If I had a pound or a dollar for every time a client or member had said to me ‘but it might come in useful, I might need it or use it again’ I’d be very rich.

Here’s why you convince yourself that things you let go of would have come in useful and why you use is as a justification to keep everything in your clutter.

Your Brain the Filing Cabinet

Your brain stores new thoughts, feelings and memories in your memory filing cabinet. The most recent thoughts, feelings and memories get stored in date order with the most recent ones at the front. It sorts and organises most of these thoughts, feelings and memories while you sleep, which is why you can sometimes wake up in the night or in the morning and find you’ve figured something out that you struggled to figure out while you were awake. You brain did the sorting while you slept and was able to make the connections.

If you’ve been trying to make decisions based on ‘Keep’ and ‘Get Rid Of’ (rather than the 7 Action Focused Categories of the Clutter Clearing Process), you may have decided to be ruthless and get rid of something. So, you put that thing in the rubbish / trash / recycling or took it to the charity shop / goodwill and felt proud that you’ve ‘got rid’ of something from your clutter.

By making that decision you’ve moved the thought, feeling and memory of that thing in your clutter from way back in your filing cabinet to the front. 

Fast forward a day, week or even a month or two and a situation arises where you’re trying to solve a problem or find a solution to something in the present. Your brain starts trying to solve the problem and search for a solution by going to its filing cabinet of thoughts, feelings and memories, starting at the front with the most recent and working its way backwards.

Guess what? Because you ‘got rid’ of that thing recently, the thoughts, feelings and memories associated with that thing are near the front of the filing cabinet, and because you believe that thing you got rid of is the ONLY thing that would have solved your problem in the present, you stop looking for another solution and believe you ‘should’ have kept it.

But here’s the thing. If you hadn’t got rid of that thing, the thoughts, feelings and memories associated with it would have stayed in the deep, dark, depths of your filing cabinet. When you then started trying to figure out a solution to the problem or situation you have in the present, you would have almost certainly come across ANOTHER thought, feeling and memory about something else that would have ALSO been a solution to the problem.

Of course, it’s more likely that you would have become impatient, given up looking in your filing cabinet, and either got rid of it anyway, gone and bought a new one, bought something else, or actually found a BETTER solution to the problem.

When you find yourself keeping things because it ‘might come in useful’, put the item in your not sure category so your brain has time to process it, realise that you don’t need it and let go safely when it’s ready.

You can clear your clutter fast, or you can clear your clutter forever, but you can’t clear your clutter forever, fast.

To find out how Clare can help you clear your clutter Forever, without the need for an expensive home visit, click here now: https://www.clutterclearing.net/clares-help-centre/