mindset today. We're talking about, ugh, the frustration that I have with all the empty promises of from stuff that I've purchased that never works out like I think it has all those impulse buys, all the things that I thought were going to make my life easier, how they are impacting me in such a negative way. And we're also going to talk about motivation. Hey, clutterbugs. Welcome back to the Clutterbug podcast. I thought we talked today a little bit about everything when it comes to getting your house under control. Today was the all day declutter, the live all day declutter with the Take Your House Back team. So I have a course with Dawn from the Minimal Mom and Dana from a Slob comes clean.

And about four times a year we do an all day live declutter where we kind of just act like coaches and help people declutter their space and organize their space live. There are thousands of people who take part in this event. And it's always really inspiring and really, really motivating. but also, I don't know, it's so emotional for me. It's such an eye-opening experience because I sometimes forget what it's really like to live in chaos and clutter. It's just been so long. We kind of get used to our current environment and our current lifestyle.

But so many people in this group are sharing pictures and they're sharing active pictures. And when I look at these, it's like a stab to the heart because my, home looked like that. Most of the photos that feel that that painful way or the before photos, obviously kitchens where you can't even see the countertop and sometimes not even the floor. Bedrooms where the piles of clothes are almost as high as the bed on either side, living rooms where there's kind of like paths to the sofa or the chair and everything's just everywhere. every flat surface covered with stuff. And these people who are sharing these photos who are joining this group who are pouring their

heart out and being just so honest with their struggles, I remember what it's like to be there. I remember the shame and the guilt. But I forget when I'm not reminded by the images. You forget. You just, I'm so spoiled now to live in a home where that's no longer even a thought. I don't even think about stuff. mess. But how do they get to that point? How do we? How do people who live in a cluttered home get there? It's really, it's coming from so many different angles. It's definitely coming from these

empty promises of the crap that we buy. We go to the store. We see scented candles or we see gadgets or bins and baskets that are going to, you know, get us organized. We see commercials for things that we're going to buy the newest whatever it is. And we spend money on things that we shouldn't. People give us gifts. We're always accumulating. I think it's it's human nature, but it's also driving the economy. It's marketing 101. If we don't buy obnoxious amounts of crap, we're not going to continue thriving. And so we're kind of tricked into buying things that we shouldn't buy and it's filling up our homes. And I think this is the biggest reason why we didn't see the same amount of clutter 30 years ago as we're seeing now. It's because fast fashion. It's because

it's easier and because stores are shoving it down our throats the internet oh my god i can't even go on facebook without having ads trying to get me to buy stupid things and i've fallen for so so many of them but if we're not getting things out at the same rate as we're bringing things in it doesn't take long for our house to be filled for every surface to be covered and looking at these pictures i get so emotional because i just remember the struggle of just getting out the door of trying to find two matching shoes or my keys or my phone or the diaper bag to try to get dinner on the table, to try to be able to find things in the pantry or even clear off a spot to chop vegetables on my counter because they were so full. The struggle of living every day. Just the struggle

of living in my house. And the immense, I don't know, like relaxation I felt going to a hotel or going somewhere else where this stuff wasn't surrounding me. And yet, even though I knew that the clutter was the problem, it felt almost impossible to let go. And I was hearing those messages from people on the all day declutter today saying, I've already decluttered. Now I just need to get organized. And then showing a picture of a space so full that, I mean, you couldn't even set down a glass. Or I just need to organize this pantry.

And it shoved so full. and there's also boxes of food on the floor in front of the pantry. I had to learn the hard way that organization actually takes up more space than just shoving a closet and cramming it tight. Putting things neatly, sorting it, putting things into containers, that takes up more space. I had to really learn that the hard way, but there's this lie. There's this lie that beautiful containers and organization is going to be able to somehow

magically expand our walls or make our things all fit better. And even when we do stack things really neatly and kind of cram everything in every nook and cranny, the next time we need something, we pull something out. It all kind of comes tumbling down because we can't keep that up. We can't keep this perfect stacking. That is not long term. That's not a reasonable organization. We need to be able to have breathing room for our stuff. And the only way we can do that as getting literally truckloads and truckloads and truckloads of things out of our home. But that's so hard to do. So hard to do. And how do we do that? How? How do we do that? So I think it really starts with mindset. And people talk about mindset and my eyes also glaze over.

And I just want to roll my eyes and be like, listen, all right, we're not doing some woo-woo meditating stuff. But what I really mean by mindset is we have to stop. ourselves from having this negative victim mentality which I 100% had and I still struggle with this all the time this victim mentality of well if only my husband helped or if my kids helped or if maybe this or if I wasn't sick if I didn't have Hashimoto's if I wasn't you know working so much if only they they have this because of this and I can't because of that the victim mentality that mindset that stop me from even trying because I didn't think I'd succeed in the first place. I just didn't think I did.

