Lauren Williams's (casualuncluttering) Blog

OHIO, Only Handle It Once, is a golden rule among Organizers. It's meant to teach our clients how to forestall "churning" - a word I dislike intensely! Churning - I prefer "shuffling " - is a behavior where people try to make keep/let go decisions about their possessions, but only end up moving s...

I'm teal blue. My favorite color is purple, followed by blue, green and a deep raspberry red. A client has our appointments in teal blue on her calendar and she lit up like the sun when she told me she'd settled on that perfect color for me. It's one of her favorites. I'll take it, I'll rejoice w...

I've been buying little odds and ends of furniture to make my home more functional. Some of those pieces need some maintenance, using linseed oil or equivalents (and am I ever grateful there are equivalents!!!! The smell of linseed oil makes me ill). Not gonna name the source, but one of my furni...

Sounds simple, open a window. And still I forget to do it, even as I'm driving on my favorite Washington back roads, surrounded by greenery, no other cars for miles, no commercial buildings burping smoke, and thinking to myself just how stale the recycled air is in my car. How open windows benefi...

Games that don't waste time. Well, first off, no game wastes time - play never wastes time. For children, it is a critical mechanism for learning, as The Hechinger Report article Twenty-six studies point to more play for young children suggests. Dr. Stuart Brown, founder of The National Institute...

I've read a lot of books about organizing and hoarding disorder. I've attended a lot of classes. Dr. Robin Zasio's book, The Hoarder in You,  is the best introduction to cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), a counseling modality which can be effective for treating people with hoarding disorder, th...

Spendaholism, compulsive buying, compulsive shopping disorder, overspending, overshopping, shopaholism. It's as real as alcoholism and just as destructive. It can contribute to hoarding. And it's winked at, even grossly encouraged, around the world. "Just a girl's night out." "A boy and his toys....

To Buy or Not to Buy: Why We Overshop and How to Stop by April Lane Benson is a critical tool for anyone suffering from spendaholism (compulsive buying, compulsive shopping disorder, overspending, overshopping, shopaholism). Dr. Benson, who passed away 3/29/2021, was an internationally recognized...

HURRAH, HOARDING SHOWS I LIKE!!!!! I am sooooooooooooooooooo soooooooooooooooo thrilled to be able to point people to hoarding reality TV which is gentle, thoughtful, empathetic, realistic and even carefully humorous. We need to go across the pond to Britain. Jasmine Harman, Help for Hoarders, br...

Do you go with the flow? Turn on a dime? Breeze through? I've written before about tiny nuances of language that fascinate me. The experiments of what to say to yourself and others, for  encouragement, to make decisions, to exchange and learn ideas more easily, may not be easy, but absolutely wor...