Book Review: It’s All Too Much

An Easy Plan For Living A Richer Life With Less Stuff by Peter Walsh

In a nutshell what is this book all about?

Basically, It’s All Too Much really is about one thing, stuff, and how stuff has a way of preventing you from getting what you want and living a fulfilling life. Initially it might seem like a leap, but Walsh convincingly shows how all the physical stuff or clutter in our life prevents us from living the life we truly want. Through a series of exercises and practical how-tos the book shows why we have so much stuff, what to do with it all, and what to do next to get that richer life we all feel we should have.

Wait, isn’t that the guy from the TV show Clean Sweep?
Yep, that is the guy. I had never seen the show before reading the book, but I did track down an episode after the fact. In some episodes Walsh might get into some of the deeper issues and problems caused by all the stuff, but in the episode that I saw it was mainly about home make-over and little else. So if you have seen the show and think, well I don’t need that book, I would strongly argue that they are not one-in-the-same, at least based on the single episode that I saw.

Introduction:
The book starts off by setting the mood that most of us are feeling either every day, or at least on occasion, that it is all just too much. Whether it is the overfilled garage or the newest food now linked to causing cancer, it is all just too much. To much information, too much stuff, too much that really doesn’t matter and does not improve our life, yet somehow has a way of controlling it.

One part of the introduction is about the storage epidemic. In our country garages are no longer used for cars, houses are storage facilities, and when those places get full there is a 15 billion dollar storage industry just waiting by to “help” you out. FYI - 10% of American homes have stuff in storage, which in an increase of 75% from just 10 years ago, and in this time the average American house size has increased by 50%!

Part One: The Clutter Problem

1: This is not my beautiful house
The section in part one describes that our “stuff” is much more then a collection of useful and necessary things. Our stuff is a collection of memories, commitments, wasted dollars, guilt and much more. The first chapter explains that the book will show a systematic system to help deal with it all.

The second page in the author presents a quiz just to convince you that, yes indeed you most likely have a problem with stuff and clutter, which is a great ploy to convince you that there is in fact a problem, and that if you want the solution, you need to finish this book. The quiz is followed by more pages helping to illuminate all the ways that the “stuff” affects our lives and our relationships.

What you will get out of the first chapter is the realization that if you most likely have a problem with stuff!

2: Excuses, Excuses
This chapter really starts things off right by starting off attacking all reasons or excuses we hold on to things.

Excuse one: “I might need it someday”
While this could end up being the case the author convincingly argues that keeping around one or two of these “maybe someday” items is more than enough. While the future is important and planning for it can be helpful, one thing to realize is that holding on to the clutter stops us from living in the present.

Excuse two: “Its Too Important to let go”
Items are often kept not for their use or beauty but because of sentimental value, family history, or personal achievements, which can often be fine. However, how many of these items that you are holding on to do you truly cherish or display. Looking at how you actually treat an item can often answer how much you truly value it. Is the item wrapped up in a dusty old box in the attic or displayed prominently on the mantle?

This chapter goes on to speak of some horrific examples of families who had not had guests in years due to the clutter in their house and lives. The examples may be extreme but I would imagine that most people can relate at least on some level and realize their own issues with “stuff” and clutter.

Excuse three: “I can’t get rid of it, its worth a lot of money”
This excuse basically points out that we spend good money on things and then later even after they have lost their usefulness we hold on to them as a way to sort of hold on to spent money. However, this really does not work and the items we hold onto after they are of use actually rob us of real value. This excuse is probably the biggest eye opener if you really pay attention. The author asks to really think about how much it costs to hold on to things of perceived value. Imagine the storage fee that ends up costing more then the item you are storing, or the large house mortgage to pay for the large house, to store all the “stuff” that is no longer of use, it all adds up!

Excuse four: “My house is too small”
The author has a simple answer to this excuse. If this is the case then move to a larger place now! If for any reason you can’t do this right away, then it is time to slim down and get rid of “stuff”.

Excuse five: “I don’t have the time”
This one is pretty simple to dispute and the author does so quite well. Have you ever spent time looking for your keys, or an unpaid bill? Realize that clutter monopolizes your time, and getting rid of it will free it up!

Excuse six: “I don’t know how it got like this”
Stuff gets more stuff, and clutter begins to take over. It will only get worse and it will not fix itself!

Excuse seven: “It’s Not a problem - my Husband/Wife/Partner/Child just thinks it is”
Realize that clutter jeopardizes our relationships. One partner thinks the “stuff” is ok and the other thinks it needs to go. Both may have a valid argument, but just realizing how deep stuff and clutter and affect our lives and our closest relationships is downright scary. Do you want to spend all your time arguing over “stuff” or make reasonable compromises and put relationships first?

