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Mastering Mental Clarity: Enhancing Your Life through Decluttering And The Four Pillars Approach With Kitti Andrews
Episode 30 • 31st October 2023 • Mindful You • Alan Carroll
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Alan speaks with International Best-Selling Author and master de-clutterer Kitti Andrews in the 30th episode of Mindful You! Carroll and Andrews discuss what the purpose of decluttering is and how the four pillars of life tie into this. When we declutter is completely improves the four pillars and we must do things one at a time so as not to get overwhelmed.  

About The Guest:

International best-selling author Kitti Andrews, known as “Your Thought Organizer”, helps successful entrepreneurs to get their physical and mental surroundings under control by helping them to declutter their space and brain.

Kitti has presented at Stanford and Harvard Universities, and contributed articles to the Los Angeles Tribune Magazine and USA Today. 

About Alan:

Alan Carroll is an Educational Psychologist who specializes in Transpersonal Psychology. He founded Alan Carroll & Associates 30 years ago and before that, he was a Senior Sales Training Consultant for 10 years at Digital Equipment Corporation. He has dedicated his life in search of mindfulness tools that can be used by everyone (young and old) to transform their ability to speak at a professional level, as well as, to reduce the psychological suffering caused by the misidentification with our ego and reconnect to the vast transcendent dimension of consciousness that lies just on the other side of the thoughts we think and in between the words we speak.

Personal: https://www.facebook.com/alan.carroll.7359

Business: https://www.facebook.com/AlanCarrolltrains

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/aca-mindful-you/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mindfulnesseminar/

Web Site: https://acamindfulyou.com/

Transcripts

Alan Carroll:

Welcome, everybody, to the mindful U

Alan Carroll:

podcast. My name is Alan Carroll. And I am your host, as

Alan Carroll:

we traveled together, down the path of mindfulness, in order to

Alan Carroll:

develop that power within ourselves. And there's many

Alan Carroll:

different paths. And many different people have many

Alan Carroll:

different ways that they achieve this mindful state of

Alan Carroll:

consciousness. And today's guest, Katie Andrews, has a very

Alan Carroll:

unique way, but very, very practical. I've been practicing

Alan Carroll:

her technique for 50 years. And it's just, it works. It works.

Alan Carroll:

To be able to get your physical environment, your mental

Alan Carroll:

surroundings are under your control through the process of

Alan Carroll:

decluttering. So today's podcast, we're going to focus on

Alan Carroll:

what is decluttering? And how can we begin to declutter our

Alan Carroll:

own reality in which we live, to free up our thoughts to allow us

Alan Carroll:

to achieve a more powerful and clear state of consciousness,

Alan Carroll:

which will we call mindfulness. So please welcome to today's

Alan Carroll:

mindful you podcast. Kitty, Andrews. Thank you, kitty.

Alan Carroll:

Kitty, welcome to the mindful you podcast. I'm excited to have

Alan Carroll:

you on today. And I'm excited about the topic that you're

Alan Carroll:

going to be talking about. So I want to really just want to

Alan Carroll:

welcome you. And thank you very much for being here today.

Kitti Andrews:

Thank you so much for having me. Oh, and pleasure

Kitti Andrews:

to see you again.

Alan Carroll:

Thank you. One of the words that captured my

Alan Carroll:

attention that you use that I would call your vertical

Alan Carroll:

expertise is a word called decluttering. And I'd like you

Alan Carroll:

to share with us a little bit about what that means. And also,

Alan Carroll:

the the fun trip you might have gotten from the discovery of

Alan Carroll:

decluttering is something of value. What was the journey that

Alan Carroll:

led that led you there and a little bit of your of your

Alan Carroll:

background?

Unknown:

And then yes, I'm processing two different

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questions there. Well, what I do is I help people to declutter

Unknown:

their space and their brain, so that they can focus on being

Unknown:

profitably productive, and getting the right things done.

