It’s rare that anyone remains indifferent when they see a clean, tastefully decorated home. Such a house evokes thoughts of comfort and harmony. However, there are quite a few of us who find it difficult or even impossible to maintain order in the house. Living with such reality day after day, the owners experience a spectrum of all kinds of feelings - from shame to complete apathy. But there remain those who, without losing hope, try to understand the mysteries of their own or others’ behavior.
A few years ago, I was seriously puzzled by this question. IN total I've counted 12 reasons why a mess can take root in your home, and most of them are really related to psychological problems. So let's get started!
1. You are easy not taught to keep the house in order. This is not psychology, but a completely everyday skill that parents should have instilled in their children according to science. Most likely, in most of our families, cleaning was carried out using the “all-hands-on-deck” method, that is, “The guests are coming!”, “I’ll finally throw away this trash!” or “Aren’t you ashamed to be covered in dirt?!” This is a destructive approach to establishing order and only a few know about the existence of techniques for order and cleanliness. And further smaller number are able to methodically pass this technique on to their descendants.
2. Emotional immaturity
. It's already closer to psychological problems. What is needed for a complete physical development many people know. This is nutrition, sports, sun and others physical factors. What does it take for a child to develop emotionally? The question is more difficult! In the meantime, with early childhood the child must be taught to think that he is a full-fledged member of society, who is able to take care of himself and others. In practice, often everyday tasks, such as washing dishes, for example, are used for punishment purposes, which creates negative attitude to work. Or, on the contrary, the child is protected from any household responsibilities in favor of study or, even worse, entertainment: “He will still have time to work hard.” This the right way raise an over-aged child who will take time off from work whenever possible.
3. Attention to your person- the first full-fledged sign of psychological inferiority! Or one more children's way manipulation. “I can’t put on my socks!”, “I can’t heat up dinner!”, “I can’t find my gloves!” - “Oh, my good one - let me put it on, warm it up, and find it!” And in adulthood this turns to large scale: money is lost, bills are not paid, soup turns sour on the stove. In general, in any way I need to show that I am helpless, and therefore I need a “nanny” who will clean, find, serve for me.
4. Protest- this is another “hello” from childhood. Destructive ways discipline, in which rigidity, inconsistency or aggression predominated, can result in teenage rebellion. Often this rebellion migrates into adulthood under the slogan: “I’m already an adult, I live as I want.” And “I want” in defiance of the parent, that is, in disorder. Thus, a person of this type continues to prove with his chaos that he has the right to disobey his parents. Of course, there is also emotional immaturity at play here.
5. Family stereotype
It can also prevent a person from sorting out his home. If people have lived in chaos for generations, while maintaining a favorable emotional climate, a person needs the same chaos to feel at home.
6. Lack of ownership(toys, clothes, books) in childhood contributes to hoarding in adult life. A person experiences a subconscious fear of returning again to a state of lack of everything, so he does not part with what he has accumulated, although it is unnecessary.
7. Attachment to the past also prevents a person from parting with rubble in the house. Every thing in their life is like a good friend who is painful to part with. Afraid of losing touch with the past, such people often fear the future.
8.Dislike of housing blocks all attempts to start a clean life. Often the condition rented apartment or life with your spouse’s parents is very depressing. No wonder, rarely does anyone want to invest in someone else’s property or adapt to old people’s customs.
9. If you didn't teach yourself to respect yourself- this is another path not only to trash, but also to sloppiness in appearance. Main argument, a person who does not respect himself: “Yes, it will suit me too!” If you at least sometimes use this phrase, most likely you should learn a little more about self-esteem, then order will come to your house faster.
10. Emotional experiences
do not allow a person to live in cleanliness and comfort. “I throw things around as if under hypnosis,” admits 30-year-old Anya. “I absolutely don’t understand how this comes out!” In a state of emotional crisis, a person’s priorities shift. Negative thoughts and feelings should have their place - like any object in the house - used and then put away out of sight. If you forgot to clean or didn’t want to, then both negative experiences and disorder in the house begin to fill our lives. Thus, when we stop “putting things in order in our heads,” we stop putting things in order in our house.
