Recently I finished reading Clear Your Clutter with Feng Shui by Karen Kingston. Which I recommend for anyone wanting to learn more about different insights into decluttering. One aspect of the book I found interesting was the concept of Feng Shui bagua. Feng Shui bagua is the idea that different regions of your home are linked to specific areas of your life. Furthermore, when clutter exists in these regions, they can negatively impact the corresponding area of your personal life. For example, the top left corner of a room is linked to prosperity, wealth and abundance and therefore clutter in this area may mean that a person is experiencing financial difficulty. It is only when they remove the clutter that their financial circumstances may improve. I found this concept intriguing, but at the same time, a little farfetched as how could clutter in specific regions of someone’s home impact certain areas of their personal life?
Clutter & Mental Wellbeing
Despite my view, Feng Shui bagua did reinforce that clutter and disorganisation could affect a person’s overall mental health and wellbeing. This was recently reinforced when I had to go through a box of stuff that I had stored at my mum’s place. I took the box back to my apartment, went through it and was happy to get rid of most of the stuff. However, I felt the stuff had some value, so I decided to put it online and attempt to sell it. While the items were up for sale, I decided to leave them on my armchair; ensuring they were front of mind guaranteeing that I would get rid of them.
This turned out to be a mistake as two months later some items remained on my armchair. Having these things linger in my apartment put me in a frustrated and negative mood. The primary cause of this negativity was that the unwanted items were causing clutter and disorganisation in my apartment. This was stuff I no longer needed, yet I had allowed it to take up space and energy in my apartment, and every day I was reminded of that. While I did not discover any adverse impact on a particular area of my life (which according to Feng Shui bagua it would have been knowledge, wisdom and self-improvement), it did negatively affect my overall mental health and wellbeing. It wasn’t until I got rid of the items that my mood improved.
What can you take away from my experience?
Your mood may be a reflection of how organised or rather how disorganised your home is. Consider declutter and organising your home. Living with less will not only improve your mental health and wellbeing but also clears your mind to focus on things you truly value. When you declutter, you need to ensure unwanted items leave your home as quickly as possible. This will guarantee you reap the benefits of an organised home sooner. As I experienced having unwanted items linger put me in a negative mindset and it wasn’t until I removed the items that my mood improved.
The best method to ensuring unwanted items leave your home quickly is to plan how you are going to discard unwanted items. For example, unwanted clothing can be donated to charity; old magazines can be recycled, etc. While the objective is to dispose of things quickly, you need to ensure you are disposing of things ethically. While landfill may be the quickest, it is often the least ethical.
In my blog are you decluttering in a responsible manner?, I provide some ways you can ethically dispose of unwanted items. Selling is one ethical disposal method I recommend, however, based on my recent experience it is the most time consuming and may mean that things stay in your home longer. My recommendation if you choose to sell unwanted items is to ask yourself; is all the time and energy in coordinating the sale worth the money I will make from the sale. For example, I would have earned about $200 by selling my unwanted items. Honestly, it was not worth the time and effort, in taking the photo, posting the item online, negotiating price, coordinating the pickup, etc. I even had one person agree to by an item, I made time in my day to meet them, and they didn’t even show up. If it’s not worth, your time and effort to sell unwanted items consider giving them away for free or donating them to charity, which is what I ended up doing, since doing so, I feel much better for it.
The simple benefits of generosity far outweigh the financial rewards of most garage sales
Josh Becker – Becoming Minimalist
While I have not experienced the concept Feng Shui bagua, it has reinforced my views that clutter can have an adverse impact on a person’s life. By making your home clutter free and organised you are taking positive steps to help to improve your mental health and wellbeing. While the journey to a clutter-free and organised home can be challenging, the quicker you remove clutter from your home the better your mood.
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