Are you overwhelmed by more than just the mess you see?

Clutter isn’t just about the things piling up in your closet or the endless emails in your inbox—it’s often about the unspoken stories, habits, and identities we carry. In this episode, we sit down with Stephanie Young, a professional organizer who goes beyond surface solutions to help people uncover the “why” behind the clutter and find freedom in their physical, digital, and mental spaces.

What We Cover

• Why clutter is often rooted in emotional patterns, trauma, and learned behaviors—not just “too much stuff”
• How societal changes and family history shape our urge to hold on or accumulate
• The real impact of mental and digital clutter, and why they’re often overlooked
• How to honor the stories behind sentimental objects without letting them control your space
• Simple, functional strategies to start decluttering on your terms
• The power of group support—and why sharing your decluttering journey can lighten your load

Key Takeaways

• Clutter is about what we hold onto—and why. It’s more emotional than physical.
• Functional organization is personal. Find what actually works for you, not what looks good in a magazine or on Instagram.
• Sentimental items should be seen and enjoyed, not boxed and forgotten.
• Your clutter often hides in digital and mental spaces. Unsubscribing from emails or acting on repetitive to-dos can bring immediate relief.
• Asking for help isn’t a sign of failure—your ask may be the answer to someone else’s need.
• Progress doesn’t require perfection. Start with one small step—trash a single item, unsubscribe from one email, schedule a lingering task.

Take Action

Pick one area—your junk drawer, inbox, or to-do list—and do a single thing today: throw out rubbish, unsubscribe from five emails, or finally tackle that one nagging task. Share your experience with a friend or in our community—because you’re not alone on this journey.

Ready to transform your relationship with stuff?

Visit hiresteph.com/clutterescape for Stephanie Young's online support group, and join the conversation on the Epic Living with Jean Facebook page.

Because it’s not really about having less.

It’s about living with intention, creating space for what matters, and remembering—it’s all about the story.

Mentioned in this episode:

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I'm in Texas right now, sitting in a hotel room. And if you know me, you know that usually means I'm either on an adventure or in the middle of a story. And this one is an adventure. But a girl still has to work. So I took some time to interview Stephanie Young, and we had a great discussion about something that I think haunts all of us. Clutter. But not just the kind that you can see, the kind that you feel.

I've been in a season of cleaning things out. Drawers, closets, files, and yes, even my computer. In the middle of this mess, I caught myself asking a question that I don't think we ask nearly enough. How much of this stuff is actually serving me? Not what used to serve me, not what someone told me I should keep, not what I paid money for that I'm holding on to because someday I might get around to using it, but what is actually serving me right now. And here's what I realized. Clutter isn't really about the stuff. It's about stories. It's about habits, it's about identity.

It's about the things that we were taught, the things that we've experienced, and sometimes the things that we're afraid to let go of. I've come to see that all that overflowing closet, that packed inbox, that never ending to do list, that's not disorganization, that's overwhelm. It's comparison. Their grief and their fear. It's like we're trying to use this stuff to feel something in us that doesn't get filled by having more. And that's why this conversation matters. Stephanie doesn't just help people get organized. She helps them understand why things got that way in the first place.

And more importantly, how to create a space physically, mentally, and digitally that actually supports the life that we want to live. Not someone else's system, not a one size fits all solution, but something that works for them. And I'll tell you, there were more than a couple moments in this conversation where I just stopped and thought, wow, that changes everything. So whether your clutter is in your closet, your calendar, or your mind, the conversation is going to help give you a new way to look at it. Not with guilt, not with pressure, but with clarity. So let's dive in. So I'm sitting in a hotel room in Texas, which is my favorite place to be. And I am so excited that I get to talk to you.

Just real fun talk and not necessarily work like we usually do. So introduce yourself to everyone and let's talk about what you do and how you can help solve the world's problems with what you handle.

Hi, I'm Stephanie Young, and I support overwhelmed women who have decided have realized that their physical, digital, and mental clutter is just not worth the time anymore or the stress.

And I love the fact that you throw digital in there because that's not something that a lot of people talk about and a lot of people deal with. But I tell you, that is probably my biggest area of angst.

Yes.

Is digital. And I'm in the middle of trying to take care of that, so that will be a great way to tap into. So how did you get started in this? What led you to this?

Oh, it's actually. So I've been rearranging my childhood bedroom since I was, like, 12. Like, if I couldn't sleep, I would just rearrange my room because I felt like it wasn't efficient enough.

I'm the same way, and I still do that.

I like, I love to find ways to make things in my life more efficient, to, like, save me time so that I can relax. And it followed me into college. Like, all my roommates and my suite mates would always, like, giggle, like, oh, no, Stephanie's rearranging again. Because I just love to do it. And then, like, past that, in 2016, I started selling Lularoe clothing, and I really fell in love with it and, like, building my community. And then I kept hearing the same complaint over and over and over again was, my closet is too full. I don't have any room. My closet can't handle anymore.

And I realized that I was accidentally contributing to a problem that pretty much every woman has experienced where your closet is overflowing and yet you have nothing to wear. And it's not because you didn't buy beautiful clothes, and it's not because you don't have great taste. It's because you have now given yourself so many options that your brain can't make the decision anymore. And so I wanted to dive into that and what that meant and how that happened. And I realized that it was the clutter, the physical clutter of your closet being so full that your brain couldn't make the decision like, that it was stressful to try and get dressed. I was like, how many other places do we accidentally clutter without realizing it? And it just took me down this huge rabbit hole of exploring clutter and minimalism versus maximalism and how there's different types of clutter and that a lot of times people ignore the ones that aren't visual. So, like, it's easy to ignore mental clutter, and it's easy to ignore digital clutter, and it's harder to ignore physical clutter. And so I started working.

I started. I found, like, my first client and just said, hey, like, this is something new. I'd love to try. Like, would it help you? And they said, yes. And so I started helping other people declutter. And it's just kind of ballooned into this, like, huge passion that I love. And I feel like most of the time, physical clutter affects people who either work from home or you're a busy mom, things like that. And a lot of people don't realize that digital clutter affects business owners and entrepreneurs.

