How Clutter Affects Your Life, & Secret (But Simple) Military Communication Techniques
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Special Announcement: Especially for listeners in and around San Antonio/Austin, TX
Our friend and colleague Karen Meade of Let’s Get Organizing will be hosting her annual Organize and Energize workshop. It’s on Saturday, January 19th, 2013 from 9:30 AM to 12:30 PM at TriPoint on North St Mary’s, in San Antonio, Texas. There’s a great lineup of speakers talking about organization, meal planning, health and fitness and Dan will be there talking about tech. For more information check out LetsGetOrganizing.com or Facebook.com/LetsGetOrganizing. Hope to see you there!

Main Topics  
Vanessa's Topic: How Clutter Affects Your Life
So, what is clutter?  Here’s how some experts define it:

Princeton University's WordNet defines clutter as:

"a confused, multitude of things"
"to fill a space in a disorderly way"
"a confused, disorderly, jumble of things"
"filled or scattered with disorderly accumulation of objects or rubbish"


Clutterers Anonymous defines clutter as:

"anything we don't need, want, or use that takes our time, energy or space, and destroys our serenity"


Clutter is more than piles and piles of stuff.

It's a combination of new, old, unused, forgotten, misplaced, and emotionally (or coerced into being emotionally) "attached to" items.


Clutter is more than just a physical item...clutter is also about how an item is or isn’t being used. For example, a magazine in-and-of itself isn't clutter...it's just a magazine.  But when that magazine hasn't been read for two weeks, two months, or even a year and is just sitting on top of a stack of other magazines that are several years old, and that stack is on top of your desk preventing you from being able to use it...that's when that magazine is now considered "clutter."

So for the rest of this topic, let’s just consider clutter as "anything we don’t need, want, or use that takes our time, energy, space and serenity"

Examples of clutter:

Things that are expired (food,  medicine and toiletries for example)
Duplicate items (3 coffee makers, 4 vacuum cleaners, 3 punch bowls, 3 of the exact same North Face jackets...all the same color and style...you get the idea)
Things that belong to someone else (stuff you’ve borrowed and never returned)
Broken toys
Broken dishes
Broken appliances and tools
Outgrown toys
Clothes you’ve grown out of
Knick knacks that don’t serve any purpose
Gifts that...let’s face it...you never really liked  ("in a million years I wouldn't be seen dead in this" kinds of gifts)
Hand me downs or inherited items that you’ll never use
Just in case items...for emergencies
"Don't know" (no idea why it's there or how to use it...but darn it, I'm keeping it!)
Stuff that causes safety concerns (pose a hazard such as fire or physical harm)
Stuff that can cause health concerns...old food sitting around the house, trash lying around attracting bugs and rodents, etc.
Obsolete / outdated papers
Piles of papers and mail that have never been opened or are waiting to be opened and sorted

Other not-so obvious clutter items aren’t necessarily physical items, but impact your lifestyle


Overcommitment
Meaningless activity / duplication of effort (activity that is unfulfilling or serves no real purpose)
Old resentments and ill feelings / unresolved issues
Unsatisfying relationships
Unsatisfying work (paid work, work at home, volunteer work, etc).
Digital clutter (emails, photos, online documents)

So those are a few examples of what clutter is, but how do you know if clutter is affecting you?  
You see...the truth about clutter and accumulating more, is that eventually you'll be overwhelmed by the physical clutter which in turn will overwhelm you emotionally in terms of stress,