This article has been written by our writing services findwritingservice.com/ along with their essay writer Melisa. Recently, a trend towards the decluttering of living space has become popular. People arrange flash mobs, take part in training sessions, and tell friends on social networks how many things they got rid of today and what they plan to throw away in the near future. Let’s see what kind of phenomenon it is, where it came from, and what is good about it.

Where did the trend come from

Initially, decluttering was just a way to clean up the house and get rid of old things.

So, Marla Cilley in her The Fly Lady book suggested her approach to cleaning homes for American housewives. In the late 1990s, the eleven principles of “flying ladies” inspired many women and made them change their minds about everyday household chores. According to the author, in order to clean less, you need to litter less, but for this, you need the right conditions. That is, throwing away all that is superfluous, just do not litter the space again and regularly clean the house. Working housewives, and then other social groups, also appreciated the principles of housecleaning for housewives.

There is nothing surprising about it. For years our mothers and grandmothers have been saving and collecting towels, dinner sets, and carpets, many unnecessary figurines, etc., for which we had to queue for hours. The shortage of goods in stores forced them to stock up for future use – because of this, many things were never used and like dead weight in closets. Therefore, the grandchildren dream of throwing out a grandmother’s dinner set with holiday plates and a stack of bed linen, which they do not like, but was bought for some reason.

The decluttering movement

Another famous declutter is the Japanese writer Marie Kondo. She wrote Magical cleaning in 2011. The Japanese art of putting things in order at home and in life ”laid the foundation for a new wave of popularity of getting rid of home trash and launched several flash mobs on the Internet. After the release of the series “Cleaning with Marie Kondo”, the author was nominated for an Emmy Award for the reality show. Her followers are all over the world.

The principles are pretty simple. At the space level – once a year/month/week a total inventory is carried out. Each item is weighed and evaluated in terms of utility and frequency of use. If the dress has not been worn for a year or a bright mug with flowers has not been taken from the shelf, they must be thrown away. If it is a pity to throw out, then things need to be sorted into categories and distributed.

An important point is if a thing belongs to a specific category (an elegant evening dress, a tent for tourism, etc.), then you do not need to rush and do not cut it out. Put the thing away and give it a year of probation so that it shows itself.

We advise you to approach the declutter-up of your wardrobe and home wisely – you should not throw away absolutely all things that have not been used for a year.

Decluttering began to gain popularity along with the spread of minimalism in the interior – this style involves only the most necessary, simple in form and functional pieces of furniture. There is also a minimum of decor, and everything that can be hidden behind the facades of the cabinets is hidden. A person in such a home understands that trash needs to be put somewhere, otherwise the harmony in the interior will be lost due to unnecessary details. Built-in wardrobes cease to solve this problem over time, and you will have to declutter periodically – without this, living in a minimalist interior is simply impossible.

Things and people must carry positive energy

Decluttering already has several levels and techniques, and this process is associated not only with cleaning the premises.

The method of the same Marie Kondo, for example, is also associated with the creation of psychological comfort. The bottom line is to take each thing into your hands and feel its energy – does it bring joy or only recalls the past, depresses, crushes, upsets? If the second, then with any subject it is worth saying goodbye. Only things with positive energy should remain in the house.

The same thing with people – you need to understand if this or that person makes you sad or worried. You need to stop communicating with toxic friends.

Minimalism in the digital environment

Another level of decluttering is getting rid of unnecessary content on the phone and computer.

When photographs were printed on paper, they were treasured precisely because they were harder to reproduce. Old wrinkled photos are carefully stored in family archives – they are truly unique because negatives are often lost.

The book of the same name by Cal Newport is devoted to digital minimalism: digital minimalists, having reduced their stay on the Internet, note positive changes in their lives.

Thus, the decluttering of space is no longer only at the level of a person’s home or environment. The digital environment is also being cleared. And this makes a lot of sense – a huge amount of time is released that can be spent more rationally.

Get rid of the unnecessary for the sake of change

Fans of trashing and the authors of the training sessions argue that the amount of temporary and living space for each person has limitations. If these conditional vessels are filled with unnecessary little things, then you should not wait for changes in life – they simply have nowhere to come, because everything is already busy.

Therefore, it is necessary to give up old bored classes, to make repairs, after buying new clothes, it is imperative to remove the old one, which you will definitely not wear anymore. It makes no sense to protect it – you will not want to return to what has already been put out to grass.

Many followers come to the practice of decluttering as a result of some changes in life or searching for themselves; they undergo various marathons and training sessions by psychologists. A huge number of users on social networks regularly pick up the baton from friends on the hashtag # decluttering and participate in flash mobs.

It is impossible to say for sure how long the trend will last, but it is actively gaining popularity along with organic food and veganism.