And so it cracks me up when I meet business owners and entrepreneurs that are like, oh, there's nothing you can do to help me. I'm like, oh, I bet there is. Because you probably don't realize how much digital clutter you have. It's not visual. It's hard to notice. But it's brought me on this really fun journey of really, what I believe is focusing on what you actually want in life and what you actually love, because your clutter can go back from that and you don't. You might not even realize it.

Yeah. And I. And that's another thing I think is started sometimes when we're very young, we develop these habits.

Yes.

That we don't even recognize as an adult. And we certainly don't understand that that's the pattern that we've developed. And we, you know, we learn it from our parents or our grandparents. And when you look back, they may have had those situations because of their lifestyle or their, you know, how they grew up. And it's just something that doesn't serve anyone anymore. And it's funny that that just came out of my mouth because as I've been decluttering and I think I told you that my husband has been had to retire. And so he's living his best life down. Down here in Texas.

And I've been upstairs, and while he's been gone, that's what I've been doing. Because with no interruptions, I can drag everything out of the closet. And I keep having this thought of what is serving me right, what is serving me. And, and. And for the first time in my life, I've gotten to the point where I am very easily putting things in piles to donate, you know, and giving things away. But it's funny because I can't even. I don't even want to acknowledge the amount of stuff that I have. I've been in this house for 25 years, and it is astronomical.

And I have all kinds of excuses. I homeschool. My kids were in sports, but why am I like this? So. So my first question is, how do we. How did we get here? I mean, how did we get to a society where we have to buy things and we have to hold on to everything, and it's just not natural for us to give it away? I mean, have you learned anything? I have.

I think there's a handful of reasons why this happens, and it's a little bit different for everybody. And sometimes it can be every single one of these reasons, and sometimes it's just one or two. So if you think about, like, if we go back even to the 1920s and the great Depression, where, like, everything, things were scarce and. And even before that, like, you. You would buy, like, your one Sunday dress and, like, your one work outfit. So you had, like, two, maybe three outfits, and you bought them, and you did your best to take care of them and repair them and make sure that they worked. You did the same with, like, your farm equipment or the vehicle that you bought because it was an investment and things were slower. We didn't have the Internet.

We didn't have advertising in our face all the time. And you would get this year's in robot catalog, but it wasn't sent to you in an inbox that you get every day with, like, some kind of, you know, buy one, get one coupon. And so a long time ago, we took care of what we had. We. We valued what we had. We cared about what we had. And those values continued. Like, those parents taught those children and those children taught their children to value their things.

And then everything started changing when, like, fast fashion is now a huge thing. You used to not be able to go to a store, and there were 37 different shirt options just in the one section that you were in, and you haven't even crossed the aisle. You know, so now we have. We have so many options. And we were. We were told, you know, you need options to be able to be happy. And I don't always think that's true, but part of that, like, has evolved over the last, you know, four to five, even six decades, you know, with TV having more channels and then needing advertising and all of those things. So I think we've kind of gotten away from having the.

The handful of really good quality pieces that we love. But those. Those sentiments are still there. I think another reason that we end up with all of this stuff is because we start to compare ourselves to others. The whole, like keeping up with the Joneses and, and feeling like, oh, well, they just got a new car and I need a new car, or they just got this and now I needed this. And we accidentally start comparing ourselves to people that don't actually really care what we have. And frankly, if somebody does care about what you have, I'm so sorry. Like, you deserve better people in your

life, but we need to talk about decluttering the people in your life too. That would add that to the list.

That's totally a thing. And so, but we start comparing ourselves and then instead of being content with the things that we have, all of a sudden what we have that we do love isn't that great anymore because, oh well, why aren't, why isn't, why aren't I happy? Like so and so? Well, so and so might not be happy, they could be drowning in debt and you have no clue. But we see what other people buy and we think, well, I need to have that. So I think part of, part of having too much in our homes has, has come from the comparison and also from the lesson of, well, if I want it now, I can have it. Amazon can get something to you in two days or even overnight. So you can get that instant satisfaction that dopamine hit. I think too, as, as our houses have grown, the need to fill it has happened.

Oh, good point.

I remember we, my husband and I, our first apartment was 747 square feet and we loved it like we had. And it made it easy because if it didn't fit in the apartment, it didn't come in the apartment. But if you move into a 2500 square foot house or a 3500 square foot house after that, all of a sudden what was working and what was making you happy put into a much bigger space might not make, it might not make you feel as happy as you used to. And so there's that drive to like, oh, I need to fill up the space or I need to use this space better. But yes, houses used to be significantly smaller. And so you didn't need, you know, a TV in every room. You didn't or want even a TV in every room. So I think as, like houses have grown and family sizes have grown even to some extent.

When you have a big space, when you have a big container, it's easier to fill. But if you have a smaller container, once it's full, it's full. And I Think it's hard sometimes to separate and to recognize. Just because my container is bigger doesn't mean I have to stuff it to the gills.

Yeah, well. And one of the things that I find interesting is all those buckets are perfect. And I really see the correlation of how times have changed and how these little buckets of problems have risen. But I'm very visual, and I love. If I'm looking at house designs and things like that. I love simple. I do love simple, but I love these really eclectic things that you walk in, and there's just, you know, all kinds of cool stuff to see. And, you know, like, you know, have you.

You've seen the guy on. On Instagram that goes into people's houses in New York City?

Yes.

And he'll. He'll ask them, you know, how much is your rent? And then half the time, these people say, well, I own it. And you go in there and their walls are covered with art and there's books and. And part of me loves that. I mean, I love that visual aspect to it. But now I'm starting to see, oh, my God, all that stuff you'd have to clean, you know? And then, you know, I've lost both my parents and my husband's parents. So now I'm, like, thinking, who's going to go through all that stuff and get rid of it?

Oh, yeah.

