What a great idea. Made me stop and think hard about this, and that's got to be a good thing.
Here's my sources and how I've stopped/am trying to stop the flow.

Gifts... Thankfully our family and *some* of our close friends have discussed this among ourselves and are in agreement about no more gifting just for the sake of it, so that's not such a problem anymore.
Shopping....Those things are *designed* to attract us. Just watch me in a Kitchen Shop, and you'll see what I mean LOL. I've learnt to admire something and leave it there..sometimes when I see a new thing I find irresistable now I think, Ok, I'll come back to you. Then when I've seen it for a few weeks in other shops, familiarity causes it to lose some of its charm for me.

Status symbols, peer pressure, advertizing etc. There *is* a campaign out there to get us to consume, so I suppose it's only natural we feel the pressure sometimes. I'm pretty cynical about all that now, which helps me not to fall for it; but being cynical also means getting frustrated when I see nice otherwise intelligent people getting sucked in, and I have to pull myself up from becoming righteous.
Availability and accessibility and transport: I remember going to town with my Mum on the bus, with me holding her hand, and her pushing a baby in a pram. That would limit what you decided to cart home, I imagine. Also, she had to walk around the street to get to the different shops. Now, I go in an empty car to the shopping mall, get a super trolley, shop in airconditioned comfort, and don't even have to step over a gutter. Easy to bring home a whole car load if I feel like it. Mum would have to wait until Dad could come with her on a Saturday am, if she wanted something other than the absolute necessities, so impulse buys would be pretty limited, I imagine.
When I was a teenager, way back in the 1960's, my Mum got a book about cosmetics, written by a cosmetics company executive, explaining their advertizing and sales policies... how they would package and price the exact same product differently, just to market it to the different types of consumers. Mum made all of us kids read that book, and it had such an effect on me, that when all my friends were worshipping the Monkees and the Beatles, my hero was Ralph Nader, the consumer campaigner. Even though I grew up with no illusions about advertizing tactics, it is still powerful enough to "get" me sometimes. Otherwise why do I still get sucked in by shampoo bottles with pictures of "natural" herbs on the label LOL.

Ok, here's something I've really been wondering about lately, and I know someone here will have the answer. Is clutter a cultural and/or time period phenomenom?
Do Eastern cultures also have the problem, or is it mainly the Western society? Did the early Native American tribes have hoarders in their midst. Do Japanese people have homes filled with clutter? I've been wondering about village/tribal lifestyles where things were shared and...

I think an economist could also contribute to this thinking...I was in the fabric store b uying a seam ripper the other day, and I noticed that the allocation of square footage has really changed...far more floor space devoted to drapery/upholstery fabric, quilting and craft supplies, and tools, than to material for making clothes, and I thought that the explosion of cheap, attractive clothes from offshore factories has likely made it less economical to spend time making your own...?
In the US, we are a consumer economy. We are much more likely to receive information from advertisers than from educators. So we are horribly overmatched by the marketing machine, which is in the business of creating what I have come to call an unfillable well of desire, and replaces the understanding of the power and uses of money that we probably should be getting in school.
Ooops...am I ranting???

My sources of trouble are paper (I'm a writer, and I think I want to read everything), a tendency to start things and move on before I'm done, and the mnistaken belief that if I leave something out, I will be more likely to do it. In fact, it causes distracting, debilitating visual noise.

When we were preparing to help my mother move from a three-bedroom house into a two-room apartment in a retirement community, we made a discovery that helped to guide us. And that was, you need your things around you to tell you who you are, BUT five well-chosen ones will do the job as well as fifty accumulated ones.
And everything that went with her had to qualify in three areas...it had to be irreplaceably useful, beautiful/well-designed, and it had to do more than one thing (for example, a table had to have drawers, and a bed had to be high enough to store things under...).
This worked so well that we patted ourselves on the back for months!

One last thought, and then I'll try to shut up for a while.
One of the best things my family did was to take us to museums all the time. What we gained there was twofold...we learned to see what was really beautiful, and to have high standards for what attracted us, AND we learned to look at and appreciate things without a thought of owning them. I discovered that you can treat beautiful catalogs and high-end shops the same way. Look, learn, leave, and keep your money in your pocket and your space in the cupboard.

Of course it doesn't always work, but it makes a great foundation for staying in control.
So..
Who else???