And yes, I was trying to use other systems that weren't made for my style. But most of the time, I wasn't trying because I wasn't trying. I wasn't trying because I had talked myself out of it before I even started with a failure victim mindset. And I still fall into this today. I still fall into this woe is me, poor me, feeling sorry for myself, of blaming everyone else for my problems instead of taking action on my life and creating the life that I really want because it's hard work and I don't want to do hard work. I want the easy way out. I always want the easy way out.

But I spent years trying to find the easy way out working the least amount possible. And the hilarious thing was I was working so hard to manage my mess. I didn't want to work to declutter and work to organize. Yet I was spending hours stuff shuffling and moving things around and just looking for lost things all the time. I had no idea that the truth was that spending the time decluttering and or really decluttering, not tidying, getting stuff out of my house so much. That time that I had invested paid me back tenfold, which means I had to work a lot less to maintain a home. and I got to be proud of myself, but I didn't, I couldn't, I had to make the mental shift before I could make the physical shift in my home.

I had to start seeing it as a challenge. I had to start saying every day I'm going to do something small. I can do this. And the amazing thing is because I'm such a, I don't want to say lazy, but I'm kind of lazy. And because I'm the person who needs like immediate gratification, when I was doing a small task, like finding 21 things that could go today, that could be donated or trash, I accomplished something and I felt a little bit of pride in myself, something that was really missing before.

I wasn't proud of myself. I was always upset with myself. So when I started doing these little things, it became really, really addicting. And the more little things I did that I could accomplish, that I could see the results, the better I felt about myself and the better my home started to look. But I had to consciously remind you. myself of this new mindset that 15 minutes a day 15 minutes a day is going to make me feel good it's me time I'm not doing this for my family I'm not picking up after other people I'm doing

this because I freaking deserve this because I'm sick of cleaning I'm sick of stuff shuffling and I deserve a home that's easy to manage and easy to maintain and if that means putting crap that I bought from Walmart that I shouldn't have in the first place or those five lighters I bought from Costco when I only needed one I'm going to donate the extra four and I'm not going to feel bad about it because my time and energy and happiness is worth more I had to really stand up for myself and put boundaries on myself and say enough is enough and change my mindset from victim to hero of my own life and I'm still doing this to this day. I'm still trying to remind myself of this today. There are lots of days where I just, I feel

sorry for myself and I don't even know why. Like I have such an incredible life, but I do. And I don't want to get out of bed and I don't want to do anything. And I just complain. Why does my husband help? He's supposed to be a stay-at-home dad. He's not really doing anything around the house. I'm doing all the cooking and the cleaning and I work full-time and I take care of the kids. And the more I start saying this things to myself, whether it's true or not, the more resentful I feel about my The more sorry I feel for myself, I fall into this victim thing and it zaps my energy and I just want to crawl in bed and watch television all day or surf the web. I don't have the motivation because I stole it from myself. And also motivation, it wanes.

Sometimes we'll feel it at 2 in the morning. Sometimes we won't feel it at all. But if we're not working actively on a positive mindset, then we really won't feel motivated. ever. So it starts with mindset and then like Mel Robbins says, we create our own motivation. We get up and we do something. We force ourselves to do something for just five minutes. We're not always going to feel like it, but we're going to do it anyways because we are the hero of our freaking life. And we don't have to work all day. This isn't about busting your button, never relaxing. This is about doing one thing every day that's going to put you a little bit

closer to the life that you're craving. A small thing. Instead of watching six hours of the internet surfing the web, we're doing five and we're doing one hour of something amazing. And I know what it's like to work full time. I work full time hours nine to five every day. And I sometimes work at night on top of that. I'm probably working 50, 60 hours a week. If I'm being honest. Plus, I'm doing the grocery shopping and the cooking and the cleaning. And I've got three kids who are going to different activities. I understand what it's like to be exhausted. I have Hashimoto's and I have other medical issues right now. I understand and I'm not crushing it. I'm not doing a ton of stuff, but I'm doing something small every day for no other reason than because when I fall asleep at