And so are you starting to see a change in those trends kind of overall of people starting to say, you know, maybe that's not where I need to be sometimes.

So I think sometimes trauma also can contribute to clutter. So, like, if people experience trauma in their life, it can be really hard to let go of things from either before that trauma happened, like, before the bad thing happened, and then after the bad thing has happened, like, good things in your life can still happen. And so it can be hard to let go of those good things. For example, I have a client whose mother grew up in another country, unbelievably poor. Like, the whole family shared one mattress. And so her mom brought that feeling of lack because that was how she had to be raised. She brought that with her and kind of raised her daughter the same way. Like, we just don't ever have enough.

And so even now, as an adult, her daughter is convinced that she doesn't have enough when she has more than what she needs. And she's actually unbelievably successful, and, like, she's doing so well in life, but her whole life, her whole life, she was told over and over again, we never have enough. Everything is a struggle, you know, never get rid of anything because you might need it. So like, when you're taught that your whole life, it comes with you into adulthood. And so her mom's trauma in part became her trauma. And now she's trying to separate herself from it and realize, like, I, I didn't necessarily grow up like that. Like, she did have a mattress of her, her own. So did her mom.

After she got married, her mom remembered, you know, not necessarily having food. Her daughter does not remember ever being hungry. She was always fed and always taken care of. And so what her mom experienced and what she experienced are completely different. And yet her brain still sometimes thinks the same way her mom does because that's all her mom verbally said out loud.

Yeah.

And so sometimes trauma can, can be why people accumulate clutter. Loss can be a big thing. When you lose someone that you love very dearly and your body and your brain don't know how to cope with that loss, it can start to say, well, I need to get more, I need to fill this hole. And unfortunately, items don't ever fill the hole that a person was. But there's that belief that I need to fill this, I need to fix this. And so clutter can come from so many different things in life. And like I said, I can't just blame fast fashion or anything. And I am seeing a shift personally.

I've been going to a lot of estate sales in my area to find like quality made pieces for my home. So like most people, when they start out in their 20s or in college, you know, you go to Ikea and you buy the really, really cheap shelf because that's all you have the money for. I'm not saying IKEA is terrible. They do have some beautiful, lovely pieces, but at the same time, some of them are made very quickly and very cheaply. And so you go and you buy that super cheap thing. Well, you get a little older and you realize, oh, I've got a little more money, I could replace this with something more substantial. And secondhand shopping has become very popular now. Secondhand shopping is for, I believe, the second year in a row, outpacing buying an item new in a store, which is amazing.

Really, that is amazing.

I think that things are shifting. I think a lot of our younger generations are really noticing that. And they're, they're being raised by parents from the 80s and 90s. And we have a lot of nostalgia for the things from our childhood. And we've talked about it. And now our kids are Wanting some of those things. And so I think secondhand shopping is becoming more popular, which in turn makes it more sustainable. And so instead of buying cheap furniture that's going to break, you know, in a year or two, you're buying a piece that maybe somebody bought in the 50s that was handmade, and that that piece is going to last forever.

And so we're seeing a little bit of a shift there. I believe it's going to get bigger, which is exciting to me, because all the pieces that, that people valued from the generations above us don't always have to go to a landfill. They can go to someone who's actually going to love and appreciate that piece.

I, you know, I can't help but think of, you know, the stories that you would hear about, you know, this country when it was first established and people would move west and they would load, you know, this furniture under their wagons and drag it across the country because it's all. They're where we'd like, you know, dump everything on the, on the front porch for the trash to pick up, and then we just move and buy something there. Yep. Oh, yeah. And the other thing that I see a lot of, and, and I love that you're. You're wording it in such a way when you start comparing it, you know, the trauma and the, and the history and things like that, people are really open to looking at things like alcohol addiction and drug addiction because they are using these chemicals to replace something or to make them feel something.

Yes.

Shopping and, you know, your house full of stuff is really. Can be. Not necessarily is, but can be the same role.

It can be very, very addicting. It can be very addicting. And shopping indeed. And like, if you have. If you have a more addictive personality, which I know can be a thing, and you are trying not to do drugs or trying not to do alcohol, and then you find shopping like that can fill a hole for a lot of people. Again, sometimes it's that dopamine hit of like, ooh, I just got this new thing. And then the thing gets there and you're not as happy as you were when you bought it. And so you have to go in search of the next dopamine hit to make it feel better.

But, yeah, shopping, collecting those, can those can fill that need that other things, Other, worse things could have filled. And then, because I. I don't ever want to say that shopping is way worse than doing drugs, because it's just not. But.

Well, and actually, I think in a way it could be worse because it, it seems socially. So socially acceptable.

Right.

But if you can ruin your life and destroy your family and your, you know, your job and everything, the same way you can if you have a drug or alcohol addiction. I mean, it can really take over just as easy.

You just didn't harm, for the most part, you just didn't harm your body. Yeah, there's some struggle there, like, and it can be very hard. And yeah, it's not an easy thing to get over sometimes or to work.

So when you go in and help somebody and you start with them, do you help them? Kind of look at how they came up with this problem. I mean, is there a way to help them start to see, you know, I mean, keeping aside. I mean, the actual hoarders.

Right.

I know everybody loves to watch because it's almost so extreme. You're like, this doesn't really exist. But it does. But for the average person, I mean, is there a way for them to.

There, There definitely can be. So I have two consistent client clients. Clients. Right now. They're. I have. I technically have room in my schedule for one more. But the two people that I'm working with right now, one of them is in.

In his 80s. And so we're like downsizing his entire life plus everything he kept from his parents and even Sounds like a big job. It can be. It definitely can be. We've been working together for a full year now, and I would say we're maybe a third of the way done. So it's taking a lot. And his needs, and then my younger female clients needs are totally different in that he believes that his value is. Is his items and not himself.

Whereas the female client, who is younger, in her 40s, she feels like if she doesn't have enough that, like, that somehow she is a failure. And so, like, they have totally separate needs. And it took a while to uncover both of those. He would get very angry. Like, one time we were going through things and I, I. When I enter someone's house, I don't always know what is most precious to them versus not precious to them. Like, and someone could come to my house and probably not know that either. And so that takes time to figure out.

