42: Routine Decluttering: The Ultimate Stress-Buster with Sarah Horgan
Sarah Horgan discusses how decluttering can lead to intentional living and a more fulfilling life. As a cancer survivor and decluttering coach, Sarah shares her own journey and offers practical tips for reducing clutter in small increments.
She emphasizes the importance of changing our mindset about possessions and encourages women, in particular, to consider whether each item is adding to their well-being.
Through her approach of incorporating daily routines and creating a "Maybe" box, listeners will learn how to maintain a clutter-free home and lead a more purposeful life. Tune in to discover the transformative power of decluttering.
Summary
In today's society, it's easy to accumulate clutter in our homes and lives. But what if decluttering could actually lead to a more intentional and fulfilling life? Sarah Horgan, a decluttering coach and cancer survivor, believes that it can.
Sarah's journey towards intentional living began after being diagnosed with stage four cancer in 2014. She found that decluttering helped her have more time for herself and allowed her to have more purpose in her own life. Now, as a coach, she encourages others to follow suit.
Sarah suggests that decluttering can be done in small increments, such as taking a few minutes a day to get rid of things. She recommends having a box or bag on hand to toss things into as you move through your home and daily routines. This approach allows for gradual progress towards simplicity without overwhelming oneself.
Sentimental items can be hard to let go of, but Sarah suggests going through them multiple times and making small decisions over and over to build confidence in decision-making. She also suggests taking a photo of an item or turning it into something useful, like a quilt, to keep the memory without cluttering the space.
Sarah emphasizes the importance of changing the way we think about our possessions. Clutter can impact our stress levels and overall sense of peace in our homes. Women, especially, are encouraged to consider whether each item is adding to or taking away from their well-being.
To prevent unnecessary clutter, Sarah recommends waiting 24 hours before buying or bringing anything into your home. She also suggests incorporating daily routines to reduce overwhelm and clutter, such as taking a few minutes to declutter while making a meal or waiting for an event to start. As you do laundry, it's a good time to sort through clothes and make decisions about what to keep or get rid of.
By making decluttering a routine part of daily activities, such as scanning drawers and cupboards in the kitchen and bathroom, it becomes easier to maintain a clutter-free home. Sarah also recommends creating a "Maybe" box for items you're unsure about, giving you time to live without them before deciding whether to keep or discard them.
In conclusion, decluttering can be a powerful tool for intentional living and inner peace. Sarah's approach to decluttering allows for gradual progress towards simplicity without overwhelming oneself. By changing the way we think about our possessions and incorporating daily routines, we can lead a more purposeful and fulfilling life in a clutter-free home.
Mentioned In This Episode
Where to find Sarah: Website and Instagram
Sarah's free gift: CREATE your Intentional Life
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Transcript:
You. And my special guest today is Sarah Horgan. Sarah is an intentional living and decluttering coach, and she was diagnosed with stage four cancer in 2014, and she was forced to examine everything. So initially she tackled her perfectionism and people pleasing, but fast forward to becoming mom. She was pushed to dig deeper, struggling in survivor mode with opposite schedules from her husband. Keeping it up, it just felt impossible. So she realized that all the stuff, not just physical stuff, was standing in her way of living her life. And Sarah started to get rid of things and it just clicked. She radically changed her own life. But you don't want to hear it from me. I want you to hear it from Sarah. And today we're going to be talking about building decluttering into your routines. And Sarah, I have a ton of questions for you, but before we get into them, can you tell the audience a little bit more about you and kind of expand upon what I just mentioned there?
Sarah Horgan 0:01:12
Yeah, absolutely. So, yeah, it was really my cancer diagnosis that sort of propelled me into living more intentionally. But I did really find it to be a process. And I found once I became a mother, it really pushed me even further. Because as women, we're always trying to keep up with all the things all the time, and I just found it really impossible. So I had read The Minimalists, one of their books, Everything That Remains, and I just started getting rid of stuff, and I started to find how much easier it was, and it allowed me to have a lot more time for myself. And then it kind of pushed me towards what I'm doing now because I had always wanted to write more and I felt like I had figured this out and that I could help other people. And so I just sort of started with my blog and that's rolled into my Instagram and my podcast, and now I'm coaching women, so that's sort of where I am now. And it's just allowed me so much more time to have more purpose in my own life and to have things be easier.
Destini Copp 0:02:31
So I definitely want to dig into this, specifically around the topic of kind of building this into our everyday life, which is, I think, what you that's your specialty because it can feel daunting, right. When we have maybe a lot of us live in these big homes, quite frankly, compared to a lot of people in the world, and we live in these big homes. And over the years, I know we've been in our home here for 13 years. And over the years, I know I have a ton of stuff here that I'm neither not using or I need to kind of get rid of. How can we start on that process to really make it feel like it's manageable and not so daunting?
