Did you know I’ve offered my 30 Days to Clarity: Clutter Busting Course for more than a decade? It was my first foray into online coaching courses. And it’s a class I created straight from the heart, something I wish I’d had myself twenty years ago. As I was prepping for the next round of students, I gathered some of my favorite decluttering and organization quotes to share with you here on the blog.
The thing is, I am not a naturally organized person. I was constantly being fussed at as a little girl due to the state of my room. You know: Barbies left out, piles of books everywhere, and a messy closet. Of course, the easiest way to clean was to shove everything under the bed. (Nope, that doesn’t fly as “cleaning your room” when you’re nine.) I read books and hoped to get tips on how to keep things tidier.
By the time I was in middle school, I sought out organization quotes and tips. Seeking guidance. And in a quest for inspiration. When I hit high school, I finally learned to organize my school work well. Understanding how being more disciplined and organized helped me be more successful in college. And how I finished my Bachelors in 3 1/2 years without summer school.
I also learned how to better manage a household. And that life felt much easier when everything had a place.
But when I became a young wife and then a mother? All those naturally unorganized tendencies became the norm. It’s also easier to feel overwhelmed and burned out when your home is in need of tidying and decluttering. You have work to do, kids to bathe and feed, and all the other stuff that goes along with running a household.
And the thing is, being unorganized causes you to lose things, like your keys. And it causes you to lose other important stuff, like the electric bill, too. Because, let me tell you, darling, when your closet’s a hot mess and every flat surface in your home is cluttered, you need some inspiration to dig out from under it.
In the midst of my divorce I discovered that when my home was neat and tidy, I thought more clearly and got more done.
So in the most challenging of times, I discovered discovered that clearing clutter opened the path to me loving my life more. In fact, until I got a handle on how my stuff affected my mental health? I don’t know if I ever truly loved myself. Or my life.
Over the last few years, I have found a deep love an appreciation for the art of housekeeping. And how seemingly small luxuries have a big pay off.
Keeping a (mostly) clutter-free home invites me to delight in beauty in my home. And my life. That, my darling, is priceless.
When I an in need of hope, help, or inspiration, I turn to books. Though I still struggled with my natural tendency to be a bit messy, I have my favorite books that I turn to time and again:
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- Alexandra Stoddard’s Living a Beautiful Life
- Pam Young & Peggy Jones’s Sidetracked Home Executives
- Cheryl Mendelson’s Home Comforts
- Peter Walsh’s Let it Go
My collection inspirational housekeeping, decluttering, and organization quotes continues to grow. Having an organized, clutter-free home allows me to focus on what’s important.
Whether you are one of those born organized folks. Or more like me: a little messy around the edges. I think you’ll appreciate a little inspiration to tidy things up. Tend your home. And dive into how much more you love your life when your home is organized and clutter free.
Here are 42 Decluttering, Housekeeping, and Organization Quotes that I love:
- “Clutter is the physical manifestation of unmade decisions fueled by procrastination”
–Christina Scalise
- “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.”
— Leonardo DaVinci - “Yet housekeeping actually offers more opportunities for savoring achievement than almost any other work I can think of. Each of its regular routines brings satisfaction when it is completed. These routines echo the rhythm of life, and the housekeeping rhythm is the rhythm of the body. You get satisfaction not only from the sense of order, cleanliness, freshness, peace and plenty restored, but from the knowledge that you yourself and those you care about are going to enjoy these benefits.”
–Cheryl Mendelson - “Clutter robs us of life. It robs us socially, when we’re too embarrassed to have people over. It robs us spiritually, because we can’t be at peace in a cluttered home. And it robs us psychologically, by stealing our ability to feel motivated in our space.”
— Peter Walsh - “Intimate, necessary details add up to one’s private life. Select them with care because they are your life.”
–Alexandra Stoddard
- “Clutter is not just physical stuff, it’s old ideas, toxic relationships and bad habits”
– Eleanor Brown - “Once you have a clear idea of your priorities – that is your values, goals and high leverage activities, organize around them”
– Stephen Covey - “What really does work to increase the feeling of having a home and its comforts is housekeeping. “
― Cheryl Mendelson - “You are important enough to invest the time and energy needed for the change you want. Commit to becoming the person you wish to be and carve out the time for what needs to be done!”
–Peter Walsh - “If we could make our house a home, and then make it a sanctuary, I think we could truly find paradise on Earth.”
–Alexandra Stoddard - “Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.”
–William Morris
- “Out of clutter, find simplicity.”
― Albert Einstein - “Housekeeping creates cleanliness, order, regularity, beauty, the conditions for health and safety, and a good place to do and feel all the things you wish and need to do and feel in your home.”
― Cheryl Mendelson - “What I know for sure is that when you declutter – whether it’s on your home, your head, or your heart – it is astounding what will flow into that space that will enrich you, your life, and your family.”
–Peter Walsh - “Life is too short for you to be the caretaker of the wrong details.”