11. Depression is a disease characterized by a decrease in mental and physical activity. With depression, a person loses motivation, which leads to cluttering the house, and cluttering the house, in turn, makes the house even more depressed.
12. Mental problems
a frequent companion of an unkempt house. For example, the so-called “Plyushkin syndrome” is considered incurable. A person carries mainly all sorts of rubbish from the trash heap, until his home is completely filled. This is the most extreme and perhaps hopeless case.
The best part is that most causes of chronic clutter in the home can be overcome! Each case requires individual approach and decent motivation, but it is possible to accustom yourself to order.
If you are one of those who have difficulty keeping their home in order, you have probably wondered at least once how those who are amazingly tidy manage it. Well, the cleanliness in such apartments will no longer cause you confusion. People who always manage to maintain order shared their secrets.
Learn to find a place
Even if you don't think you accumulate a lot of stuff, you probably have plenty of variety on every surface. Start following the rule - one new item in the house, it’s time to throw out one old one. Whenever you bring something new, find a place for it by getting rid of the old and unnecessary. This will help you avoid accumulating useless items.
Keep surfaces clean
It's common to run out of space in the odds and ends drawer, and the clutter starts to spread onto other surfaces that should be kept clean. Envelopes, checks and other small items quickly accumulate on the table. People who have in the house perfect order, immediately begin to solve the problem. If you maintain space in in perfect order, it is not only more aesthetically pleasing, it is also easier to clean. Just don't leave anything unnecessary on surfaces.
Consider a cleaning schedule
A clean house doesn't magically become that way - tidy people have a clear schedule, thanks to which they manage to keep everything in perfect order. They are distinguished by thoughtful rituals that prevent the accumulation of dust and dirt. For example, such a person probably has the habit of vacuuming or doing laundry every Monday. As a result, most important tasks never go unnoticed.
Think about order right away
Sometimes it is enough to pay attention to the little things to make your home shine. Start by taking your shoes off right away. If you leave your shoes right at your doorstep, you prevent toxins, soil, leaves and other contaminants from staining your floors and spreading throughout the room.
Keep things in their place
If you have too many things that don't have a place, clutter will be impossible to beat. Try to come up with a special corner for each item and always send it there.
Get organized step by step
People who always have a clean house do not wait until the mess reaches a critical limit. They approach the issue comprehensively. For example, before leaving the living room, they adjust the pillows and fold the blanket. They teach children to put toys in a box before bed, hang things on hangers, and fold dry laundry as soon as they remove it from the dryer.
Come up with interesting storage solutions
Tidy people are smart about using products to help them stay organized. For example, they use a variety of organizers and containers. A transparent organizer allows you to immediately see where everything is and greatly simplifies the search for the right item.
Don't be afraid to ask for help
Of course, not everyone has the budget to regularly hire professional cleaners. Those who do have such means have a higher motivation to maintain cleanliness - the cleaning lady will not put all the things in their places, she will simply put everything around in order. If you clean everything up, the house will be much cleaner.
Learn to delegate
Unless you live alone, you should understand that clutter is a collective effort. You should also take a collective approach to cleaning. Everyone should have responsibilities, and this applies not only to adults, but also to children.
Turn cleaning into something enjoyable
If you don't like cleaning, you may feel like it just can't be fun. However, there are always ways to cope with the tasks at hand without focusing on them. Make cleaning more enjoyable by listening to an interesting podcast or your favorite music.
Make storage aesthetically pleasing
If you consider organization and storage part of your interior design, you'll want to make sure everything is aesthetically pleasing. For example, you can organize your closet so that dresses are together and jeans, sweaters, and tops are kept separately. Each category can be sorted by color. It looks nice and makes searching for things much easier.
Wash the dishes right away
If you wake up and your sink is full of dishes, your mood immediately deteriorates. Try to wash dishes or load the dishwasher right away. This will make you feel more productive, and there will be no greasy residue on your plates, which is so difficult to wash off later.
Use available items for cleaning
Don't put off cleaning just because you don't have everything. necessary items. You can easily clean your windows with a regular coffee filter. You can use an old T-shirt to remove lint from clothes or remove dust. There are many similar convenient solutions that can help you.
