Decluttering Is An Inside Job

No sleep. Let it sweep you off your feet.

Hi, you're listening to find your joy. If you're looking for ways to thrive rather than survive in a world that can seem rather chaotic, you're in the right place. We will be sharing stories of our own, as well as those from guests who have found ways to bring hope, healing and freedom into places where trauma has impacted them. I'm Ali, author of the art of healing trauma, and I'm here to remind you that life is sweet. Now, let's dive in and find ways to create our joy.

Hi, this is Ali and find your joy. Well, we are in for a treat today. If you were like me, and you can get things just a wee bit cluttered our guest today Kitti Andrews is going to be someone who is going to break open Elvis find a path toward joy. Kitti is someone who helps people to clear the cut and clutter in their lives both mentally, physically. And she's going to tell us all the different ways. Welcome Kitti.

And hello, hello, thank you so much for having me. I'm so appreciate Ali. Thank you.

I'm excited. Are you kidding me? I was just chatting with a friend the other day about? How do you go about finding someone to help you clear your clutter? And to know exactly what to keep? And what not to get rid of. Because, you know, sometimes in a big clean note, I've got rid of things. And then a little while later thought oh no, I was too overzealous, that one thing mattered to me. So I find it very interesting that today, you are the person that is here when I was just talking about this in the last week. So I am just going to sit back I have a pen even though I'm recording it, I have a pen and paper in hand. And I have got to be taking notes. So go for it.

Right? Well, I'll give you a bit of an overview. And I'm going to temper that with you. We're just talking about what to keep what to toss, I have just right smack dab towards the end of a move. And I've lived in that old apartment for five years. And you accumulate things I moved in with a fair bit of stuff, some of which probably shouldn't have been moved in, did throw away a lot of things. Even just in the last couple of days, I probably still have stuff here that shouldn't have been moved in. But it's going to be a ceremonial toss. Because I've got a little bit more time and I'll say, No, this does not belong on my fancy new place cotton kind of thing, right? In my new fresh space. When you talk about and that's near and dear to me about should I keep things I had a friend who's also a client helping me she was doing the cleaning and part of this move. And this move is representative of moving out of a space. And you can apply this to all five pillars of your life, by the way, and we'll talk about that briefly. But when you when clutter is defined as that which no longer serves you, and my old apartment no longer served me and be in my present, being able to talk to people like yourself. You don't I wasn't doing that. I was evolving, I evolved. And that means that you also evolved out of things that you thought that you liked, like clothes from when I had my cleaning business four years ago, and I thought well, I might need them someday. Right? Yeah. Can you

get an amen?

I mean, I'm ashamed to say but they were expensive bathmats when I got them, but my friends said Kitty, bid them farewell, okay, they've done their service.

It's hard to get it. It's hard to get around. Kitty, just throw it away, please.

And there was a lot of that happening yesterday. And you just have to realize is it fitting my new life and in a pinch this is what I often recommend is and this came from a client who did move across country from Washington State to Minnesota, and she said Do I want to correct this in my in my u haul trailer and unpack it at the other end. And that can be a really good litmus test. It's my favorite litmus test actually, would I cart this across country? If it's a no no, no. Well, you know what to do, but you want to have a keep a toss and a maybe pile now many, or quote organizers will disagree with me on that, that no one's got to be black or white. Well, I don't think life is black or white. I did have well, my maybe pile is a I know which ones are the maybe they're in there in the box, isn't it through the men? Okay, it's probably a no, but it's not taking up that much space. I took very little maybe with me, but make sure that you give yourself that out. Why here? Would you like to know the why I do it that way,

absolutely.

Saves mental energy. Now, don't forget that every time you declutter, like my sessions with my clients are 50 minutes, five, zero minutes, plus 10 minutes wind down, you know, you've got a little bit on either end. And the reason for that is decision fatigue, I will see that my clients eyes glaze over. And these minutes. Now yesterday, I did two hours of decluttering. But that's okay, I was on a mission, I had a whole lot of ginseng in my system. I was able to focus, and I had to and it's just the way it was. But I would never advise anybody else to try to do that. You know, because decision fatigue starts to hit and you know that battery at the, at the top of your phone, you know, and then yours watching?

Yes, it's a great reminder.

If you have that maybe pile rather than agonize over that photo or that shirt? or what have you, then, okay, we'll put it in maybe and we'll deal with it with fresh eyes in the next session or the next day, which is actually even better and better to sleep on it. But it gives you that out. Now as the maybe power starts to be hitting the ceiling, well, then you're gonna have to deal with it.