–Alexandra Stoddard - “Get rid of clutter and you may just find that it was blocking the door you’ve been looking for”
– Katrina Mayer
- “Getting organized in the normal routines of life and finishing little projects you’ve started is an important first step toward realizing larger goals. If you can’t get a handle on the small things, how will you ever get it together to focus on the big things?”
–Joyce Meyer - Whether you live alone or with a spouse, parents, and ten children, it is your housekeeping that makes your home alive, that turns it into a small society in its own right, a vital place with its own ways and rhythms, the place where you can be more yourself than you can be anywhere else.”
― Cheryl Mendelson - “Clutter is not just the stuff on your floor—it’s anything that stands between you and the life you want to be living. ”
–Peter Walsh
- “Beauty, like love, makes us happy, but we have to be keenly receptive to the seduction. “
–Alexandra Stoddard - “Keeping baggage from the past will leave no room for the happiness in the future”
–Wayne L. Misner - “The more I examine the issue of clutter, the more effort I put into combating it, because it really does act as a weight.”
–Gretchen Rubin - “Home is the one place in the world where you are safe from feeling put down or out, unentitled, or unwanted.”
― Cheryl Mendelson
- “Start with the stuff (as most people are inclined to do when they try to conquer their clutter) and you are pretty much guaranteed failure. Start with the vision you have for the life you want and you have taken the first real step to long-term and remarkable change.”
–Peter Walsh - “When something small is right you can then forget about it and think about more lofty ideas.”
–Alexandra Stoddard - “You can’t reach for anything new if your hands are still full of yesterday’s junk”
– Louise Smith - “When we clear the physical clutter from our lives, we literally make way for inspiration and ‘good, orderly direction’ to enter.”
–Julia Cameron - “We have, instead (of soot and dirt), disorganization. We have this proliferation of goods. It’s the disease of the time. “
–Cheryl Mendelson - “If a gift has come to you wrapped in obligations and tied tightly with a ribbon of guilt, then it’s not really a gift at all. It’s a manipulation. A gift should be something freely given that enhances your life and reminds you lovingly of the giver. If it’s not, you simply should not give it a place in your home.”
–Peter Walsh - “Everything in our surroundings speak for us, and if we accept living with vulgar design we must pay for it. Carling about aesthetics increases your sensitivity. The more we care about the small details, the more in tune to beauty we become, and the more we realize how seemingly insignificant items affects us.”
–Alexandra Stoddard - “Clutter-clearing is modern-day alchemy.”
–Denise Linn
- “Clutter is a physical manifestation of fear that cripples our ability to grow.”
–H.G. Chissell - “Malignant items don’t have to be reminders of bad times, like a breakup or a health crisis. They can bring back memories of loved ones or high points in your life. But if these memories leave you feeling sad or feeling that your life isn’t as good now, then the objects are causing you mental and emotional harm and have no place in your home. …The key to enjoying happiness and good health in a warm, welcoming home is to live IN THE PRESENT MOMENT surrounded by items that you cherish and that have meaning for you and your family. If too much of your time is spent replaying your greatest hits or struggling with old pain, you’re not making new memories of your present life.”
–Peter Walsh - “Set up systems that help you keep the bedroom neat, so that even when you are tired or rushed, you can keep the special place calm and uncluttered. Have a place for everything so that when you undress you are relaxed.”
–Alexandra Stoddard
- “Having too much of anything results in chaos, confusion and clutter.”
― Geralin Thomas - “Being organized is not about being company-ready 24/7. It’s about being able to find what you need and restore order quickly.”
–Monika Kristofferson - “If you have no systems, you have to reinvent your housekeeping or debate what to do first every time you do it, and the required mental effort is a major obstacle, especially when you are tired. But a tired working person is often able to do things that are routine and habitual.”
–Cheryl Mendelson - “There’s memory clutter, which reminds you of an important person, achievement, or event from your past. I think memory clutter often gathers in the homes of people with some degree of depression. And then there’s “I might need it one day clutter, in which people hang on to stuff in anticipation of an imagined future. Among these folks, I’ve noticed a recurring theme of anxiety…Maybe it’s possible that the stuff we own and obsess over is the physical manifestation of the mental health issues that challenge our minds.”
–Peter Walsh - “You can tell a great deal about a person by visiting his or her kitchen.”
–Alexandra Stoddard - “Your home should be a reflection of how you want to live right now, and for the next phase of your life.”
–Martha Stewart
- “Too many things in too small a space cut off flow, block creativity, and bury beauty, much like a bad cold can make it hard to breathe. Remove things from this space today.”
― Laura Staley - “Having too much of anything results in chaos, confusion and clutter.”
― Geralin Thomas
Just writing these decluttering, housekeeping, and organization quotes to share with you made me want straighten my bedroom and tidy up the kitchen!
How about you? Are you inspired to do a little tidying up? Which if these decluttering and organization quotes spoke to you the most? Do you have a favorite I didn’t include? Drop me an email (debra AT debrasmouse.com) and let me know!
Have these inspiring Decluttering, Housekeeping, and Organization quotes
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