It's usually not done in the first session. Usually it takes about a month of working with someone one on one to really understand that. But I didn't know. I was like holding a lifesaver's tin and I said something about, you know, do you want to donate this? Keep this? Like, what, what can you tell me what's so special about this tin. And he just lost it and was like, that was my grandmother's. And it was. And I, like. And like, the words vomit of everything came out.

And I stood there for a minute and was like, okay. And, like, he yanked it out of my hand, and I was just startled because he'd never had that kind of a reaction before. And I was like, okay, like, I'm not going to take this from you. Why don't we take a break from it? We'll work on something else. And then when you're ready, I'd really love to hear the story about the first time that you had a lifesaver at your grandmother's house.

How beautiful.

Because there was a story behind it, and that story meant something to him, and it was. It was valuable. Like, even though to me it was just a 10, to him, it was one of his first memories of his grandmother.

Wow.

And I didn't know. And. And. And that's okay. That's. That's part of learning. And. And other organizers would tell you that they'll learn in a similar way where they didn't realize something was special to a client until a very emotional reaction happens.

And so I always want to hear the story of why something was special, because when people go, oh, I'm just keeping it because I'm like, oh, okay, I guess, you know, if you really feel like you can't live without it. But when somebody is holding something and they say, oh, I was like 6 years old, and I went to my grandmother's house, and she said, oh, honey, do you want a lifesaver? And I didn't know what it was. And she opened this tin, and there were all these little colored candies, and she let me pick out whichever flavor I wanted. And she said, if you don't like the first one, you can try a different one. And my grandmother let me have a choice.

Wow.

Like that. That's precious, and that's special, and that's beautiful. And so that tin, instead of becoming just something that we could have donated, became. Where can I put this so that you can see it and have that memory come back to you as much as humanly possible? Because clearly it's valuable. We had a similar experience a few months later. We were going through all of his old toys, and. And we opened one and remind you, he's. He's 8, in his 80s, so he's a little bit older.

And he opened this toy, and the look on his face was so beautiful because I felt like I Was looking at him when he was 5, opening

a Christmas present, opening his Christmas present.

And he. His whole voice changed and his demeanor. And he said, I played with this for hours. I had it outside in the yard. I played with my friends with it. My brother and I played with. Lived on the shelf in my bedroom. And it was my favorite toy.

And again, I was like, then we need to display this. Because that feeling that he had, I was like, every time you look at this toy, that's the feeling you're going to feel over and over and over again. And so I don't think it's bad to keep things. I simply believe that if you're going to keep something and if it has that beautiful memory, where can we put it so you can see it, so you can treasure it, so you can use it so that all of the good feelings that are tied to it can happen over and over and over again for you?

Well, and that brings up a really good point because I wonder sometimes, you know, you have this old toy that you've had since you were little. You know, we put the toys away. It's in a box on a shelf somewhere.

Yep.

But now you're out there buying new stuff because you're trying to find that feeling that you had when if you would just take that out of the box and put it out there where you could get that feeling that you wouldn't need to necessarily be out 100%. I love it.

I really. And I like I said, that's why I'm like, I don't think that everyone needs to be a minimalist. I don't think everyone needs to be a maximalist. I think we need. Every person gets to figure out what works best for them. And in my brain and what I've always believed deep in my heart is that what works best for every single person is to be able to see and enjoy the things that they love. Because if you love something, is it normal to put it in a box and shove it in a corner and never, ever touch it? Yeah, not really. I mean, we're kind of trained to do that.

Just to store it, to store it. But when there's something that you love that makes your heart very happy, that you can still use or wear or whatever it is, having it where you can see it and access it is actually what helps make that item precious to you because it's not just shoved in a box, wrapped in some old tissue paper, getting covered in dust. It's in a place where it's being honored. And where that person can have all those really good, fun, fuzzy feelings as often as humanly possible.

That's beautiful. And the thing I think I like about it the most is that for people who feel like they're overwhelmed with all this stuff, if they take that into consideration and they understand it's not about giving stuff up or losing stuff or having to, you know, have less, right. You can really start to think, you know, what's important to me.

Right.

And. And why do I love this? And what does. Why do I feel. Why do I have an attraction to it? And. And what is it giving to me? And is that worth, yes or no, what I, you know, what I have? So, for instance, and I'll give you one of my favorites. I have a box and I. I now use. I was the one who had.

I seriously had seven boxes of silver or silver plate. You know, my mother. My mother's, My aunts, my grandmother's, my husband's mother, you know, and so I. I did finally get rid of most of the Civil War. But the boxes are beautiful. So I kept one, and I took all the little separators out, and it's full now of cards and letters that I've gotten from friends and clients and things like that that just really make me feel special and remind me of things. And I keep them all in there. So it's a really pretty thing.

And I love. The reason I kept that box is because it reminds me of all the seven pieces or sets of silver I don't have anymore. But, you know, those. Those letters and those tokens, especially since my mom's gone, you know, the things that she used to write me, the Mother's Day card she sent me, Those are things I want to keep. And instead of in a folder in a filing cabinet somewhere.

Yes.

And I don't. Sometimes I don't even have to open it and look at it. I just know I see the box, and I know they're there, so you can still get that feeling. So I think it's great that you give people the opportunity to set those little gifts up for themselves, for lack of a better word, 100%.

Like, so my younger client has a whole box of her, like, grandmother's tchotchkes. And it's a pretty big box. And I've told her multiple times, I'm like, it doesn't bother me that you want to keep it. It bothers me that you don't want to display them. And part of the reason that she doesn't want to display them Is she doesn't know where to put them yet. And so I'm like, well, then let's figure that out. Like, I, I, I feel like almost everything in life is figureoutable. And so I'm like, well, then let's figure out how to display these.