Unknown:

Now, that sounds very cut and dried. But what invariably

Unknown:

happens when I work with clients is they come to me with

Unknown:

physical, the physical clutter was like the they don't know

Unknown:

where to start, or it's just too much, it's too overwhelming 30

Unknown:

years of, of accumulation in a basement or your late mother's

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papers, or just just anything, and it just, it just gets to be

Unknown:

too much. And what happens is, invariably, the as we start to

Unknown:

clear, the physical clutter, the the other four pillars of life,

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your heart, your health, your habits, and your head, hence my

Unknown:

company named declutter the brain. These other areas start

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to come come into play. Now, you asked a bit about my journey.

Unknown:

And I've I've been pretty much a natural, organizer type person I

Unknown:

like I like things to be in their place, because I'm ADHD

Unknown:

and I need to be able to know where to find things. So that I

Unknown:

don't have that mental moment of frustration, which can kind of

Unknown:

throw you throw your entire hour off, day off, month off. So I

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need to stay reasonably organized. And I felt people do

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that for a long time. Like my first job was a file clerk. And

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I was promoted to and remember back in the in the days of

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offices and paper files. I do. And I was promoted to the

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accounting department and a couple months later, a lady came

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from where I used to file and she said Would you consider are

Unknown:

coming in and working for us part time because we can't find

Unknown:

anything anymore. Where were, you were the best way ever has

Unknown:

in to me, it seems very simple A, B, C, D, and then good Oh,

Unknown:

subsections of that, but it doesn't come to everybody. So

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I've noticed over the years that fast forward to rest and to long

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restaurant career, where I was always voted the one to go clean

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out the walk in fridge, because the tie at the end, when at the

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end of their shift cooks just throw everything into the

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fridge, willy nilly, and they just think that they don't care.

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And eventually, you can't find the yogurt, I'd like to be able

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to find the yogurt, waitresses, when you've got a full section,

Unknown:

you want to be able to find the yogurt. So So I've always had a

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challenge. And not not quite an obsession, but pretty close to

Unknown:

being able to find things. Now factor in ADHD or it's also need

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to be able to see we often say, Well, I need to be able to see

Unknown:

it. So I remember that it's there. But if things are in

Unknown:

their proper place at all times, then that turns into a good

Unknown:

thing. Now most of my clients, it's coming back to the five

Unknown:

pillars. If if, if you don't mind to illustrate a point of my

Unknown:

being clear. Am I being clear so far?

Alan Carroll:

Right? I wanted to Kitty go into the five pillars

Alan Carroll:

because the five pillars I got I got the home I got the heart I

Alan Carroll:

got the head I got the health and the fifth one. Habits.

Alan Carroll:

Habit. Ha bi t right. Yeah. Okay, cuz? Because I bet that

Alan Carroll:

they they sound like they sound like benefits to me, when you

Alan Carroll:

when you talk about decluttering. So what do you get

Alan Carroll:

out of decluttering? And I suspect that that they lead to

Alan Carroll:

improving the five pillars? Is that true?

Unknown:

Absolutely. I actually I've been credited, to my

Unknown:

knowledge by saving three marriages and ending an abusive

Unknown:

marriage. Wow, my best way of illustrating how it can affect

Unknown:

how clutter can affect the five pillars is with a client. So I'd

Unknown:

love to share with you that story of Sarah in Ohio, who does

Unknown:

not mind? Just she she has just always been the perfect example

Unknown:

of but yeah, off all five pillars. Most of my clients, by

Unknown:

the way, have been with me for over three years. Why? Because

Unknown:

it decluttering is not one and then we keep finding more things

Unknown:

to declutter. So allow me to illustrate. Sarah came to me,

Unknown:

along with these other clients. We started a group program

Unknown:

together. And she had the usual physical clutter. The she never

Unknown:

Sarah never met a hobby that she didn't like. And the evidence of

Unknown:

it was all over all over the house. And then the sun porch

Unknown:

where you're walking where you walk into your home. A there's

Unknown:

kind of a path to walk through like it was it was chock a

Unknown:

block. Wow. Wow. So so that's all very well and good. And we

Unknown:

use my one system to help to start to clear the clutter. We

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started with the entrance and then moved to another room and

Unknown:

then another room and that's how I do things sequentially. And a

Unknown:

funny thing happened about two months into were working

Unknown:

together. She said she just popped up out of the blue. I

Unknown:

don't know were in the middle of a consultation saying you know,

Unknown:

I have decided that I'm going to take up the fitness program that

Unknown:

I have been meaning to do for years. Now. I was reasonably

Unknown:

new. I was two years into declutter coaching at that

Unknown:

point, so I didn't really think that it didn't really hit me.

