Outer Order, Inner Calm by Gretchen Rubin is a guide to decluttering and organizing one’s life to create a sense of calm and happiness. The author shares practical tips and strategies to help transform your living spaces, optimize your daily routines, and improve overall well-being.
Significance of Outer Order
Outer order plays a crucial role in fostering inner calm and can impact your sense of personal freedom, autonomy, and self-worth.
Creating structure and decluttering your environment helps reduce stress, improves focus, and promotes overall happiness.
Cultivating Mindful Consumption
Mindful consumption is essential to minimizing clutter.
Be conscious of your purchases and avoid impulsive buying, helping to prevent creating new unnecessary clutter.
Set rules for spending and seek experiences rather than material possessions.
Value of Shared Spaces
Shared living areas can be challenging to maintain; however, clarifying expectations, setting common goals, and establishing collaborative routines are vital in creating harmony and mutual respect within shared spaces.
Celebrating Progress
Acknowledge and celebrate your progress throughout your decluttering journey.
Cherishing your accomplishments not only creates a sense of achievement but also serves as motivation to continue your pursuit of outer order and inner calm.
Avoiding Procrastination
Procrastination can hinder progress when decluttering.
Break tasks into smaller, manageable parts to avoid feeling overwhelmed, and consider using the ‘power hour’ technique to complete tasks you might normally procrastinate on.
One-Size-Fits-All Approach Doesn’t Work
Decluttering and organizing methods are highly personal, and it is essential to find the techniques that best suit your unique preferences and habits.
Experiment with various approaches to discover what works for you.
The Importance of Habits
Establishing daily habits, such as making the bed or sorting mail, is essential in maintaining outer order.
Prioritize creating routines that help support your goals and contribute to a clutter-free, organized environment.
Decluttering Digital Spaces
Decluttering extends beyond physical spaces and includes digital ones like email inboxes, computer files, and social media.
Develop an effective digital organization system and schedule regular digital decluttering sessions to maintain overall order.
The 5 Steps to Decluttering
The author proposes five basic steps for decluttering: 1) Make the choice to start, 2) Remove what you do not need, 3) Organize remaining items effectively, 4) Maintain the order through consistent effort, and 5) Reassess and adapt your methods over time.
Strategies to Let Go
Letting go of possessions can be difficult.
However, adopting concepts like the ‘one-minute rule,’ the ‘one-in, one-out rule,’ and the ’20/20 rule’ can simplify the decluttering process and help you make those challenging decisions.