Excuse eight: “It isn’t mine”
This excuse is all about the stuff in our lives and homes that does not belong to us. Other peoples clutter robs us of opportunities that should be ours. The author asks, if this item is so important to someone else, why is it sitting in my house?

Excuse nine: “It’s all too overwhelming”
This excuse gets a pass from Walsh and he relates as he has made a business out of this exact feeling. It is overwhelming, stuff in it millions of different flavors takes over and we don’t have a clue how it happened. Our stuff and clutter robs us of our peace of mind. By following throughout the book Walsh is going to help us attack this feeling by breaking down the clutter into manageable steps.

3: Imagine the Life you want to live
Dealing with stuff is not about getting organized, nor is the answer to get rid of clutter, the answer is to imagine and know the life that you want to live! The key is to look beyond the stuff to the life you want to be living. Do this before the moving the sorting and organizing of stuff to get closer to the life you want. In this chapter Walsh guides the reader down a road of personal exploration to really ask the important questions that we often never ask ourselves, yet should be the map we follow to get where and what we really want from life.

Part Two: Putting Clutter in Its Place

1. Kick Start - Tackling the Surface Clutter
At this point in the book it is time to get your hands dirty and get started. The first method of attack is the F.A.S.T system, which stands for “Fix a time”, “Anything not used for twelve months”, “Someone else’s stuff”, “Trash”. The book goes into great detail to show the benefits and rules of this useful system along with helpful preparations and consideration to take care of before starting. This section also helps plan out details of a successful yard sale to handle the items you are going to get rid of but have a worthwhile market value.

2. Hash It Out!
Now you have got rid of some stuff and you feel better, but that was just the beginning. This section of the book takes you through the process of re-imagining your home. It might have been working “okay” before, but this in no longer enough. It is now time to make your possessions serve your life, instead of vice versa. Before getting started Walsh has a few paragraphs about basic household communication and making sure everyone takes a minute to evaluate what is truly important before moving on to the challenges ahead. After that is out of the way things start to get somewhat technical with things like room function charts and questionnaires. This technical section is followed up by ways to anticipate and handle conflict and lastly covers a section on “zones”.

3. Conquer Your Home
Now with a few steps out of the way, where do you go? If it could all just be “cleaned up” or put in a storage facility would you be done, no! So often it is hard to even decide where to start so the author represents the “Trash Bag Tango” where you just take a trash bag around the house for 10 minutes for two weeks just getting rid of whatever you can. If you get in the habit of doing it every day you will start to notice a huge difference. At this point Walsh asks us to remember and review all the excuses that may prevent you from getting rid of the most amount of stuff and also offers a few helpful ground rules to really help get things moving. The rest of this section is where the book really comes alive with helpful tidbits and helpful observations. It talks about the importance of a romantic and clean master bedroom, tips to help weed out all the clothes you never wear, and much more targeted advice for every room in the house.

Next the book systematically goes through every room and gives usable tips on how to get rid of clutter and make the rooms more usable and enjoyable. However, before starting Walsh sets up some ground rules.

Rule 1: Think it Through, for each room think about what needs to be in it and what tends to accumulate in it.

Rule 2: Set it up, utilize the provided function charts to first determine the rooms purpose, its zones and what does not belong.

Rule 3: Make it Happen, the action plan to make the vision a reality.

Room 1: Master Bedroom
Walsh brilliantly points out that no room in a home should be more important to a couple then the master bedroom. If this room is not a peaceful retreat it will have devastating effects on the relationship and family. Basically Walsh points out that this room needs to be all about the couple. This is a place of peace and romance and should just have your furniture and clothes. This is not a place for the tax papers, kids toys, office desk, etc. This room is for relaxation and romance and nothing else!

Of the two things that can stay, furniture, and clothes the one most of us have a problem with is the clothes. Furthermore, Walsh goes onto say that clothing is the single greatest clutter problem he runs into. One brilliantly obvious observation pointed out is that clothing is relatively inexpensive with millions of choices every where you look. It is not an issue to get new clothes and fashions are always changing, so why do we tend to resist getting rid of the stuff we never wear?

Walsh has many great tips on how to get rid of the clothing clutter, which is summed up with Lose the losers, and keep the winners.