Unknown:

And oh, okay, good. You're doing a fitness program. Good for you.

Unknown:

By the way, I'm proud to say that she is still at it. She has

Unknown:

kept that fitness program. This is where you get into the habits

Unknown:

part. Okay, so we've covered the health. We've covered the

Unknown:

habits. She got herself a personal trainer, she

Unknown:

nutritionist, everything that she needed. Miss lady is so

Unknown:

dedicated that one time her or her regular vehicle broke down

Unknown:

and she grew up the family We tracked her to the gym. That is

Unknown:

how habitual she became 1030, Eastern Natalia there she was

Unknown:

going. And so, so you've got your health and your habits.

Unknown:

Now, a little while later, and then maybe about a month later,

Unknown:

she said, you know, my husband said something to me the other

Unknown:

day that I'm not really sure that I like. And she told me

Unknown:

what it was, and it wasn't so aware now, and I was I wasn't,

Unknown:

it wasn't great, but it wasn't abusive. And I said, Oh,

Unknown:

interesting. Again, not really thinking too much of it at the

Unknown:

time. But she said that she said this kind of thing to you

Unknown:

before. And she stopped and she thought about it. And she says,

Unknown:

you know, come to think of it. He's been saying that kind of

Unknown:

thing to me for the 25 years of our marriage. Ah, all right.

Unknown:

She's one of the marriages I'm credited with with saving. If

Unknown:

she had an agenda and I'm first she got angry and took it took a

Unknown:

few months of working on this and as the layers of the onion

Unknown:

with that, when you're doing physical decluttering the layers

Unknown:

of the onion seem to kind of peel back and clarity emerges

Unknown:

and you start to see things that you didn't notice before, like

Unknown:

the her husband's the snarky for lack of a better word. Gently

Unknown:

snarky if you can be gently snarky, gently snarky comments.

Unknown:

I'm not even noticing them and now say, Whoa, hang on a minute

Unknown:

now that that wasn't very nice. And she started noticing it and

Unknown:

i She confronted him. And of course that escalated so we

Unknown:

worked on how she could address it gently. And that that

Unknown:

actually turned out really really well. For him it it

Unknown:

brought to Dale Carnegie into action about the right thing to

Unknown:

say the right thing to handle in the way way to handle things. So

Unknown:

what have we gotten now we've gotten our habits, we've gotten

Unknown:

our house we've gotten our heart meaning relationships, and then

Unknown:

you've got your head I mentioned before that she's never met a

Unknown:

craft that she didn't like, I like honest to God and and she's

Unknown:

a DIY er the there's nothing this woman cannot do with her

Unknown:

hands and she's five, two and full of spunk. She could do

Unknown:

anything but one of her favorite and one of her passions was

Unknown:

stained glass art, actually making stained glass art which I

Unknown:

revere, and she dabbled in this. She dabbled during our time

Unknown:

together. She had always dabbled in everything, again being

Unknown:

really ADHD or many, many varied interests. And she put

Unknown:

everything kind of on hold for a while well, about a year ago,

Unknown:

the passion she she just started to really realize that she

Unknown:

wanted to stick with one. Notice I said the one system before.

Unknown:

Okay, well, one is one of my keywords at declutter the brain.

Unknown:

She decided to take my advice and stick with one craft and see

Unknown:

if she could make some money at it, whether that be knitting or

Unknown:

crocheting or painting or pick a craft out. And she said, Okay,

Unknown:

well, I'll go with the stained glass. I am over the moon proud

Unknown:

to report that about two months ago, she accepted her first

Unknown:

deposit on her for her first commissioned work of art. Wow.