Andrey YAKUTIN, practicing psychologist:
There is a category of people whose entire home is in terrible disarray. This causes a lot of inconvenience, but attempts to put everything in its place are futile. Let's try to figure out what these people are hiding behind their rubble?
Causes of disorder
Helplessness and loneliness
If a person makes a mess, this may indicate that he wants to free himself from feelings of helplessness or loneliness. And, throwing things around, as if “marking territory,” he tries to prove that he exists.
If your partner behaves this way, try to come to an agreement - offer to leave a place next to him for someone else.
Lack of attention
Clutter is a way to attract extra attention from others. A person asks for help in finding “lost” things, and at the same time evokes such sympathy and pity from those around him that they drop everything they are doing and rush to the rescue. This is how people who are not very confident in themselves receive additional support, which they lack in life.
Lack of desire to grow up
The habit of constant disorder comes from childhood. Books scattered everywhere, piles of things, a pile of unwashed dishes - this is a sign that characterizes children too pedantic people. There is only one salvation from the desire for excessive order on the part of parents - your own disorder.
And then the grown-up slobs refuse to follow generally accepted concepts about cleanliness and order, considering them unnecessary conventions that vividly recall the time when almost the only phrase with which parents communicated with their children was: “Clean up the room!”
Disorder as a means of avoiding adult responsibility for your life leaves a ghostly hope that someone will solve your problems for you. For example, it will put things in order in the kitchen, on the desktop, pay bills, allow you to demonstrate own helplessness and further.
Constant anxiety
Sometimes death loved one or even a beloved animal, divorce or a breakup can make a person completely unwilling to clean up their home. This sometimes accompanies depression. A mess at home literally sucks a person in, drowning him in anxiety attacks and his own past.
There is only one way out - urgently start throwing out everything unnecessary and putting in order what is valuable in order to free up the space at home and your inner space for everything new, more joyful and giving love.
Do you recognize yourself? And want to fix something? It's real!
Recipe for Cleanliness
Refuse to help you find the things you need. Forever. By doing this, you will deprive yourself of emotional “positive” reinforcement, additional attention from others and, possibly, main reason leading to chaos.
Come up with a “tasty” incentive to clean up. For example, you want to finally invite guests into your home, or at least just calmly approach the work table or the kitchen sink, and not make your way through the rubble.
Start sorting out the rubble with something that won't throw you into panic. For example, take out the trash first. Then wash the dishes, sort out some things, arrange books and magazines. And attempts to remove everything at once will most likely remain attempts.
Have you tried all of the above, but your apartment is still in chaos? This means that your inner turmoil has very deep roots. And to get to them, you will have to sort through your memories, the fears and emotions associated with them. That is, to qualitatively shake up the past. On your own or with the help of a specialist.
“I’ll cook, and you clean up here”
If you are “lucky enough” to live next to a person who sows chaos around him, under no circumstances take the position of a parent towards your partner, fueling his feelings of guilt. Look at the situation with humor, find a compromise: “I’ll cook something tasty, and you clean up the table.” This is how you are more likely to find mutual understanding and maintain peace and love in your family.
How to determine the level of clutter in your home?
To do this, answer a few questions.
1.Have you ever lost an important document, check or receipt at home?
2. Do you feel a sense of panic before a sudden visit from guests?
3.Have you ever lost your own jewelry at home?
4.Do you feel like there are too many unnecessary things at home?
5.The closet is full of things, but you have nothing to wear?
6.Are you often dissatisfied with your own appearance?
7.Are you constantly short of time?
8.Do your friends make fun of the mess in your home?
9. Are you late for work in the morning because you can’t find the right wardrobe item?
results
If you gave positive answers to at least 4 out of 9 questions, it means that your home is no longer a creative mess, but real chaos. We recommend doing spring cleaning in the very near future!
Mess in the house - just a reflection of our inner life. We are sure of this Melva Green And Lauren Rosenfield, authors of the book “Breathe freely. How a messy home can help you sort yourself out". It is useless to study storage systems; it is not enough to be able to do so. In order for order to reign in the house, you need a careful analysis of all the accumulated rubbish, leisurely cleaning, during which you can not only part with unnecessary things, but also create space for a new life.