And so when you were talking about the guy that shows the New York apartments with, like, all the stuff on the walls, that's again, why I don't think everyone needs to be a minimalist. Because if you're 50 grand, like the 50 grandmother's tchotchkes that, like, every time you see them, you think of visiting her, it's like, cool. How can we display them in a way that honors these items, brings back those memories, gets them out of storage, like, lets you have those feelings again and again and again. Let's figure that out. Like, again, I don't mind if you want to keep it, but how can we let you keep it in a way that makes you as happy as you are when you see the items? I always want to figure out for somebody.

Well, and you know, when you pick up a magazine or read an article that talks about, you know, decluttering. Yep. You don't usually get that lesson. No. And I, I think that's why a lot of people don't want to do it.

Right.

Because, you know, it feels like punishment.

It does. Or 10 ways to get rid of your emotional clutter. But nobody wants to talk about why it's emotional. Nobody wants to talk about how to deal with those emotions. Nobody. Like, and especially in a magazine article or a blog, that's a really hard thing to delve into and be deep into is all of those feelings. And I think they're worth exploring whether they're good or bad. We've found items at my older client's house that made him very sad because he remembers the bad thing that happened around it.

And once we talked about what happened and really discovered it, I was like, well, do we want to hold on to these bad feelings? And he was like, no, I really don't. But it took us talking about it and hearing the story about what happened for us to realize, like, this is not worth holding on to. Like, this, this memory is really, really just not worth holding on to. And it helps that I have good stories to be like, okay, but do you remember when you found that toy and, like, your whole face lit up? Like, that's the feeling we want in your house. But, yeah, no one. It's hard to dive into those things. And I love there I follow a bunch of other organizers. They have beautiful methods, and they're wonderful.

I struggle when people are like, this is one size fits all. No, every person is unique and every person is different. And their stories are beautiful and worth hearing and worth sharing. And what works for one might not work for another. And that's. They're not a failure. They're not a failure because that method didn't work for them. And I love Marie Kondo, but when she's like, you know, hold your items, and it doesn't bring you joy.

My. My phone bill does not ever bring me joy. Like, I'm glad to have my phone. I'm grateful to have it and that it gives me. But I love paying it. But I can't throw that out. That's irresponsible. My phone will get off.

So, again, that question can work for many items, but not all. And that question can work for some people and not all, because some people do say every single thing in their house brings them joy. And they're not lying. Yeah, they're not lying. So it's like, how do we, as professional organizers and decluttering experts, help people find all of their, like, stories and be able to share their stories and see their stories in their home without the stress and without the overwhelm and without the. Even. Sometimes the guilt of like, my great grandmother gave this to me, and she told me I had to keep it for the rest of my life

can

be really heavy for someone. And so how it's navigating all of that emotion and. And feeling and saying, okay, how. How do we make your space happy and how do we make your space delightful and less overwhelming in a way that works for you and functions for you, not just, well, that worked for so and so. It should have worked for you.

And I think we're. I think you're seeing a lot of that. I love how you pull in some of the, you know, the big names and. And they're the new theory and why, you know, people are continually going out and buying the next book about how I need to handle. Right now we're talking about clutter. But, you know, any situation there is, and then you read it and you try to do it and it fails, and you don't know why. And it's not you.

It's not you. And it's not even the author. It's not their. They didn't. They didn't cause that either. Yeah, it's. It's that again, everything can't be one size fits all. We're all too unique and too valuable as individual human beings for something.

For most things to be one size fits all.

So if someone's in that. In that position where they're starting to look at, you know, their kitchen counter, what's the first thing that they need to do in order to find what's going to work for them? What do you think the first step is?

I always tell people to go to what functions, and it sounds really boring, but I'm gonna, like. So pretend you're standing in your kitchen right now. You're gonna cook dinner, and you know that you need a skillet. Where do you grab your skillet?

Like, my skillets are always. I've got drawers underneath my stove or underneath my oven top. And so their skillets are always there.

Okay. What happens if your skillet was in your pantry?

I'd never find it.

Find it. Okay. But for somebody. They might like that all their skillets are under. Yep, they might like that. They're out of sight, and they might go. Okay. But it works for me to go into my pantry, grab my skillet, grab my ingredients, come back to the kitchen and do it.

That's why, again, not everything is one size fits all. But it's about the function for you. Like, my. My skillets right now are on a lazy Susan next to my oven, not under. But does it mean that you need a lazy Susan to put your skillets on? It means that you have found how you function in your kitchen. So I always try to figure out how people function, and I do this a lot. This one cracks me up with shoes. Where do you put on your shoes in the morning?

I try not to put on shoes. I do the best I can. So my shoes are sitting in my. Because I have a pair of shoes that I can just slip on to run and get the mail or, you know, let the dog out. So I have a pair of shoes that sits in my office, right by the door to my office. So if I need to slip them on and I can run out.

Yep.

If I am leaving the house dressed up, like, for an event, I will put them on in my room.

Okay. So what if you read a book that said the best way to store shoes is to have them on a shelf display in your closet. Okay, that sounds really great in theory. Having them color coded even sounds really great in theory. Having them organized by type. Like your tennis shoes, your dressy shoes, your sandals. That all sounds really lovely. But if you are the type of human being that puts your shoes on by the door when you leave and takes them off at the door when you come home.

Are you going to walk those shoes to your closet every single time or not?

That's. That is so brilliant.

And so I always want to figure out how people function, because if it can function for you, you're more likely to stick to it. You're less likely to clog up that area because it's working, and life just feels easier. It just feels easier because you're not being forced to do something that you wouldn't naturally do.

I love it. And. And, boy, that. That attitude, that understanding can fit everywhere.

It can. It can. Like, if you are a kind of person that if your toothbrush isn't sitting in a cup by your sink as your visual reminder to brush your teeth, don't put your toothbrush in a drawer or in a cabinet.

Yeah.

So that, again, for me, it always, always comes back to function. And how people function is, again, different and unique to them, and it's totally okay. That doesn't mean they're broken. That doesn't mean they're wrong. It means that somewhere along the lines, somebody lied to them. And unfortunately, they believe that lie that they were broken or they were wrong. But they're not.