Unknown:

What I didn't know until just recently is she accepted a

Unknown:

commission on a second piece of art. Now, I asked her this may

Unknown:

sound all very random. But I don't believe that I don't think

Unknown:

you would believe it either. Because of your field of

Unknown:

expertise and in metaphor or the you know the metaphysics it is

Unknown:

the university it's not exactly what you see kind of thing.

Unknown:

Would you agree? I agree. Well, I believe that the universe

Unknown:

opened up for her because of Her physical decluttering is replace

Unknown:

perfect now. No, it isn't much it stated she couldn't get it

Unknown:

right back to perfect in an in in one day it because she has

Unknown:

the skills to do so the skills and the mindset to do so. But,

Unknown:

um, yeah, I asked her after the first commission, I said, Do you

Unknown:

think that you would have been able to do this? Before we

Unknown:

started? And it was a resounding hell no, no, no, I wouldn't have

Unknown:

even considered it, I wouldn't have stopped myself good enough.

Unknown:

I, you know, I just, I wouldn't have thought of it. even dreamed

Unknown:

of the possibility. So that I believe, is the power of

Unknown:

decluttering. And most of my clients so well, they're usually

Unknown:

over 40. When you're in your 40s, I find that people are in

Unknown:

kind of a transition. They're the the, the they're saying, is

Unknown:

this all there is, you know, that old song is that oh, there

Unknown:

is all right, well, you start looking for more you start,

Unknown:

maybe you're going through a divorce, maybe you're going

Unknown:

through a job transition, you're not sure you want to do

Unknown:

corporate anymore. If I would say every single one of my

Unknown:

clients, except one who was 30 has been they come to me with

Unknown:

the physical clutter. But invariably, they're looking for

Unknown:

a change of their life. In fact, one of these three year clients

Unknown:

just two weeks ago, told me, you know, I've hated my job for a

Unknown:

long time. Oh, what would you rather do? She's a, she's a

Unknown:

pharmaceutical researcher. I would work with animal

Unknown:

psychology quotes.

Unknown:

And this was after a recent decluttering stint because she

Unknown:

and I, you know, she'll take a break for a while and defer a

Unknown:

month or two and then come back and we did a bunch of

Unknown:

decluttering. All of a sudden, she wants to be an animal

Unknown:

psychologist in which she had gone to school for us kind of

Unknown:

thing. That is what I'm trying to talk about is your eyes

Unknown:

become open as the physical clutter clears, the clarity in

Unknown:

everything else emerges. And I'd love to hear your thoughts on

Unknown:

this.

Alan Carroll:

An image comes to my mind of a window. And on the

Alan Carroll:

window, you you're inside the house, and you're looking out

Alan Carroll:

through the window. And the window looks out over a

Alan Carroll:

beautiful garden. And flowers and green and birds flying

Alan Carroll:

around even some blue sky with white puffy clouds. Yet, when

Alan Carroll:

you look through the window, the window has dirt on it that a

Alan Carroll:

film built up over years film and and you're sort of used to

Alan Carroll:

looking at the world through that window. And that's the way

Alan Carroll:

the world is. And then someone comes with a rag and some

Alan Carroll:

Windex, and says why don't we try to remove some of that

Alan Carroll:

clutter, which you didn't even know was there. And as you

Alan Carroll:

remove the clutter, all of a sudden the film has disappeared.

Alan Carroll:

And the clarity of what you now are able to perceive in your

Alan Carroll:

mind's eye gets better and better and better. And so I'm,

Alan Carroll:

I'm a, a believer of the what you do in the physical world has

Alan Carroll:

some connection to changes in the metaphysical world and just

Alan Carroll:

share a story. When I left the job, I had a job working at a

Alan Carroll:

computer store and I didn't have the next stepping stone didn't

Alan Carroll:

have the next job. And I remember my body was shaking.

