Clutter: The 1 Thing Done Approach – Part I
The Clutter Equation
There are plenty of books, websites and professional consultants who would be very happy to tell you about you and your clutter — what doesn’t belong, what should be moved, discarded, downsized or stowed. Trouble is, these experts don’t know you, your stuff or your life.
I don’t know you either. But I can offer a tool that may help you make your own decisions. The tool is called the Clutter Equation:
More plainly:
If I is negative, then the item is not clutter. Its presence adds more value to your life than it consumes. Your life is, by definition, richer than it would be if the object were not there.
If I is positive, then the item is clutter — at least for now. It is costing you more than it is worth.
Of course I’m not expecting anyone to put specific numbers into this equation. Most of the costs and values involved cannot be quantified. (Though if you’re spending $45.00 a month on a storage unit for your collection of 1980s Tiger Beat magazines, there’s a cost you can quantify.)
Also, it’s important to remember that there are no “correct” values for any part of this equation. Like everything else about real or so-called clutter, the final decisions are subjective.
The purpose of the equation is to get you to think differently about the stuff in your life. Don’t assume you need to get new stuff, need to keep stuff, or need to leave stuff where and how it is. But don’t assume you have to get rid of all of your stuff either. Instead ask honestly — how much does the stuff enrich your life, and how much does it cost you?
Honesty and clarity are the keys to making this equation work. If you suspect that an object might be cluttering up your living room, be brutally honest about the value it brings. Sure, that SpiderMan snowglobe is nice, but what does does it add to your life? Try to be more specific than “it’s nice” or “I like it.” What do you like about it? What senses are engaged — sight? sound? memory? What about it would you miss if it were discarded or packed away?
Above all, beware of mistaking guilt or a sense of obligation for real value. As a cogent aphorism from unclutterer.com has it, “Guilt is not a reason to keep something.” Guilt is not value, and it is not a good basis for designing your environment. Moreover, a genuine obligation to another person can be served in better ways than keeping stuff you don’t really want in places you don’t really want it.
It is also important to be clear and honest about the cost side of the equation. Think about the space taken up by the object. What other use might you have for that space? Would your environment be more relaxing with nothing in that space? How much does that space cost, as a percentage of your housing costs (or storage space rental for those Tiger Beat magazines)?
The other potential costs make for harder questions, but may be even more important. How much time, attention and energy does the thing consume? How much time do you spend keeping those decorative teacups clean and dusted? Does that telescope on its tripod add to the time and effort it takes to get from your living room to the patio? How many times have you looked at that stack of crossword puzzle books and had negative rather than positive thoughts?
If you spend some time on this process and come to the conclusion that an object’s costs are greater than its value, then it is clutter. That means you’ll be better off if you do something about it.
In Part II of this series we’ll explore options for changing the balance of the equation.
