CLUTTER vs FORM + FUNCTION + WELLBEING

Why I Help Clients Eliminate Environmental Stress

As a Stress Management Coach I help people to prevent and manage stress, whether that is personal stress, workplace stress, or environmental stress. Environmental stress can manifest in the home or workplace with contributing factors such as; pollution, temperature, overcrowding, noise and of course, clutter and mess.

During my degree we studied 'Form & Function'. William Morris said, “Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.” Form and function requires something to be useful and beautiful. How many items in our cluttered homes nowadays can we honestly call both functional and beautiful? That lurid, highly branded plastic bottle of washing up liquid serves a purpose, but you’ll be hard pushed to convince me that any of them on offer are ‘beautiful’. They are usually to be found in an under sink cupboard or by the sink itself, on display. Perhaps some items are neither useful nor beautiful? How many of us have bought an item which we thought (or were told) would be helpful to our lives, only to find it at the back of a cupboard 5 years later with a load of other ‘useful’ items? My guess is that if it were beautiful, it would be on display.

"The items you spend your (ever-increasingly) hard earned money on need to work hard for you. They need to add value to your life."

The last declutter I did with my own belongings was when I moved house. One particular draw contained appliance and gadget user manuals. Whilst I had previously systemised packing them neatly away in case I needed them in the future, it became apparent when sorting through them that a lot of them weren’t useful because the corresponding appliance/gadget was long gone. Old user manuals. Neither useful nor beautiful.

We are all suffocating in consumer goods and so is the planet. When I left my career in buying I had started to feel the weight of guilt that I was contributing to our unhealthy consumer culture. Every season/year we had to produce/buy/sell X millions of pairs of shoes to meet our ever increasing budgets and 5 year plans. But I’m fairly sure that 10 years ago no one was really thinking about the after life of all those shoes and the components that went into making them, in many cases, upwards of 25 per shoe. How many pairs of shoes do we all have versus how many we actually need? Shoes are just 1 item in a list of hundreds, if not thousands, of items in our homes. How many multiples of each do we unnecessarily keep hold of, many of which are probably gathering dust and causing us stress.

Why We Should All Consider Decluttering

Decluttering can be extremely cathartic. Having so many items on display in every room is a lot for the brain to look at and process everyday. It is like spending too much time scrolling on social media; our brains have to process it all and we end up anxious and stressed. Not only that, but the process of decluttering, of letting go, can teach us to value items differently. Firstly, they are just items, material belongings. They should not replace people or connections and if they do, we can become overly attached and emotionally invested in them to the extent that letting go can be really hard. The items you spend your (ever-increasingly) hard earned money on need to work hard for you. They need to add value to your life.

I went to uni to become an interior designer. After my degree I ended up going into the corporate world, creating products and product ranges for national & global brands and multi-channel retailers. The chances are that that your husband/brother/son/nephew/ grandfather has had a pair of my shoes on their feet at some point. At uni I wrote my final dissertation on Brands and I have worked for and with many internationally recognised brands. Brands, especially tech brands, are very good at telling us what we need and indeed, creating the need in the first place. Updated versions of products are released and of course, we are told why we need to buy the news ones. But do we? The result of being sold so many things, is clutter. Clutter which gets out of control, clutter which stresses us out. Clutter which we often can’t face sorting out. Perhaps because the scale of the task is overwhelming, perhaps because we know how much money was spent on buying the items in the first place. The guilt of an unworn item of clothing which still has the tag on it 5 years later and which we know we won’t wear because either it doesn't fit or it's not 'on trend' anymore. We all like nice things and I’m not suggesting that we shouldn’t buy consumer goods. But if we can all be more mindful about what we choose to buy and the value that the item brings us, we would end up with less unwanted clutter.

Having a cluttered space can be really stressful. Sometimes we can be blind to it. We can just get used to our status quo. We may wonder why we struggle to relax when we’re surrounded my mess. We don’t need to live in homes which have the look and feel of a modern interiors magazine, but we should all be considering how our environments are affecting our moods. When you sit in your kitchen or living room, how do you feel? I firmly believe that our homes should give us a hug and if they don’t, why aren’t they? In this modern world, if our homes aren’t our sanctuaries, then where on earth is?

5 Tips For Thinking About Your Spaces Differently;

1. Get rid of things that have served their purpose & overstayed their welcome. Ask yourself ‘How does this item add value to my life?’

2. Have effective storage solutions where items can be stored neatly and out of sight

3. Consider how you want to use your space e.g. reading space, social space, space to undertake a hobby/activity

4. Consider your senses i.e. lighting, air flow, temperature, smells & your view

5. Bring nature in as much as possible

As a Stress Management Coach, it became clear to me that just helping clients to manage personal stress via 1-1 coaching wasn’t all I could help them with given my interest, education & experience. I still have a lifelong interest in interior design, but now it comes from needing a home to provide a hug. The Danish call it 'Hygge'. Stress and trauma give you a new perspective on what is important. Your home should be your sanctuary, not somewhere which adds to your stress. Now, for me, interior design and styling is about creating spaces which supports your wellbeing.

#Declutter for #Wellbeing

Hannah offers in-person Decluttering, Home Organisation and Virtual Declutter Coaching. To find out more visit www.simplelifespaces.co.uk