Alan Carroll:

And I knew it was shaking because I went down to the

Alan Carroll:

golfing driving range and I couldn't hit a ball. My body was

Alan Carroll:

as good at the ball. So I went home and cleaned my house.

Alan Carroll:

cleaned my The Cabinet Door drawers in the kitchen, the de

Alan Carroll:

jour that had all that junk you put into that drawer in your

Alan Carroll:

kitchen and it's like a it was under my control. I didn't know

Alan Carroll:

about the next stepping stone but my home is under my control.

Alan Carroll:

Oh, and I found that that that is correlates exactly, to what

Alan Carroll:

to what you're saying. And, you know, and shortly thereafter,

Alan Carroll:

the universe opens up and a job appears. And so I am in, then it

Alan Carroll:

leads to a career and it leads to podcasts. And it's, and it

Alan Carroll:

has a lot to do with the practice of practice, ongoing

Alan Carroll:

practice, to maintain a sense of integrity to your physical

Alan Carroll:

world. And so what I hear you talking about is cleaning the

Alan Carroll:

windows and maintaining a sense of integrity. So you are more

Alan Carroll:

balanced as you're sailing through sailing along the river.

Alan Carroll:

That's my, that's my answer to your question. How did that do?

Unknown:

That? That was awesome. And it's funny that you

Unknown:

mentioned windows, and the EU, yeah. The coal relation because

Unknown:

I did my moved into my new home, beginning of May. And it's brand

Unknown:

brand new construction, and I didn't do everything was done

Unknown:

for me when I moved in. But windows get dirty, and I noticed

Unknown:

myself just kind of feeling saggy, you know, and just not

Unknown:

not lemony fresh, if you will just, and I said to myself, by

Unknown:

the end of this weekend, I am going to clean the glass in the

Unknown:

home, that being the mirrors, I didn't clean all the windows,

Unknown:

because there are a lot of them. But I pinpointed three or four

Unknown:

glass items and the patio door. By the way, patio doors are

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very, very, very your listeners very important to keep clean,

Unknown:

because they are the window to the world. You want them to be

Unknown:

clean. And I'll tell you what, oh, what a difference to be able

Unknown:

to wake up Monday, and everything was just sparkling.

Unknown:

And what a nice way to start them to start the week and

Unknown:

maintain. So I vowed that, that I would keep them clean. And

Unknown:

I've done this before. It's it's just amazing what, what a

Unknown:

difference and what a difference it can make. And it doesn't take

Unknown:

that long, just some Windex and the squeegee and Bob's your

Unknown:

uncle, or George or John, or

Alan Carroll:

Wow. Let's before we before we end, I'd like to

Alan Carroll:

have you take a look at some of the practical things that people

Alan Carroll:

can do. And you and you mentioned one already, which is

Alan Carroll:

one at a time, rather than the whole house. Let's do the drawer

Alan Carroll:

of kind of a thing. So share with us some of the things that

Alan Carroll:

people could could do to, to to taste this water, or this wine

Alan Carroll:

of my Declutter. decluttering.

Unknown:

All right, thank you. Well, the one system is in this,

Unknown:

this will break down. So so bear with me, the one system is one

Unknown:

room at a time, one area of that room at a time and one thing at

Unknown:

a time. And the idea of all of that is to reduce the overwhelm

Unknown:

that people experience with clutter. So they feel like they

Unknown:

have to do everything at once Well, I'll tell you what I want

Unknown:

if you're unless your magic wand is better than mine is not going

Unknown:

to happen. It didn't accumulate overnight, it's not going to go

Unknown:

away overnight. So cut yourself some slack. That's usually the

Unknown:

lines that I close with, but I've given it to you early and

Unknown:

pick the smallest room in your home. The this is where we get

Unknown:

into the handy tips because I won't go into the whole system,

Unknown:

