Do You Feel Guilty?

Louise felt really overwhelmed and frustrated. Her husband put his “crap” anywhere he felt like leaving it. After years of arguing, she found it easier to just pick it up for him than try to get him to do it. 

She felt guilty. “After all,” she said, “he works long hours and she doesn’t work at all.” 

Maybe you can relate. 

She also felt guilty asking for my help, thinking that she should be able to get the mail and paper clutter “under control” on her own, especially since she didn’t work. 

It's hard to do something you have never learned to do. De-cluttering is not cleaning house. 

I asked Louise how she spent her time. She rattled off the few things she did "as not much:"

1) managing two large homes,

2) selling a product her family produced,

3) caring for her own family, 3 kids and elderly father, and

4) frequently entertaining her husband’s colleagues. 

She worked! Louise had numerous jobs, and little respect for her time. Her husband couldn’t possibly work the demanding hours at a job he loved if she wasn’t putting in equal time managing their lives. She gave him his freedom. Valuable if you ask me! 

“I never thought of it that way,” she said. (I love it when my clients say that to me!) 

In truth, her house was beautiful and very orderly. Stuff was stashed in closets and drawers, but the house was in shape for guests to come over anytime. (Imagine that!)

The first clutter Louise had to “get rid of” was her guilt, and replace it with a healthy dose of self-respect. Paper clutter was easy after that. In a matter of weeks, Louise learned how to keep taking care of the new systems we put in place. We switched from in-home sessions to over the phone coaching to fine-tune the sytems to fit her family, and surprise, surprise, her husband began to make more of an effort, too. 

Louise was GETTING FREE of lots of clutter:

1) in her thinking, and subsequent guilt,

2) in her calendar, making time to de-clutter with me,

3) in her relationship, the arguing with her husband,

4) in her home, the paper clutter, and mail - in that order.