Sarah Horgan 0:03:15
Yeah, because that's the one thing that I feel like, especially if you're already feeling overwhelmed. And a lot of the women that I work with are moms, and so they're already feeling overwhelmed with dealing with all the things all the time. And so the whole task of decluttering just feels like something extra and something big that they have to deal with. And what I try to teach women is that actually, you can just do this a few minutes a day, and that taking action on something, even if it's in a really small way, still feels really good. So it really helps to motivate you and propel you forward. So I'll say things like while you're making a meal, when you pull open a drawer to get a utensil, just take a moment and look in the drawer. And if you notice one or two things that you don't really use or are broken or whatever, just take them out. And if you have sort of a box or a bag on hand that you kind of toss these things into, then you can routinely, as you move through your home and you move through your sort of daily routines, that you can be pulling things out a little bit at a time. And then naturally, what happens is there's times where we have more energy or we feel more motivated that will tackle more and get rid of more. And maybe there's a weekend where you do more, but that overall that you're sort of continually chipping away at it, and then it becomes part of who you are. Like that you're continuously sort of organizing and staying on top of things, that you're thinking about your stuff and that you're just becoming more intentional about what's around you. So it also helps you to become more intentional about what comes into your home, because you're continually sort of like, touching in with those things. So you think to yourself, oh, I don't actually want to bring more stuff in because I've been working hard every day to get rid of stuff.
Destini Copp 0:05:18
So I love that. And as you were going through that, I was thinking about something I did this weekend that I think I actually do this, and I didn't even realize I was doing it. So I was in my car waiting on my son's baseball game to start because they had to go warm up and everything, and I had this grocery store plastic bag in there, and I was like, okay, I didn't know I had that. And I was like, I think I can clean up my car and kind of get some stuff. It wasn't trash in my car. It was just stuff that had been put in the glove box or in the center console. I love that strategy. So can you walk us through some other simple strategies like that to help us reduce that daily clutter?
Sarah Horgan 0:06:01
Yeah, what you were saying is a great one. Sometimes when you have a few minutes that you just sort of grab a bag and fill it with stuff. But there are certain areas that I think there's specific strategies for. So with your closet and clothes, which often is a really overwhelming area for women, I think clothing gets tied to so much about our body image and how we feel about ourselves. And that can be like a big area of overconsumption for people as well. And they don't want to get rid of stuff because it's like the size that used to fit or it will fit or whatever. So it's really a challenging area to tackle. So the one thing that I like to say is wear the things that are maybes for you, like if you have something hanging in your closet or in your drawer and you sort of continually pass it over, I always challenge people to wear it. Like, just take one day and pull out those pants that you keep passing over and then wear them and then decide that day like, oh, I wore these today and they were uncomfortable, or I didn't feel good in them, or whatever. And then you can just make one decision at a time. And I find that that's like a really helpful way because when you're looking at a piece of clothing that's not on your body and you haven't worn it in a while, it's easy to say, oh, I can think about when I can wear that. But if you actually have an experience wearing it and you're like, oh, that was awful, or like, I didn't feel good, or it was digging into me, or I was pulling it up all day, then it's so much easier to decide and get rid of it in the moment.
Destini Copp 0:07:39
That's a great tip because I can relate to what you just said. I have a bunch of different sizes in my closet and I'm like, oh, I need to lose like 20 pounds and then I could probably fit into that. So that is really any others?
Sarah Horgan 0:07:55
Yeah. And then I think when it comes to sentimental items, that's another really hard area for people. It's tied to a lot of emotions. A lot of those things feel irreplaceable, and they are, but we often just hang on to them because of that and we're not actually using them in our lives or interacting with them at all. So they just sort of take up space and depending on I've talked with women who a parent died and then all of their stuff came to their house. So sometimes it's quite a lot of things, but that you can take the time to process through those things. I often encourage people to go through things many times and that each time you go through like a bin of sentimental items, for example, there'll be things that you realize you don't need and you can get rid of. And sometimes it just takes more time. But that also you can do things like take a photo of an item, because often it's just about the memory and looking at it and a photo accomplishes that the same way that having the item does. But also if it's something really special, that you can do something with it, like you can display it in your home. Or I've seen people do like, really beautiful shadow boxes and have things hanging on their wall or there's lots of ideas about turning textiles into a quilt or something that you actually use on a daily basis. So it's, again, like so much of decluttering is about making decisions and that's harder for some people than others. Some of us are naturally more decisive and then there's other people who don't have the confidence yet to make those kind of decisions. So it's giving yourself an opportunity to go through those things a few times and make small decisions over and over and it builds your confidence so that then as you go further along this road, it becomes easier for you to make quick decisions about things because you feel more confident.