At its core, decluttering is a deep spiritual practice that helps you get closer to the people you love and to yourself.
We have selected several universal tips from the book that will help you make your home cozy and find spiritual harmony.
Come up with word symbols for each room
Any room in the house - it is not only a functional room where we eat, sleep, wash, work or communicate with household members and guests. This is also our small universe, the center of our unique life. There must be something special, attractive about her.
Before you start cleaning, the book's authors advise choosing at least three symbol words for each room that describe the atmosphere you want to create in them. For example, words for the bedroom - "rest, relaxation, love", for the kitchen - “creativity, inspiration, comfort”, for the living room - “communication, light, peace.” Such formulations will help in the cleaning process: after all, it is important not only to get rid of the trash, but also to decide what exactly you want to achieve.
Creating atmosphere becomes the goal of designers and architects. You should approach your home space the same way.
Take a look at the interior from the outside
In order to clearly understand what items and things you should get rid of, Melva Green and Lauren Rosenfield suggest doing several simple but very effective exercises.
For the hallway: walk out the door and then walk in as if you were a first-time guest. What's the first thing that catches your eye? What feeling comes over you? What prevents you from experiencing positive emotions? Remove those things that turned out to be “unnecessary” and caused discomfort. Head out the door again. Do this until you realize that the hallway is filled with life and not with trash.
For the kitchen: Grab your favorite cookbooks and plan a dinner that's a real treat. Don’t deny yourself anything, think through every dish. Once you've planned your menu, go through each recipe and get out all the tools you need to prepare that dinner: pots, bowls, blenders, spatulas. Lay it out on the table. And take a break. If that's all you need for the perfect dinner, why do you need the rest?
Throw away unnecessary items with compassion.
As with any task, the right attitude is important for cleaning. The authors of the book advise not to treat the process as a battle for life and death: “Under the influence of adrenaline, we cannot act competently and think intelligently.” It's best to treat unnecessary things with delicate participation and even sympathy. You can even talk to them kindly, “How did you get here?”, “Let’s get out of here and get you back to where you belong.”
When touching a thing, try to evoke in your soul the sympathy you feel for a lost child. To some objects you will say, “You are in the wrong room. I know where you will feel better." Such things are sent to the “relocate” box. You will address others with the words: “You have wandered too far. This is not the place for you, but I know we will find you a home.” These items go into the “charity” box.
Avoid negative emotions
There are only two types of emotions - absorbing (negative) and replenishing (positive). The goal of decluttering is to keep an eye on consuming emotions and prevent them from materializing in the home.
How many things do you keep to yourself because of guilt, regret, anxiety and fear? It is extremely important to understand how much space these emotions take up in life. If we intend to get rid of them, we must know what power they have over us. Now take these things away: donate them, recycle them, send them to a landfill. The choice is yours, but you must say goodbye to the consuming emotions that these things cause!
Don't leave secret places
Everyone has places in their home where mountains of junk are hidden from prying eyes. You must pull out the contents of all hiding places, deal with them and never hide anything anywhere again. No matter how much you want it. There simply shouldn’t be any “secret” places in the house.
You need to rid your home and your life of dubious things. It’s not enough to put them out of sight. They will remain in my thoughts. Even if no one knows about their existence, these things will consume you.
Don't be afraid of empty space
Most people are afraid of empty space in the house, even a small one: emptiness is perceived as a flaw. "We're willing to bet that your home - be it a studio apartment with an area of twenty-seven square meters or a huge mansion - stuffed with things - written by Melva Green and Lauren Rosenfield. - Every flat surface is covered with objects. Each box is filled with different little things. Every closet is full. Nothing surprising. From an early age we see that this is how these spaces are used. It seems unnatural to do otherwise. We are so used to this that we instinctively fill any empty space.”
And, indeed, if we find an unoccupied space, the first thing we do is - we find something to occupy him or even worse - We mindlessly fill it up with a bunch of rubbish. But try to leave it as is, free and breathing. After all, you're making room for things that aren't for you.
Stick with the idea that not every space needs to be cluttered or filled with something.