Get Rid of The Clutter

We just have too much clutter in our lives. Whether it’s our home, our car or even our business there’s clutter that has to go! What we don’t realize is how much that clutter is holding us back.

I learned this lesson the hard way when we moved from Milwaukee, Wisconsin to Maui, Hawaii four months ago. Let me just tell you upfront that the move definitely tested the relationship between my wife and I!

We decided that instead of shipping our stuff and car we would sell EVERYTHING in a huge rummage sale. As we started to dig through stuff we found things we hadn’t seen in 10 years!!

There was stuff everywhere and our dreams of the huge rummage sale quickly died. In the end we put a BUNCH of stuff on our curb that people came and got for free.

We donated an entire truckload of stuff to the Salvation Army; it was literally the entire truck. In the end we made $5,000 with the stuff we did sell but we used that money to buy things for our home here in Maui.

We learned a valuable lesson with this move. If you came to our house now you would see that we live a very simple life now. I was shocked about how freeing living simple is. Through this experience I want to share three lessons about clutter with you.

We don’t truly realize how much clutter we have

Until you really dig in you don’t realize how out of control things are. Since what we talk about here is online stuff let’s talk about clutter online. How cluttered does your website look?

Is there just too much for anyone to really focus on your message? Keep up your website and keep it simple. It should be very clear what you want people to do once they visit your website.

What about the other parts of your business? Is your schedule too cluttered and filled with unnecessary appointments? Is your social media cluttered with confusing messages and constant self-promotion?

If you answered yes to any of these questions it is time to clean up that clutter. Get things to where they need to be and won’t distract from your ultimate message.

We don’t realize how clutter frustrates the situation

When someone comes to your website and it is super cluttered they get frustrated and never come back. If they can’t get to the information they need you’ve lost them, possibly for good.

It can be the clutter on your desk where you create content or just your house in general. Whether or not you realize it that clutter is affecting your mood and ultimately your productivity.

When you’re constantly having to work around stuff it will affect you. Get rid of that clutter and your frustration level will go down.

Simple is the way to go

Simple is better. A simple website, a simple (yet powerful) message, simple marketing messages. Simple house without the clutter! This will make for a happier you and more effective business.

Take a hard look at everything you’re doing right now with your dream. Take a hard look at the physical area where you’re working on your dream. Is there a way to simplify?

I can give you a simple example: the plugins on my website. I had a bunch of plugins doing various things. What I realized is that some of those plugins were distracting and actually slowed down my website.

I removed the ones that weren’t needed and my website sped up. Now when you come to this site I hope you see the message and not the “stuff.” Take it from me and test it out yourself: simplify.

This week I challenge you to open up your eyes and see what’s around you. Is there clutter that needs to get cleaned up? Is there a way to simplify your life? If you read Zenhabits.net you’ve seen Leo’s amazing post about clutter.

Are things cluttered or simple for you in your life and business? How can you improve?