They're not. And, you know, this brings. This brings. I can't help but think of this example and. And I love what you're saying because you. People need to stop and think about the function and how their life works for them.

Yes.

When I built the house that my husband and I are in, like I said, it's about 20, 25 years old. that time, everybody was putting the laundry room upstairs.

Yes.

So. And they're. And they're thinking, makes sense. You know, you're taking clothes off in your bedroom, throw it in the washing machine there. I know the insurance companies hated that because every time they washer overflowed, it destroyed the house.

Yep.

But when we were. When I was sitting with, I don't know, the plumber, electricians, one of the guys in our house, and we were. I was talking about where I wanted things, and I said, I want the washing machine in the dryer downstairs next to my kitchen. The laundry room has to be there. And he was like, no. You know, the thing is, there's a reason why everybody's doing this. You know, you should do it this way. And I'm like, I homeschool my kids.

I am in my kitchen either cooking or teaching all day long. I need my laundry room right there, because that's where I am I never upstairs. I leave upstairs in the morning, and I don't usually go back upstairs until I go to bed.

Right.

And I remember his answer to that was, well, I'll talk to your husband. And I'm like, believe me, my husband knows nothing about laundry. Oh, yeah, but that is so true. People need to really look at what works for them.

Yes.

Because what makes sense to them.

Right. Like, and so that. That's a lot of the reason that I want, like, I love to be like. And I can even help people in group setting because you. You get like five or six women, even 20 women together, and we're all talking about function, and. And somebody might go, oh, I. I don't want to have my shoes perfectly organized. Like, I don't care about that.

I just want to dump them in a bucket by the. This. The door. And as long as that bucket is there, I know I'll find the shoes I need and someone will go, oh, my word, I've been killing myself to put each individual shoe in a box, and it's driving me nuts. And then when I don't do it because I'm in a hurry, I feel guilty. I feel guilty, and I beat myself up. And they're like, I could have just used it back. So even, like, having other people around to discuss things and how they function can help others.

And so I feel like decluttering and organizing can be done not only one on one, but in a group setting, because we all learn from each other. We all learn from each other. And then when you hear somebody else has the same, like, that their brain works kind of the same way you do, you feel less alone.

Yeah. Yeah, I love that. And I see this whole thing, and, you know, instead of the pampered chef parties, now we could have a decluttering party.

Oh, my word, I would love. I literally saw this girl on Instagram the other day. She had a dumpster party for her birthday, rented a dumpster, invited all of her friends and family over and said, hey, like, and. And told them so they knew in advance what was going on. But she was like, right, this is what needs to be done in my yard that I'm not skilled at. This is what needs to be done in my bathroom that I'm not skilled at. Would you be willing to do that for me for my birthday instead of a card, instead of a gift I don't need, or would you come over and help? And so her yard got cleaned out and she got some new landscaping, because the people in her life that had those skills, could do that for her. And I, I love it.

Like, admin nights have become a big thing where someone will organize a night and everybody gets together and they're like, oh, I need to make my doctor's appointment. Oh, so and so needs to file a passport. So and so, you know, they forgot to place their grocery order or whatever it is. And so you get together and you do these meetings. Not meaningless, but like menial tasks that need to be done. But you do it together so you don't feel alone in the moment of doing it. And I, I love that. I think that is so beautiful.

That is wonderful. You know, and one of the things that I've started doing, and I hadn't really associated with this too, until now, but one of the events that I do every year, I'll come down to Texas for, they have a clothing swap. So everyone will bring clothing that they don't like anymore, they can't wear or they've outgrown. And then people can take whatever they want, and then whatever's left over, they donate. So I had a bunch of my friends over, we had kind of a women's lunch during Lent just to kind of reconnect and hang out and have some fun. And I said, I told everybody to bring some old jewelry. And I said, you know, whatever, you're not wearing any. Because that's the one thing that I have tons of.

I worked in retail for years. I have more earrings than any, and I don't ever even wear them. I'm not have any in right now. And it was, it was fun. So maybe some of these alternative kind of off the cuff things are ways that people should start thinking that you don't necessarily just have to trash everything. Right. That you don't want.

Right. And so to some extent, I do, and this might sound silly, I believe everything will eventually end up in the trash because like seven generations down the, like four generations down the line, you know, they might not really understand or care. My favorite example, I have one son. I love him to death. He's the cutest, most sweetest little man on the planet. I really love my Disney dresses. Disney makes beautiful dresses for women. I do not expect him to love or care about those dresses ever in the future.

Like, they are something that means something to me. Now if I have a daughter, that might be a totally different situation. But right now I have a son. And so I don't expect him to love or want to keep and treasure all of my girly, wonderful, delightful, whimsical things. And that's okay. That's totally okay. Now maybe he gets married and his wife is like, oh, my goodness, I love that dress. And it fits her.

Cool.

Awesome.

It has a second life. But also, if I want to get rid of that dress now or trade it for a different one. Why not?

Why not?

Totally. Okay. Because I would love to keep things out of the trash. I would love to keep things four or five generations down the road, especially if they're well made. Beautiful hand, wonderful pieces like that can stand the test of time. I'd love for them to stay out of the trash. So I. That's why I'm estate sales, I think, are fantastic.

Thrifting is fantastic. Doing swap meets with your friends. Great ideas. Because you never know, there might have been some piece of jewelry that you wore that your friend was like, man, that's so beautiful. I wonder where she got it. I wish I had something like that.

Yeah.

She comes to your swap meet and goes, oh, my word. And now she's got this beautiful piece from her friend Jean that, like, whenever she wears, she's going to think of you. Yeah. This is so beautiful. I love that. So, yeah, I'm, I'm a huge fan of sharing resources, being the village for each other, really. That's what we're doing. That's what we're doing.

Beautiful way to say it. And I also loved. I mean, I've never heard of these, like, admin nights. Those are genius ideas. Ways to share what you're good at.