night, I want to say, okay, I didn't get everything done that I should have got done, but I'm going to focus on this, this thing, this one thing. And when I have that mindset, when I give myself like, you know, deadlines and enforce myself, the five, four, three, two, one, Mel Robbins, you've got to listen to her. She's so motivating. And I get up and I do something, even when I don't want to do it. God, it feels so good. It feels so good. It feels better than resting all day. This week, I did a fall video and and I didn't really want to if I'm being honest it was like my fall routine things that I do do every year but I spaced them out but I had one day to film this video I had to deep clean my oven my fridge I had to clean all the cabinets I had to dust the whole house and vacuum and vacuum in the furniture cracks and paint the front door and decorate for fall and get pumpkins and mums out the front and make a DIY wreath okay I I flipped my mattress I vacuumed my mattress with baking soda. I dusted the whole house. I vacuumed. I mopped. It was insane. It was insane. Like seriously, painting a door and filming the whole thing and cleaning the whole house,

like deep cleaning and on top of that decorating and doing all this other thing in one day. And I did it. And I got it done more than I've gotten done in like the last weeks. I was able to accomplish in one day of working hard. No, I am not recognizing. recommending that we work that I certainly don't think that that's a great idea. I was exhausted for like two days after that. But but the point is we can push ourselves so much further than we think. And what I realized was, man, the harder you work, the more you do, the more you can do. And the less I do, the less I can do. Does that make sense? The more I fall into this routine of I come home from work and I just, oh, I'm tired and I lay on the couch and I just rest.

I can't get up after that. I'm done. I'm out. And the more I get into that routine of doing less and less and accepting that, you know, I'll do it tomorrow. I'll put it off tomorrow. I procrastinate all these things. The less energy I have. And the more I force myself to get up and do something, the more energy I have.

And the more I accomplish and the more I can accomplish. So we start with mindset, really being aware of when we're being negative and when we're having that victim mentality and then we move to motivation which is creating the motivation for ourselves by just getting up i know you're tired and you worked all day but you're not going to rest until you've at least done the dishes and it's five minutes you can do five minutes get up and do it you're going to feel so much better about yourself later and then you can have the rest of the three hours to sit and rest and that's fine you deserve that but do not put off till tomorrow what you can do today because that's just punishing yourself tomorrow. You deserve a space. You deserve a home

that makes you feel relaxed and proud of yourself. It doesn't have to be perfect. That is not what this is about. But it does have to be a priority for you because your home, your environment affects you mentally, whether you realize it or not. And I know this because I've been there. And when I'm seeing the pictures of this all-day declutter, it's just bringing it all back. The feelings of embarrassment and shame and self-hatred that I felt when my home looked like that. Looking around and being so angry at myself for buying things in the first place that I shouldn't. Being angry at my house for not having enough storage. Being angry at me not having any money in the bank and yet all the money I had spent looking around.

just a toxic negative ever perpetuating cycle of hate in my home and it wasn't until I started decluttering that I saw the light that I saw that life could be different that I didn't have to live this way and the only thing between me and a more restful peaceful happy more time more freedom in my life was the crap I didn't even like anyways was the stuff that I was tricked into buying or those impulse buys where I had a moment of weakness and I bought stuff I shouldn't or I accepted things I shouldn't or I had gifts that I should have said you know what this isn't really for me but thank you anyways when I didn't really stand up for myself it filled my home filled my home

and it didn't all those purchases didn't make me happier maybe for a moment you know at the store during the car ride home when I took it out of the bag a second of joy a lifetime of regret

it's not worth it and all you have to do is be brave enough to put those things in bags donate them throw them in the trash I don't care you know what it doesn't matter I know we all want to make sure that we're recycling responsibly and helping out the earth But at the end of the day, here's the honest truth.

When you get your home under control, you are going to have more time and capacity to worry about that type of stuff. Right now, we have to unbury yourself. You have to dig your way out. And I'm looking at those photos. I'm looking at those photos of these people who are like, I just need to get organized. And I'm thinking, no, you need a dumpster. Because you have way too much stuff in your home. And you're just used to it.

And you don't realize, you don't realize the freedom and the difference because you're used to living with this amount of excess. Maybe you grew up in a home with this amount of excess. Maybe you don't realize that the people's home who you envy. You look at these and you're thinking to yourself, God, they're just working so hard. I don't want to work as hard as them. That's not what it is. They have less stuff than you. It's time.

It's time that you said enough is enough. and you let the things go. And to be able to do that, you've got to change your mindset. You got to realize this isn't a victim. This isn't anybody else's fault. You're not going to be the victim in your life anymore. You're going to be the hero. You're going to be the hero.

You're going to dig your way out. You're going to do 15 minutes a day. You're going to find 21 things today right now that can leave. You're going to create new homes for the things that you are keeping. And someday, you're going to get to a point where you've forgotten. what it feels like to live in a home that's messy and cluttered, where you've forgotten what it feels like to feel the shame and the self-hatred, and you're going to see a picture of somebody else's home and be reminded.

Thank you guys so much for listening. I really appreciate your time, and I'll see you guys next time.