Stress Free Life

Here is a great article by Darren Hardy of TSTN about the relationship between clutter in your life and stress.

Ask yourself, what would make me feel more peaceful, calm and inspired at home, at the office or in my car? What would I need to eliminate and what could I add?
First and foremost, I would suggest- CLEANSE.
Clean the clutter. Your surroundings mirror the organization in your head and thus your emotional body. Don't give in to the weak excuse, "I know it looks like clutter to you, but it's how I know where everything is." If it LOOKS like clutter, it is!
See, that's the point, your mind takes on emotionally what it sees physically.
Give it the appearance of a stress-free, tidy, peaceful environment and it will be so, emotionally.
When was the last time you went into a spa and saw it cluttered with stacks of files, paperwork, bills and notepads strewn about? How would that make you feel? That is exactly why you don’t feel free of stress and relaxed in your home or office if it is a mess of visual clutter.
Three good rules I have learned that work for me:
1) One-touch rule - Never touch a piece of paper more than once. Either file it (out of sight) or chuck it. If you pick it up and set it down more than once, it is now clutter.
2) Clear - At the end of the day, clear your desk of everything (yes, everything!). File it all away. If you are working on some things, create an action file and put it all in there and in a drawer or briefcase for easy access the next day.
3) Purgatory - If you are unsure whether something is going to ever be important and there is no appropriate file for it, make a file for that (I literally label my file, “Purgatory”). If I am looking for something, I can go through it, but 99.9% of the time I don’t. Every 3-months, without even looking through the contents, I throw the entire file out. The one out of a thousand times when you throw something out that you could have used, is worth the peaceful state of mind you will have by not accumulating and keeping clutter.
That leads me to the last point…
4) Purge - Don't be a pack rat. I LOVE to throw stuff out. It's so invigorating. I feel like I am simplifying and ridding myself of psychic weightiness. It is cathartic and liberating. When you harbor stuff, it's an indication that you are also harboring emotional (stress) stuff.
You can start with cleansing your physical environment and it will start the process of cleansing your psyche and emotional “house”.
Bonus Tip: I PP in my closet too (Purgatory and Purge). The funny thing is we only really wear (regularly) 10-20% of the clothes we have cluttering our drawers and closets – you know, our “favorite stuff”. We keep that other stuff around for that rare (never) occasion when you might wear it again. It doesn’t happen (because you go back to an ‘ol favorite) and it just litters our drawers and closets anyway.
I create a purgatory section in my closet. If I don’t wear it for a year, I donate it the next. I give away a lot of clothes – nice stuff, but I just don’t wear it and I would rather not have it collecting dust, taking space and burdening my consciousness. You would be surprised how freeing and energizing it is to cleanse, simplify and streamline your “stuff”.

Alright, no more just reading and saying “oh, good idea” and not taking any action. Do it now:
1. Clear your desk now (yes, right now). File or store necessary documents (most of which is not necessary). If you are unsure, put it in a “Purgatory” box and put today’s date on it and the date 6-months (we’ll start you off slow) from now. When that date comes, don’t look and throw it out.
2. Clear the rest of your office the same way. Strive for as little visual pollution and clutter as possible – think “Zen”. Have only what inspires you in your visual environment and file or store what only reminds you of burdens and disorder.
3. Clear your bedroom and kitchen as well. All these environments need to support a stress-free consciousness. These rooms in particular need nurture and support your calm and positive state of mind.
Daily life will give you enough to be “stressed” about, what you don’t need is to constantly live and exist in a visually caustic reinforcement of stress, disorder and chaos. Eliminate the visual turmoil of your environment and you will be surprised with the energy you will have left to ward off the rest.
Feeling better already?

- Darren Hardy

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