Yep.

And what you love. Because, like, I love to cook. I tell people all the time that cook, feeding people is my love language.

Oh, my goodness. This is why we are friends.

But. And I'm always kind of shocked when people say they don't like to cook because I don't get it at all. But sometimes when I walk in their kitchen and I say, okay, now I understand why you don't like to cook, but how great for us to get together and say, okay. And I do that all the time. I have two friends who have lost their husbands who, you know, they don't really cook because it's just them. And so when I, when I cook and I have stuff left over, it's wonderful for me to be able to bring them something and just show them how much I love them. And they, by giving them a meal,

appreciate it so much. I bet they. I bet they love that.

I hope so. But I, I think that's great that we point that out because I think that's something that People need to, to think about because there are all so many. There's. I don't even think we could figure out all the possible solutions that you are out there for ways to handle these things. And I think being open minded and trying something new and I think people are open to stuff like that. So any other ideas of off the cuff things to help you declutter and simplify or just find your solution?

So for me, and this might not necessarily pertain specifically to decluttering, but your ask always answers somebody else's need. Always. Your ask always, always answers somebody else's need. And everybody is like, I don't understand what that means. And I said, well, a few years ago I had been thinking to myself, man, I really love an upright freezer because I also love to cook. I love to bulk cook. That's one of my favorite things to do is to, to make meals so that like, I don't have to stress about it in the future. If the meal is in the freezer, I can pull it out.

I love it, love it, love it too.

Here's a meal. So I love to do that. And I was like, I don't have enough space in my small regular freezer to actually make this feasible. And so I posted on Facebook and said, hey, just throwing it out there. Like, do I know anybody that is looking to sell a freezer? And someone messaged me and she said, if you can come and get it, you can have it. Okay, cool. So I drive to her house with my husband and his best friend because she was like, it's heavy. She takes us down to her basement to show us the freezer.

She's got two. One is smaller and significantly older. And I was like, perfect, that'll work fine. And I said, okay, do you want me to take this one? And she said, oh, no, no, no, no, it's that one. And it was big, maybe two years old. Great shape. Nothing was wrong with it. Something when it had def, like so they had lost power and when it defrosted, it made a big mess.

And she was like, I have no capacity to clean it up. If you can clean it, you can have it.

Wow.

And so I'm expecting a. I thought I'd be paying for freezer, which I was totally fine with. But I got this big, beautiful freezer for free. It took me 20 minutes to clean it. It's still working now. I use it all the time. But my ask met her need because she was at home going, how am I going to get this? Get rid of this freezer. Nobody is going to want a freezer that they have to clean out.

Nobody is going to want to bring over a truck and two people to lift it out of my basement. She was like. She was so stressed about it, but my ask met her need.

Ah.

And I've seen other people that when they say, oh, my word, my house is so cluttered. What do I do? And I'm like, send me a picture. Tell me what your goal is. Like, let's chat about it. Their ask meets my need because I feel like I need to help people with this. Like, I love. I love to help people with this. When people are like, what would you do for free all day if you never had to worry about money? And I'm like, I'd help people declutter their house.

Yeah, good.

Like, I love doing it. And so. And like, you, you'll see, like, new moms when they're like, oh, I need boy clothes. And there's a boy mom, you know, one block over that they hadn't met each other. And she goes, oh, my word, I'm drowning in boy clothes, and I need this stuff out of my house. Yeah, your ask always meets somebody's need. And so when you don't ask, we're not actually meeting somebody else's need. We're not a burden.

We're meeting someone else's need.

Yeah. That was beautiful.

Thank you. I've believed that for many years, and I. It took a lot of me being willing to ask for something that felt scary or overwhelming or even embarrassing. Oh, that. That one's still, like. I can feel the feels in my tummy right now that, like, if I. If I asked for help, somehow it looked like I was a failure, but it. It wasn't.

It wasn't a failure at all. It helped somebody else realize that they could ask for similar kinds of help. It met the need for the person that was like, oh, I have that thing that you need. Like, and I need this out of my house. Or I have this resource that I'd never been brave enough to share. You know, you think about business owners that make resources, and they're like, oh, I can't share this. I can't. I can't know what I want it.

And then somebody goes, oh, does anybody have X, Y, or Z? I've got it. You know, our ask meets someone's need. And so it's. It validates other people's feelings. It helps others know they're not alone. And then whatever that thing that was on your mental to do list that was stressing you out. It's not there anymore.

I love it. And then that's. That handles not only the, the, you know, realistic clutter that could be cluttering, but that, that takes away the mental clutter big time. Okay, so as we kind of wrap this up, give me one tip. Let's do one for each. So we have digital, mental and what? Give me one tip, one starting place that I can. Can deal with each one of these.

With your physical clutter, I always encourage people to take out the trash first. Even if you look in the room and you're like, there's literally no trash in here. Cool. Go take the trash in your trash can out to the curb. Just doing what will make you feel so much better. So much better. Always take out the trash first.

I love it. That's so simple. But I can feel that. Well, because.

So, like, what happens if you were decluttering a room and you actually found trash, but you didn't think to bring a trash bag with you? And then you go to your trash can and it's full and now you're like, crap, I need to empty this and put in a new bag and blah, blah, blah, blah. Okay, well, if you started with the trash empty first, you didn't just add to your list. You started with the empty slate.

Love it.

And you did. That causes momentum with your digital clutter. Unsubscribe from emails. Unsubscribe. Pick one. Just pick one. Pick one. Maybe five, whatever you feel like you can handle and unsubscribe.

And here's why I love Tom Shoes. I don't need Tom Shoes to send me an email every day of the new print or the new sale or the new this or the new that. When I need shoes, I know I'm going to go to toms.com and I'm going to find what I need. So I don't need my inbox cluttered with every single thing. Plus, they're going to advertise all over social media when they're having a sale anyway. So I'll see the ad. You don't need the email too, or the ones that you saved from that blog that you subscribed from 17 years ago. That's okay.

