Let's Talk CLUTTER
Clutter: a collection of things lying about in an untidy state.
Do you ever feel like your mind is cluttered? Like you have too much lying around that it is getting in the way of your daily functioning?
Mental clutter may include: keeping a long mental to-do list, worrying about the future, ruminating about the past, and the list goes on.
Just like how a cluttered mind can slow us down, our home and work environments can have a major impact on our performance and our mood.
Picture this, you had a busy week at work and an even busier weekend trying to squeeze in life maintenance and socialising. Monday morning comes, your alarm clock goes off and you are scrambling to get yourself ready; rummaging around trying to decipher which clothes are clean and trying to remember where you left your keys the night before. By the time you get to work, you are already exhausted and do not feel ready to face the day.
We have all been there. When we are left feeling like life is chaotic and it’s only 9 am on a Monday morning. When our home environment is chaotic, it can cause us to feel disorganised and frustrated.
Home organisation videos such as the ‘Tap to Tidy’ trend have flooded our social media as we take delight in just how satisfying they are to watch. Research shows that maintaining a clean and organised home has benefits for our mental and physical health:
Reduces Stress and Depression
Research conducted by the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin found that individuals who described their homes as “cluttered” reported higher levels of fatigue, low mood, and higher levels of the stress hormone cortisol, than those who described their homes as “restful”.
Cortisol is a helpful response to a stressful episode. However, unnecessarily heightened cortisol levels contribute to a prolonged anxiety response in the body, leaving you feeling fatigued.
Increases Productivity
Research has illustrated that increased levels of clutter in your working environment decrease productivity. The Journal of Neuroscience reports that a cluttered environment can overload your visual cortex, making it more difficult to focus as your brain has more information in your surroundings to process. This is particularly significant as more and more of us are working from home. As we are having to adapt spaces in our homes into functional working environments, it is important to try to give yourself an organised place to work to increase efficiency and allow for greater levels of achievement to be felt.
Improves sleep
As previously mentioned, having a cluttered environment can cause stress and as we all know, stress levels can have a major impact on our quality of sleep. Having a disorganised bedroom or one that is cluttered can reinforce the sensation that you have too many ‘loose ends’, increasing anxiety and the sensation of having a ‘cluttered mind’. A study conducted by the National Sleep Foundation found that those who make their beds every morning are 19% more likely to experience regular good quality sleep.
Helps you Eat Better
The journal of Psychological Science conducted a study which found that working in a clean and clutter-free environment makes you twice as likely to make healthier food choices. Not only will this benefit your physical health, but we know that there is a correlation between junk food consumption and psychological distress, therefore improving our diets may contribute to improving our mental health.
Thank you for reading!
Jessica
