![]() “The first thing I’d recommend someone struggling with clutter should do, before trying techniques to minimize it, is ask themselves why the clutter exists in the first place,” Lush says. A better strategy is to work together to set realistic boundaries and expectations, a process that starts with each side examining their own motivations for feeling the way they do about clutter. In fact, that’s the central tenet of her advice: Trying to force anyone - your partner, your roommate, even yourself - to change completely is futile. “There’s a big difference between going, ‘This is what’s important to me,’ and ‘You have to stop doing that.’” If you’re the anti-clutter half of the pair, for instance, “instead of saying to someone, ‘You’re really messy and it’s a problem for me,’ focus on how much easier it is for you to function and get things done when the house is clean,” Lush says. Lush says that, as with resolving any relationship conflict, disagreements over how much stuff to have around the house are best resolved by focusing on your own feelings rather than casting blame. You have to own your personal perception, rather than being judgmental - there’s no wrong or right in this situation, and suggesting otherwise makes people defensive right out of the gate.” “I’m very lucky in that my husband is fundamentally respectful, which is a necessary part of people like us sharing a space. “Of course it’s easier when two people who are minimalists or pack rats live together, but that’s not how love or life works,” says Lush, who regularly works with couples at opposite ends of the stuff spectrum. For chronically disorganized people like us, the solution isn’t as easy as KonMari-ing, especially not when it comes to keeping the peace with tidier significant others or roommates. To my surprise, when I reach out to her, she says she’s a fellow born clutterbug “from a chronically disorganized background.” Chronic disorganization is distinct from mental-health issues like hoarding disorder, Lush says, but it still exceeds your everyday, run-of-the-mill mess it’s marked by long-term struggles with clutter, a depleted quality of life, failed attempts to declutter and organize via traditional methods, and discouragement as a result of that failure. ![]() ![]() With Chris gone, the two of us have found ourselves in a fairly common odd-couple situation: Whether it’s because of true love or a desire to save on rent, many of us share space with people whose accumulating and decorating habits differ significantly from our own.Īlison Lush has been a professional organizer since 2010. As a pack rat descended from a long line of pack rats, I recognize I’m something of a nightmare for minimalists like Sean it’s just that there’s so much good trash on the streets of Park Slope, and resisting my magpie instincts feels impossible. I thought it would be gone when Chris moved out, but I’m starting to worry I was wrong.” “When I moved into this apartment,” Sean said, “I knew the compromise I was making was the clutter. I noticed him wince when I brought home the blue chairs, part of my attempt to furnish our place after the departure of our third roommate, Chris, and his collection of bookshelves (not books book shelves). My roommate Sean, who inherited his three whole pieces of bedroom furniture from the previous occupants of our apartment, had been quieter than usual. I just couldn’t let them sit there all alone, or worse, end up in a landfill. For the next few weeks it sat in the living room, surrounded by a growing number of other curbside castaways - a white glass swag lamp with scrolling gold details, a vintage school desk with a base so heavy I borrowed my bodega’s hand truck to move it, a pair of blue velvet wing chairs baring only the subtlest of stains. I saw it on the sidewalk following a birthday lunch with my parents, perfect beside the giant hole in its caned seat, and convinced them to help me carry it the several blocks back to my apartment. It started with a bentwood rocking chair. Photo: Lambert/Archive Photos/Getty Images ![]()
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