But take a look at that then. Yeah, most times

it's going to be yes or no. Does that help? Does that answer

your question? Absolutely. Does, you know because I can say myself, there's been a few times I have tossed out things in and I'm gonna say exactly what you're and I didn't have that language for it. But decision fatigue. Um, I have and made really poor choices, you know, like things like and I'll say like, for people listening, my mom had to be in complex care at the end of her life. And when when a person dies, and they're in a place like that, you've got like, hours to get their stuff out, right? You just have to come in. It's not you don't have time to sit around and think about it. And you know, I mean, she'd been ill I'd been up there for days before she and then I was exhausted, I was grieving and I went in, and I started going through things slowly and then a few hours in I knew we just needed to get out and I just panicked. You know, I'm not saying that I threw out something that was the most important thing what I can say is I don't remember that I don't remember I was you know, brain injured grieving and a tired and exhausted so that I love what you're saying. Because that takes that out of the picture. That's that's a that's a beautiful way to do it. And I am a girl who I'm telling you, when I get tired, I start chucking

the default and you're bringing me back to exactly a year ago when my father passed in March and my condolences by the way, and he had way too much stuff that he had moved into the NUIT II just anyway, we're not going to go there. I was angry that he had so I had the emotions. I was angry that he hadn't looked after himself better. And while he was 84 but still his little girl was angry.

I am Mom and Dad Your mum and dad doesn't matter how old I am or they are it's gone is gone. And it's hard.

Yeah. And you're going through stuff and it starts to end everything just starts to well up and yeah, some there's a shot and there's a dish set that I wish I hadn't sent to the goodwill because but you just get tired and sometimes you have no choice you're under the gun timewise and it is what it is but if you do have the luxury of time, just a little bit before, then I advise that full disclosure. I didn't do very, very much beforehand. And sometimes you just can't work we write. But if you want, you can and you go easy on yourself. And you say, All right, I'm only I can only do so much. And did I throw out the china set that that maybe I shouldn't have? Well, it's done and somebody else is enjoying it is enjoying it.

Exactly. It's.

It's meant to be. Yeah, yeah. Cut ourselves some slack, right? Yes,

exactly. It's exactly true. I mean, to weigh it all out in in 20 years? will it matter? If I have it? Will it matter if I don't? And if I don't have a big answer for that, then then it'll then it'll be okay. A helicopter going over? Absolutely. Yeah. So the five pillars. Ah.

Now we're just off. You're talking about Marie Kondo. And what she does is absolutely wonderful just finished your book. And it's what it did. We do things differently. She and I but she focuses of course, on the physical and Does it spark joy. You personally we are show right. And, in that joy really is a part of all five pillars of your life now declutter the brain. We declutter not only your home, I call it the five H pillars, not only your home, but your heart, meaning your relationships with your partner, family, coworkers, whatever. Home, your heart, your habits, your health, and your head, hence, declutter the brain. Now, a funny thing happens. I strongly believe that physical and mental clutter are so closely intertwined that we don't even have time to talk about it today on this on this podcast, but basically, don't you feel better if you're an eve cleaner, you've cleared off your counter, and everything looks good. You've had a busy week, it's Wednesday night, you look around, you go to your UI, you clear it off Thursday morning, you're you're raring to go.

Exactly It's the difference between doing your dishes at night or waiting till the morning to know what is true right if I it no matter how tired I am, if I can, if I do the kitchen, before I go to bed, then when I wake up, I'm not going into this day with yesterday's stuff. I'm already behind them like and it's just dishes but it's I find that those things really matter to me. You know? Yeah. Ah,

so it's a well it's an assault on the senses and you're absolutely right that actually is a really good way of putting it bringing yesterday into today into today. Yesterday was yesterday today's a brand new fresh shiny day,

just dishes but man it's one more thing to clean up.

Well that's that's where you ran the symbolic for for eons symbolic of nurturing and self nurturing and nourishment and and all of that kind of stuff. It's the infamous way it's one of the most important rooms in the home. So so it was so good on you for doing that. When you were asking about the five pillars Can I tell you a quick story?

Absolutely. I would love and

give you a bit of an example. She came to me with with physical clutters her sunroom which was the entrance it's an older house so so you have your sunroom which then leads to the front door of your house and it was so crowded that she had to kind of sidle in to get to her door. And we started working through that. And after about three sessions because I do I do weekly one on one session so and she said you know I'm I'm really thinking I'm going to start that fitness program. I thought I thought about it a long time ago and I am I'm going to look into this and within a couple of weeks. She she had herself set up with a personal trainer with a nutritionist with a gym, all of this kind of stuff and I'm proud to say that she has been as she's still doing it after two and a half years she drove her tractor to the gym because her car her truck wouldn't start I kid you not But she was committed and where am I going with that? What does that have to do with physical, physical decluttering? Is because I believe that as you declutter, physically, the the metaphor, metaphorical layers of the onion, start to peel them, and you start to see other things. So she was essentially declaring her health and to a lesser extent, her habits. But here's here, here was the kicker shortly thereafter, you know, we're still working together. A couple weeks later, she said, You know, I asked and said something to me that I'm not really sure that I liked that much. And she told me what it was, it was a little derogatory, nothing really serious, but you know, wasn't exactly warm and fuzzy. And so that's interesting, as he ever said anything like that before. And she stopped. And she thought about it for about 20 seconds. And she says, you know, he's been saying that kind of stuff for most of the 25 years of our marriage. Well, we worked through it. And she, I told her, I suggested to her the right things to say, I'm a huge Dale Carnegie fan, by the way, she suggested to her the right ways to approach what the gentleman was saying. And I'm proud to say that she is one of three marriages that I've been credited with with the saving is keeping

