How to harness the power of ‘Quick March’

The simple trick that will sort out your life

Amanda Holden, doing the bins in a ballgown

This Friday is 1 March, bringing with it the desire to spring clean (we can’t help it; it’s science). As the days start to get lighter, and the first brave daffodils are emerging, many of us feel a new energy and an impulse to clear out the clutter.

Now, I know that not everyone feels this way. There are as many who hate the idea of a good clear-out as those who love it. I’m interested to know which camp you fall into.

Personally, I’m a purger, not a hoarder. Throwing things out (by which I mean recycling and donating where possible, of course) is my love language. Nothing turns me on more than when my husband picks up an old unused kitchen device/child’s toy/piece of furniture and says: ‘Shall we just get rid of this?’ 

I love it.

Before having children, I lived in 10 different places in London in 10 years, fitting all of my worldly belongings into a suitcase and a couple of bin bags. I love being free of stuff - it makes me feel lighter, clear-headed, optimistic. 

When we bought a flat, I remember keeping a certain shelf clear - even though, at the time, I couldn’t actually articulate the joy of an empty shelf. When I later read Gretchen Rubin describing exactly this, it spoke to my soul: ‘An empty shelf shows that I have room to expand,’ she wrote. ‘I’m not crowded in by my stuff, I have order and space.’

Over the past decade, I have become a home-owner and had two children.

Reader, I no longer have an empty shelf.

Every surface in my home is littered with unfinished craft projects, nerf gun bullets, miniature figures from Encanto and plastic tat that comes with kids’ magazines. I have tried to maintain some semblance of my old life, but it’s a Sisyphean challenge. And, even as I don’t feel that I’m getting anywhere, others in my household think I’m going too far. I’m forever being reprimanded for disposing of some old toy my kids haven’t looked at in months - only for them to suddenly want it more than anything. 

I miss my empty shelf. But, as an empty nester once told me, apparently I’ll miss the clutter when the kids are gone (I actually don’t think I will, but my kids are still under 10, so maybe them leaving home is too far away to feel real yet).

Beyoncé, dusting her Grammys

I know the urge to purge is not universal. Lots of people find joy in being surrounded by things that remind them of places they’ve been and people they love. But I believe that even those people could benefit from organising their joyful clutter.

An uncluttered home to me represents space, calm, freedom, control and simplicity. All things that I don’t have much of right now (and ironically, I had more of when living in tiny rented flats).

Perhaps you would like to have a spring clean, but find it overwhelming because:

✨ You’re a sentimental hoarder and can’t bear to throw things away.

✨ You’re busy with life, and want your home to magically sort itself out.

✨ Like me, you have kids, and it seems an impossible task.

If it’s a hard relate on any of the above, I suggest a strategy I am calling ‘Quick March’.