MAYBE THIS COULD GO… Your guide to empty clutter

Whenever something catches your attention, whenever you start thinking about what it is or why it’s there, always ask yourself whether you might discard it.

The following situations show the behaviour of people who don’t have a discarding mentality:

SITUATION 1: SEEING AN ENVELOPE ON THE TABLE

SITUATION 2: A PILE OF NEW YEAR CARDS TUMBLES OUT OF THE LETTER RACK

SITUATION 3: TAKING A GLASS FROM THE SHELF

SITUATION 4: WORKING ON THE COMPUTER

SITUATION 5: STEPPING OVER A MAGAZINE ON THE FLOOR

All the things that feature in the situations described above could be discarded—the telephone bill details, the New Year cards, the beer glass, the data printout, and the magazine. If they were trash, they would have been discarded straight away. But because they appear to have some value, you forget that getting rid of them is an option.

Changing a situation requires energy. The most straightforward course of action is to do nothing.

If you see something, and it’s what you’re looking for, you’ll pick it up and use it. You probably won’t notice anything you’re not looking for unless there’s a reason.

Think like this!

The moment you notice something is the moment “to get rid of it. If you don’t, it may stay there for A long time.

This makes me reflect on just how good a custom we have in the end-of-year clean-up. I’m not sure how it was in the past, but these days it’s a significant event—an occasion for getting rid of things that have built up over the year. Families clean everything inside and outside the house and throw away what they don’t want. The clean-up makes us notice things and consider whether they can be discarded. The piles of garbage in the streets at New Year mean that thinking maybe this could go” is far from extreme.

Why wait?