Keep the clothing that you:

• love
• fit you well now
  
• make you feel good
• get compliments on
• the handbag you use

Lose the:

• wish clothes
• bargins
• free t-shirts
• the stupid single socks, the ugly socks, the old socks
• uncomfortable bras
• the handbags you don’t use
• any jewelry you don’t wear, if it is valuable, then sell it!
• unsightly undies

Room 2: Kids Rooms
When it comes to kids the biggest clutter issue is the toys and if one toy is good, then fifty toys must be great! Wrong. Whether the toys are just overfilling the kids room, or the whole house it should be addressed. Pay attention to the space you have and create limits which not only help with the clutter but also teaches kids important lessons about life. Create routines, explain the joy and satisfaction of giving to others less fortunate, teach organization, teach how to make informed decisions about what to keep and what to get rid of.

One special section that I enjoyed talked about the toys from the Grandparents. The book talks about the reasons and ways that the Grandparents sometimes go nuts when it comes to the toys. The book offers many suggestions to offer the grandparents to help better guide the good intentions into something more beneficial for everyone involved and reduce the clutter at the same time. There are some obvious suggestions like contributing money towards college fund, but my favorite tip is to just suggest that they can show their love through experiences instead of stuff. Remind them that the toys will be forgotten later in life, but memories can last a lifetime!

Room 3: Family and Living Rooms
The room where it all happens often pulls double duty and thus is often overran with stuff. To help reduce the clutter in this room utilize the ratio rule (80/20) to go through music, books, movies etc and weed out what is not really important to you. Use digital tools where possible to get rid of your physical CD collection. Let the space you have dictate how much you can keep. Get ruthless with your stuff and use it the way you see fit. If you can’t part with a magazine because it has something that you are going to need later for reference, then tear out the article and throw the magazine away! Do you love your collectibles, are they of value right now, do you enjoy taking time to keep them clean and tidy, do you enjoy showing them off, if so then great, otherwise get rid of them.

Walsh provides many great tips for how to handle sentimental items. One tip that is so easy that might help let go of the actual item is to just take a picture of the item and do something interesting with the picture, or just store it away saving valuable space.

Room 4: Home Office
Walsh focuses on “zones” for every room of the house and there are potentially a few important “zones” in the home office including:

• mail
• magazine storage
• bills
• receipts
• personal information
• files

Many great tips covering how to embrace digital, handle paper, and mail are provided. Besides great little tips the idea of systems and processes are really emphasized. Something that really stands out as an important tip is to keep all horizontal surfaces clear.

Room 5 + 6 + 7: Kitchen, Dinning, and Bathrooms
Again a keep tip is to keep horizontal surfaces clear, get rid of what you don’t use or need, utilize zones, and many many more tips and tricks for keeping these rooms functional.

Room 8: Garage

Walsh says to get rid of what you have not used in the last 6 months or year. Streamline what you have, get stuff off the floor, divide into zones, handle seasonal items, and utilize the vertical and ceiling space to its advantage.

Step 4: Maintenance
Now that the house is clutter free how do you keep it that way? Well if you followed the book, created zones for each room, understand what should be where and why, then the hardest part is completed. At this point it is a matter of review along with a few last parting tips.

The 5 minute Purge: Set a timer for 5 minutes and go through a room filling a bag with as much as you can to donate.

The in out rule: Every time something new comes in, something old goes out.

Keep a charity bag: Whenever you have something you don’t want or need, but could have value to someone else, it goes in the charity bag.

Step 5: Cleanup Checkup
Just like for your car your house needs to have checkups. This is a time the family can get together to discuss how previous compromises did or didn’t worked. This can be a time to look at areas of relapse and reclaim determination to beat the clutter.

Step 6: New Rituals
Beyond Spring cleaning there needs to be a calendar for an organized home that includes times to handle all the clutter and keep things organized. This section offers an example ritual for a house over the course of a year. This goes back to other ideas already presented such as creating creating systems and routines.

Lastly, the Afterword
This section was a pleasant surprise that really helps to tie everything up into a nice little bow. If somehow you missed it the Walsh explains again, “it’s not about the stuff”, its about the “stuff owning you”. Walsh says “getting organized for the sake of getting organized is a waste of time”, but “getting organized because it helps you live a richer, less stressed, happier and more focused life, now that is a goal worth pursing”.

If you are someone that already realizes the problem with too much stuff and just want to get right to the tips, you could jump strait to this section and really find some great tips.

To Buy or not to Buy?
If you are that one house on the street that parks your cars in the garage, then maybe you don’t need to buy. If you don’t feel some joy or sense of accomplishment from buying stuff, then maybe you don’t need this book. If you have few possessions but have story after story of adventures and experiences, then maybe you don’t need to buy.

However for anyone else, and possibly even the few mentioned above, this book is definitly a great book to buy. It does not just talk about the clutter or explain the clutter, it systematically walks you through the entire process of removing the clutter from your life once and for all. The ritual section at the end of the book, if simply followed over the course of the year, would dramatically improve the livability of any house and also greatly improve the lives of the people living in it.