I'll just take a smattering. Pick the smallest room in your

Unknown:

house as opposed to the 30 years, the basement with 30

Unknown:

years of Christmas decorations. Don't do that to yourself. Pick

Unknown:

the smallest room and preferably the closet in that smallest room

Unknown:

usually a spare bedroom so that you can build your momentum,

Unknown:

build your confidence, pick one area in that room so that you

Unknown:

can see that momentum as opposed to bouncing from place to place

Unknown:

to place and really get like multitasking really getting

Unknown:

nothing done. And if you tackle one thing at a time, is it

Unknown:

tedious? Yes it is. Is it time consuming? Yes, it can be at the

Unknown:

start. But is it also the number one way that you can stay

Unknown:

decluttered for life? Yes, it is. The reason for this is

Unknown:

you're training your brain to not do what you need. and what

Unknown:

you don't need an IP. If you don't mind, I'd love to share a

Unknown:

92nd story with please do please do alright, my very very first

Unknown:

client hired me. She had a big L shaped desk full on just six

Unknown:

inches worth of paper, you could not see the top of the desk six

Unknown:

to eight inches paper maybe. And she needed to do this so she

Unknown:

could hire an assistant to come in and help her but she said

Unknown:

this, they won't know what to do here. So we start and my first

Unknown:

client, mind you and I said okay, well, what's what's this

Unknown:

first piece of paper here? And she looked at me like I was from

Unknown:

Venus and said, We are not going through all of this one by one.

Unknown:

While she relented. I didn't know what else to do. Within

Unknown:

five minutes, she starts flying through these papers. This is

Unknown:

why I say it gets faster, flying through these papers saying I do

Unknown:

not need utility bills. I can get them online. My accountant

Unknown:

doesn't need my bank statements online. So she was training her

Unknown:

brain to see other options as opposed to paper. Here's the

Unknown:

kicker trade magazines. She would buy them religiously every

Unknown:

couple of weeks, and she threw away 5060 bucks worth of them.

Unknown:

They were eight bucks a pop. And she had never read them. She

Unknown:

reports I don't know two or three weeks later, after the

Unknown:

kitty I was in the store. My arm automatically reached for that

Unknown:

magazine. No, wait a minute, do I just throw away a whole bunch

Unknown:

of these Obi Wan every couple of months? See training the brain?

Unknown:

start bringing in clutter. Yeah. So if you take your time for

Unknown:

your audience if you take your time, and just do it slowly and

Unknown:

methodically, yes, I'm impatient too. But it will work. It really

Unknown:

does work.

Alan Carroll:

I agree. I agree. I've, I've been practicing

Alan Carroll:

cleaning the cleaner window for a long, long, long time. And it

Alan Carroll:

really is a feeling of a feeling of a lightness. The analogy

Alan Carroll:

would be a gondola on a hot air balloon. You want to get higher

Alan Carroll:

you want to reach for the sky, you want to have more energy.

Alan Carroll:

Well, how do you make a gondola go up? Well, one of the ways is

Alan Carroll:

you throw the ballast off, throw the gunk off, throw the clutter

Alan Carroll:

off, throw the weight off, and it will rise. And so as you

Alan Carroll:

describe the five pillars, that's like you can visualize a

Alan Carroll:

hot air balloon just rising and rising as you declutter the

Alan Carroll:

gondola. So I want to thank you very much for sharing your

Alan Carroll:

wisdom with our, with our guests in our audience on the mindful

Alan Carroll:

you podcast. And for folks who'd like to reach out in connect

Alan Carroll:

with your kidney? How would be the best way to do that?

Unknown:

The best way is to go to declutter the brain.com and I

Unknown:

have a seven step and seven easy steps to conquer your physical

Unknown:

and mental clutter as my gift to your audience. And to sorry, we

Unknown:

had a technical difficulty there. And my contact

Unknown:

information is there. I'm also available kitty Andrews on every

Unknown:

almost every social platform except Tik Tok.

Alan Carroll:

Okay, well thank you very much kitty. Wonderful

Alan Carroll:

hearing your words of wisdom for our guests. Thank you very much

Alan Carroll:

for being on the mindful you podcast. Thank you. Bye bye

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