Clutter causes a kind of energetic inflammation.

It’s easy to fall into the trap of simply collecting too much stuff.

Whether you compulsively buy new stuff, or you’re the recipient of random hand-me-downs from friends and family, it’s all too easy to find yourself one day, weaving a way through your living room like a goat on a thin trail.

Physical clutter in your home can be a major contributor to the blockage of your creative flow. Just watch Marie Kondo’s show on Netflix for some visceral examples.

As a recovering addict of the “I need this for that” mentality encouraged by our consumerist culture, I wanted to share these three simple hacks that motherhood has encouraged me to learn.

These simple steps have helped me manage the chaos of running a household with children, make more space for being happy with less stress, and effectively soothe the ongoing bumps and lumps of life.

Give Away Half of Your Furniture

You know those resolutions you probably have to do more yoga, workout at home, and spend less time snacking while vegging on the couch?

Did you know that having a house full of furniture and very little open floor space could actually be getting in the way of having the space to move your body like you know you should? By centering your existence around technology by physically prioritizing devices in your home and living space, it makes it much harder to focus on your body instead of living mostly in your mind.

Don’t believe me?

I know from experience that screens call me much more strongly when they are the focal point of the space in which I relax. And I’ve found that having a wide-open floor space with just a few comfy seats is incredibly effective in making me remember I wanted to roll out my yoga mat to stretch in the middle of the day.

There are probably tons of people in your city that could use a new-to-them couch or table. Austin is full of people who were de-homed by recent hurricanes on the Gulf coast. We recently gave away half our furniture, and I can’t tell you how much better our house feels with the newly opened space.

Find these folks and make their day by gifting or selling them the extra furniture in your house. You will be amazed at how much calmer your life feels, and how much easier it is to keep your space clean with an open area where you once had furniture.

Digitize Creative Projects

Live a functional minimal lifestyle without giving up the rich goodness of all physical things by fully utilizing the power of the digital archive. After all, how could you possibly practice living small so you can move into that tiny house someday when you’re hoarding closets full of old junk?

It was the act of making it that had meaning. Now the finished project is just taking up space. Whether these are projects are yours or your kids, it’s easy to let the end results pile up in a corner, in a box, or in a closet to collect dust and wither away in a mass of forgotten memories.

Keep only those things that speak to the heart, and discard items that no longer spark joy. Thank them for their service — then let them go. — Marie Kondo

Here are a few examples of digital declutterization that capture the essence of honoring creativity without also capturing the storage space.

Make an inspiring vision board each year. Hang this year’s board on the wall and keep a digital archive of past years in pictures.
Capture your kids' art projects in pictures. Bonus, take the pictures of stuff with the kid themself, and you’ll get a superpowered archive of both art and child.
Make a family cookbook by videoing the process of cooking your family’s favorite meals. It doesn’t need to be broadcast on a network to be your version of a cooking show. Bonus — you can share these videos with your kids when they leave home.

These digital gems can be collected and republished into a yearly masterpiece that captures the best parts of your family's creative life. Imagine how cool it would be to look over these books in your elder years, or share them with your grandkids.

And there won’t be any dusty moving boxes full of sentimental old crap stashed in the garage or the attic for your kids to deal with when you’re dead.

Turn an Orphaned Sock Into a Cold Pack

This one is may seem like an odd duck in this list of three things, but it accomplishes the twin goals of doing something productive with those odd socks and giving you an awesome tool to deal with inflammation.

Take an orphaned sock into a dry cold pack by filling the sock with old rice or beans that have been languishing, uncooked in the corner of your pantry. Simply take the drygoods and put them into the sock. Secure with a plain knot. If the sock is worn thin, layer the lonely socks one inside of another to ensure minimum chances of the grains or beans spilling out.

Keep this sock in your freezer for use whenever your neck is tight after a long day on your laptop, or when the inevitable bonks of life happen to you or your kids.

The benefit to the dry cold is that it’s a bit gentler than the wet cold of ice or an ice pack. It’s also soft, weighted, and extremely reusable. Once you have one, you’ll wonder why you didn’t make one of these bad dogs before.

BONUS TIP: If you have a microwave, you can also take the cold sock, pop it in the microwave, and heat it up like this to make an instant weighted hot pack as you need.

These socks can smell amazing if you put things like lavender in them. Warm rice and lavender. Mmm…

More Space Means Less Pain

Our culture tells us to buy new gadgets and widgets all the time. Tidy up with this new box, or this fancy basket. Take these supplements, and buy this new pillow. Sometimes this advice makes sense, and other times it does not.

Sometimes all you have to do to make your life better is let go of a little of the extra you have. Redistribute extra stuff, digitize your creations, and use a little of the magic of cold (or heat) as needed. One less thing to manage. One more tool to make your life better.

In the end, isn’t that all we really need?