Stop Clutter From Stealing Your Life: Discover Why You Clutter & How You Can Stop by Mike Nelson

Release date: 2008 / 244 pages

First lines: “This book is about more than just decluttering. It’s about balance. A cluttered household is an unbalanced household.”

Synopsis (from back cover): “Will You Let Cluttering Steal Your Life? Clutter is not just a minor annoyance. For too many people, it is a monster that can destroy self-esteem and relationships, cause financial problems, and even lead to the unemployment line. Author Mike Nelson overcame his own cluttering behavior, and shares his triumphs and struggles with humor and insight. You are not your stuff. You are a lot more important.”

Review: I have a small confession to make: I used to have a problem with clutter. Or, more specifically, with disorganization. I don’t buy things to excess, but I can have a tendency to “let things pile up.”

For example, after I had taught my lessons for the day, instead of placing my notes and plans back in their 3-ring binder or folder, I would place them in an ever-growing pile on top of my bookcase or desk. Now, this was handy in that everything was very accessible (and easy to find since the pile was chronologically formed), but as the school year would progress, the pile would weigh me down visually and nag at me psychologically. Then, during Wimbledon each year I would haul the pile home and place it back into its 3-ring or folder.

Two things broke me of this habit: the feeling of freedom and peace I would get from an uncluttered home or classroom, and marrying my husband. He is not a clutter bug – he has a zen-like sensibility – and I just couldn’t bear to bring my clutter into this relationship.

So, when the possibility of an ARC on clutter arose, I jumped! I read and loved Julie Morgenstern’s Organization From the Inside Out years ago and was ready for a refresher. This book is very different from Morgenstern’s since her book is more about organization (how) and Nelson’s is more about the psychological components of why we “clutter”: “Living a clutter-less life is more than cleaning up. It involves changing the way we think about possessions, love, and self-worth.” In other words, he approaches clutter as a “symptom,” not as the problem.

Nelson approaches clutter through a number of different psychological avenues: through learning style tests, Temperment Character Inventories, etc. He believes that de-cluttering is a “quiet revolution of the spirit.”

He identifies many reasons for why people “clutter.” Some of these include the fear of losing love, procrastinating as a form of perfectionism (one of my stumbling blocks), time-clutterers, and clinical psychological reasons such as ADHD or OCD, depression, or anxiety.

Some of his insights resonated, like: “Many of us are so full of negativity that we’re like one-sided magnets, repelling any positive changes in our lives.” As did some of the quotes he chose: “Do what you can, with what you have, where you are” T. Roosevelt.

However, other insights did not work for me, and he seemed to have a bias against logical folks and a bias toward emotional ones – and believed the two were mutually exclusive: “You [emotional learners] should probably drop all pretenses to being logical right now” (110). Since my husband and I are both very logical yet quite emotional in our reactions to the world and to solving problems, this insight rang false.

My other problem with this book is somewhat ironic, if not surprising: It is not organized very well! This may seem subjective on my part, but after teaching organization in writing for fifteen years I will stand behind my opinion. He has so much he wants to say, and is so intent on sharing his personal journey, that the book feels a bit like a collection of “and another thing.” I would have cut out much of his personal story – or saved it until the very end after he had established credibility, because reading about his many jobs, homes, etc. felt a little ADHD and then set the tone for the rest of the book.

However, he does include a LOT of helpful insights and ideas – and I did enjoy discovering which psychological components I need to be aware of (perfectionism, anxiety) and which I do not. So, I would recommend reading this book first, and then Julie Morgenstern’s.

Interested in checking out a free copy? Simply leave me a comment and I’ll randomly choose a winner!

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