Destini Copp 0:10:04
And I love the tip you gave about taking a photo of that item. I had never thought of that before or even creating something with it, like a quilt that you could use every day. So that's some great tips. Can you talk about some daily routines that we can kind of put in our day to day life to help us kind of reduce that overwhelm and get that clutter out of our life?
Sarah Horgan 0:10:28
Yeah, so I think one thing that is important is about preventing things coming into your home as well while you're tackling this stuff. So I always encourage people to wait 24 hours before you buy anything and before you bring stuff into your home. So kind of give yourself a little bit of space to think about it because a lot of times stuff is tied to our emotions and we know feelings and emotions change and they change quickly. So just give yourself some time before you bring things into your home. Also, as you're doing laundry, for example, that's a really great time to sort of decide about clothes and especially kids clothes, oh, this is too small, this is ripped, or whatever. And just sort of like as you're already sorting laundry, you might as well make decisions about stuff. I think that when it comes to different rooms in your house, you can make little routines around it, like especially the kitchen and the bathroom, because we spend so much time in those spaces and we're using them routinely. For preparing meals or getting ready or whatever, that as you pull open a drawer or as you go into a cupboard, just make it part of your routine to take a quick scan or notice if something's expired or broken or that you just don't use and make decisions about it. So it's really like the practice of just making decisions routinely in whatever way fits into your routine. So like laundry or whatever, the things you are that you're doing on a daily basis to find a way to make decisions about stuff while you're doing that. Kids books, like when you go to read stories at night with your kids, just ask them. That's what I do with my daughter. I say, how do you feel about this book? We haven't read it in a while, and she either wants to read it again or she doesn't. And then we sort of pop it into the box.
Sarah Horgan 0:12:37
I just keep a box in my laundry room, and I put things in there as we go. And then once it's full, then you just take it out, so get it out of your sight. And there's one more, actually, really good one, is like a Maybe box. If you're feeling unsure about something, to have a place where you put things that you're unsure about, and then you get a chance to live without them for a little while, and then you can come back to it and say, like, okay, that actually wasn't as important or as meaningful to me as I thought, or, yeah, I do miss that. And so it's like the chance to feel the space.
Destini Copp 0:13:14
I love that, and I think I've done some of that to some extent, like putting a bag in my closet and just filling it up when I'm looking at something, I'm like, oh, I'm not going to wear this anymore. But I've never done the maybe box, and I think that would help me get a lot more stuff out of the house. So I love that tip. Sarah, before we wrap it up, do you have any last minute tips for the audience here?
Sarah Horgan 0:13:41
Yeah, I think that as women clutter affects us like they've studied this, that clutter actually affects women more than it affects men. It impacts our stress levels, it impacts how at peace we feel in our home. And I'm sure that lots of women can identify with that continual running list that we keep in our minds. And it just contributes to that, the inability to relax or to take time for ourselves when we have sort of undone stuff around us. So I would say so much of this is about changing the way you think about stuff. And I would just encourage women to think about every time that you keep something or that you have things in your home that it is taking away from your piece, or it's something that you have to maintain, or it's something you have to take care of or deal with, stuff isn't neutral. And so if you start to think about as you declutter whether or not this is worthwhile your piece or not, and is it adding to your life or not? And to sort of think about our stuff in a different way, especially when we've been living in a cluttered environment for a long time. We can really think about it as something that's neutral and it's just there. But it does have an impact on us. So just shift your thinking a little bit about your stuff and I think that really has the biggest impact and.
Destini Copp 0:15:18
Those are some great tips. And Sarah, thank you so much for joining us. And I want to let people know where they can find you and I believe you have a free gift for them also, can you let them know?
Sarah Horgan 0:15:30
Yeah, absolutely. So they can go through the link and there's an intentional living guide and it really has an exercise for you to craft your why. And I think that that's a really important exercise, although it's very simple, it's very impactful so that you understand why you're doing things and why you're going through the effort of decluttering or why you're exercising every day or whatever it is. That's like shifting towards a more intentional way of living. And when it's something that's really strong, it helps you maintain motivation to do these hard things. And then there are some of my favorite decluttering tips in there as well.
Destini Copp 0:16:16
And we will put the links to Sarah's website, her Instagram account, and her podcast too, because Sarah has a podcast, so definitely check out her podcast and also her free gift in the show notes. And Sarah, thank you so much for joining us today.
Sarah Horgan 0:16:32
Oh, thank you so much for having me.