beautiful. So sometimes we're seeing things and we don't even realize that they're how they might land on another person. And sometimes it only takes communication to fix that.

Absolutely. And you may not even see that, because see, what here, see here, see, whatever, you're the underlining the underlying surroundings, because the clutter, the physical clutter is in the way now, I know this sounds kind of woowoo. But it has worked so many times that even recently, a woman was she didn't. She was dreaded, she had just moved into her new home. Her mother was coming to visit. And she was just dreading it because her mother was kind of like a, you know, old Let me help. My

house. I'm 40 years old.

Right? Didn't they have they have just fed up today? Right now? They are finishing a beautiful week and a half long visit?

And enjoying it?

Yes. Because somehow this lady, when she got it, she got confident in her decluttering over the move, which is what she hired me for it. And she got confident. And I think that confidence portrayed through to her mother and her her mother reacted in kind. Thank goodness, that Oh, my God, my little girls kind of grown up here. Yes. And let's work together. So the decluttering has a lot of side benefits that are really unseen.

It will it absolutely makes sense. I mean, clutter can it just I mean, we know now, right? The connection between a trauma informed life and clutter. We know now that just anytime that when things are cluttered around us, it's hard to think it's hard to do anything. And it just makes sense to me. And for whatever reason. People tend to connect shame to their clutter. And that's that I'm sure that I will I'm gonna guess shouldn't say I'm sure but um, would you find that that's been your experience

99 99% of time.

Yeah. So just once in a while. Yeah,

you feel that you should be able to I should be speaking clean. I'm a decluttering coach, my my place should be I'm in the middle of a move but everything should be looking perfect. Now come on, knock it off. Right, right. But there is a certain level of shame that well, many times people in a family my one of my own family members and a current client have both experienced I can't get the super into make repairs because he's gonna take one look and maybe it's me, maybe, you know, what is he gonna say about me? The shame of that and that can I can start to mushroom and snowball and you got black backed up toilets because you won't let anybody in your home. And then it can it can really escalate. But but that's that's not my wheelhouse. So when it gets when it escalates that, right? But yes, the the effect on your self esteem is is absolutely huge. Yes.

Well, I, you know, I think I could just, we could go on and on all day, we could and here we are. And that's the end and I'm like, Oh my gosh, there's so much more I want to find out. I think I think so first of all, we're going to have all your contact information is going to be in our show notes. Now, so do you also work with people online?

As a matter of fact, wow. See, classic ADHD are here. I know what I do, but I forget to tell others. I only work on mine. That Oh, beautiful. I do not go into people's homes. For four years, I have done it virtually. And the beauty of that is it's rules described by a realtor friend of mine as being a less insurance and more focused way to get rid of 30 years of stuff. Why focus in genius? Justin? Yeah, you're just in the one room, you don't have to clean for the cleaning lady, you eliminate that shame. You're only focusing on that room. Less and less intrusive. Of course, you, again, don't have to clean for the cleaning lady, you're still going to be embarrassed as you shine your iPhone camera or your laptop on your mess because we've got to work through it together. But you don't have to feel like oh my god did he does a person is going to run away or they're going to judge me. All right. So so yes, it's all on mine. And oh, that's wonderful.

Okay, well, so. So for those listening, wherever you are, you can get a hold of Kitty, and she can help you to clear the clutter and calm the chaos in your life. Yay. I said it this time without falling over my tongue. It was wonderful. Well, Kitty, thank you so much. Thank you so much for being here today. I learned a lot. I hope the listeners did do I'm sure they did. And I'm inspired. I'm inspired to go that go to, you know when you have that one junk drawer. And then sometimes a room becomes the junk room. And that's been my that's been what's been going on lately. So I have my junk drawer has become a junk room. And so I'm inspired. And I hope others are too. Katie, thank you so much. Thank you so much for being here today. It was awesome. And well, I'm looking forward to it. Who knows, maybe we'll maybe we'll meet again. Maybe there'll be a part two of this along the way sometime. That would be great.

I sure hope so. This was a real pleasure, Ali. Thanks for having me.

Thank you so much. And this is Ali saying bye for now. Go and find your joy.