You can't see me raising my hand right now, but that is me. And actually, well, you know, when I went up to D.C. and I worked with Sarah, that was one of the conversations we had is about this huge problem with my inbox and what do I do with all these Subscriptions.

Oh my word. I love to clean an inbox for somebody. It like, brings me ridiculous amounts of joy.

So mental. What's something mental that we can get

rid of so often? Something mental is something that's like on your to do list all the time. Like, you write your list and then every time you make your list, you write the same thing over and over and over and over and over again. And I, I can say this from personal experience. Experience. I actually, I'm not. I don't tend to keep a lot of things and I do not journal in a traditional sense. I'm actually going to show you my favorite way that I like do stuff on paper. So this is my shoulds and notebook.

It's literally, I kid you not, it's a composition notebook. Like, it's nothing fancy.

Yeah.

Covered it with brown paper like I used to do in elementary school because it made me happy. So I will like make my lists. I'm trying to find a page that doesn't have anything on it. Yeah. So like, I'll make my list. So like a lot of people who list make, they'll write the same list over and over again. So I went through the last four years of my journals. I sat, I put a date on my calendar, blocked everything off, and I sat down and I looked through and I found all of my lists.

And I was trying to pinpoint what was the one thing I wrote down over and over and over again. And some things are cyclical. Like laundry is always going to have to happen. Dinner is going to need to be cooked. Like, that's not the kind of thing I'm talking about. But I mean, like, like file for my passport. I think I wrote that down a minimum of 50 times in the last four years.

So mine is get my real ID.

Yes, get your real ID. Okay. So you've written it down 100 times at least. I don't want to write it down anymore. So I made an appointment for myself to fill out the paperwork at home and get everything submitted. And now I never have to write that down. So when you write your to do list and it lives in your brain, you put it on paper, but it lives in your brain. So your real ID list might be on paper or in an email somewhere or a Google Doc that you made, but it lives in your brain.

So I would encourage anyone with that over and over again. Like one time task, pick the thing that you've been writing down for months or years, set a date in your calendar and do the thing. And you will feel so much better when it's over.

Because, and you know what I love about that is because, you know, if you had a doctor's appointment and it was on your calendar, you do go to the doctor's appointment. You go, you know, so it's like your calendar is something special. So if you're, if you're going to take the time to block off this time and put it on your calendar, you're not going to schedule anything else because it's already on there. So I love that it changes the perception and just makes it more important.

It does. And so again, think of that thing that you have written down so many times that every time you rewrite it, you feel guilty or annoyed or whatever over whatever that feeling is that you're like, oh, this again. And then do it so you never have to say this again about that again.

I love it. How beautiful. And you know, this is a problem that everybody has in some manner or form or another. It doesn't matter your background, it doesn't matter where you live, it doesn't matter how old you are. It's something that we all need to talk about. And I love that you have so many great ideas of how to handle that. Thank you. So website, can you throw that out there? I'll put everything you know on the, on the information page, but just tell people how to contact you.

So the easiest way is to go to hirestaff.com clutter escape and it will take you to my monthly clutter decluttering online group because again, not everybody lives in Northern Virginia with me, but I can support anybody across the country or even outside of the country if they really wanted. So like I said, hirestaff.com clutter escape and we will help you escape the clutter that has been like taking over your physical, digital and mental spaces. And we do it in little bite sized chunks. So. So we're not like jumping into your kitchen the first week you join. Kitchens are big giant bears. We get to them eventually. But we tackle these things bit by bit and relieve that stress and just give you back your breathing room and your capacity to do the things you really love and really enjoy and then

really love the stuff that you do have.

Oh, 100%. 100% love what you have. Put it where you can see it and use it. Be grateful that you've got it and that you can use it. And if you find something that you don't love, that you don't use, that you don't need, let it go. It's not There's.

There's somebody else out there who needs it, and your.

Their ask is going to meet your need of letting it go.

I think that's the greatest line I've heard in a long time. I'm just so using that. Thank you. Thank you for taking time out, and thank you for just, I think, giving people freedom to look at their lives and what is taking over their lives, I. E. Their clutter, and giving them permission to make a decision about it and that they don't have to feel guilty about what they do or don't keep, because as long as it's serving you in some form or fashion, and that's important and no two people are the same and you need to do what you need to do.

Yeah. Function for yourself.

Yes. Yes. Thank you. You're welcome. I don't know about you, but now I kind of feel like I want to go clean out a drawer, unsubscribe from 100 emails, and maybe rethink a few decisions in my life. There's so much in that conversation, but what I keep coming back to is that it's really not about clutter. It's about what we hold on to. And why.

Because when you start to understand the story behind all the stuff, everything changes. And honestly, it made me stop and look at my own space, my habits, and even things I keep telling myself that I'll get to someday. So before you go clean out a drawer or unsubscribe from every email in your inbox, let me give you today's epic message. Clutter isn't about having too much. It's about holding on to things that no longer serve the person that you are becoming. And when you start asking, does this item support my life or complicate it? Everything begins to shift. So here's your challenge for the week. This one is simple but powerful.

Pick one space today. A drawer, your email inbox, or maybe your to do list. And do one thing. Throw away the trash, Unsubscribe for five emails, or schedule that one task that keeps being added to your to do list.

That's it.

Not everything. Not all at once. Just one step. Because clarity doesn't come from doing everything. It comes from starting. If this episode hit home for you like it did for me, I want you to do two things. First, share it with a friend. Because I promise you, you are not the only one feeling this.

And second, if you're ready to take it deeper, not just clearing clutter, but really create direction, I want to invite you into one of my dream activation experiences. Because when you remove what's in the way, you finally have the space for what actually matters. Go to Epic Living for more details. Living with Jean Facebook page and tell me how your challenge went and find all of the ways to follow Stephanie. And for now, thank you for being here, for showing up, for listening, and maybe for starting to look at your life a little differently. At the end of the day, it's not about having less. It's about living with intention and remembering. It's all about the story.

I'll see you next time.