My mother's house is cluttered because it contains three sets of furniture-hers, the set she inheirited when Grandma died in 1976, and the set my brother brought when he moved home after his divorce. My clutter starts because I bring things home and don't put them away. I just drop them wherever there's room. The "secret" for me is GIVE IT A HOME OR THROW IT AWAY.

you need your things around you to tell you who you are, BUT five well-chosen ones will do the job as well as fifty accumulated ones.

Brownwyn - interesting comment. I agree with it, but, sadly, it is impossible to convey that idea to a collector.

"we learned to look at and appreciate things without a thought of owning them.." I like this. I read once that you can admire and appreciate the beauty of a waterfall, without taking it home to your backyard. Since I read that, I apply it when I go shopping. I just ask myself, could this be a 'waterfall' item. Works *mostly*.

I found myself thinking, why don't we swim to the headwaters of the river of stuff, and see if we can't stick a plug in it!

Or, "First, do no harm"

I hae also done the "look, admire, daydream, but don't buy."

nd I found that lots of the stuff I was accumulating was the stuff I thought I'd use to tackle some project I was dreaming up. I gave myself permission to plan something (like a set of shelves, etc.), and NEVER do it--on purpose.So, i didn't have to buy the supplies and tools. I can be as elaborate as I want, as long as I identify it as a hobby. What's more 'proper' as a hobby--building a model-railroad track, or planning a customized shelf unit that you know you're never going to make?

When I was a kid, corporations scambled around to identify and fill needs. Now, their efforts have shifted to marketing -- trying to persuade us that we need all the junk that they produce.

Ok, another question I've been pondering? DH and I watched a documetary recently about bower birds and other creatures who spend days, collecting and arranging and rearranging "junk" for their bowers. These aren't their nests, they're just places they use purely for showing off to attract a mate. Now they haven't been influenced by media and advertizing, though the element of competition is strong... they'll even vandalize another bird's bower, to draw attention away from it, to their own.
So how does that natural instinct to decorate and collect relate to us humans, what's the connection there?
Have we just let our natural instincts run amok and become extreme or what? I'm really curious now?

My temporary visual clutter is due inadequate storage. My closets are clutter free becasuse they have to be. LOL

"We have met the enemy and it is us."

Look at history, and even prehistory, and you'll see that acquiring stuff -- originally food and tools -- is hard-wired. There's really no point in comparing modernity to traditional cultures because they were rooted in scarcity. As recently as two hundred years ago almost everything had to be made by muscle power, and generally by hand. Those acquisitiveness genes could save lives by getting them to put by as much food and firewood as possible to last the winter. Just as some of us have to learn to deal with "thrifty" genes that make us put on weight simply because we have enough to eat year round, we also have to learn how to deal with the incredible amounts of amazingly cheap stuff that modern technology makes available to us.

Great question. If I think about the source - rather sources - of the clutter I can better deal with it.

• Saving every piece of paper I bring into my life. Such as every To Do list. Past utility bills etc.

• Piling. One good piece of paper gets piled into a bunch of junk papers. The small piles get piled into larger piles. Eventually these larger piles end up in boxes etc. I can't throw out the pile until I sort through it all and find the few pieces of significant paper which are mixed in.

• This has value so I shouldn't discard it - such as photograph paper which might come with some small inexpensive albums. I will never use the photo paper.

• This has value, I could sell it in a yard sale.

• This is so beautiful and it only costs $10 or $20. I deserve it. If I don't get it, I'll regret it. Then filling my house with tchochkes.

• I used to like that article of clothing. But I never wear it. It no longer fits, but I hope to lose weight. It needs some repair, then I could wear it.

• I don't like that article of clothing. But I spent money on it. One day I might need to wear that serviceable dress. You never know.

• I might need this thing. Such as baggies filled with 100+ twist ties, 100+ bread bag clips, 50+ tasteless soy sauce packets that comes with carry-out.

• It was a gift.

• I don't know what this black nubby round plastic thing is, but I might one day figure out what thing it popped out of and then need it.

• I should recycle this even though I didn't like the lotion, shampoo etc. which was in it years ago.

• I should return this bathroom hardware. After all, I spent good money on it.

• I know I'm going to get to that project. That's why I have all the tools, supplies, and unfinished things that goes along with it.

• I probably already have picture hooks, glue, bug spray, etc. But I'm not sure where that is so I'll have to buy more.

This is like one big Mea Culpa list!

Rachel, so you have those black nubby round plastic things at your house too? I thought they only popped out at our house? LOL.

Nope - it'a an epidemic! We have them here, too! LOL

I have learned I have to browse less and look at fewer catalogues. I am better now about just being able to "window shop" because I can be more ruthless about telling myself I'm the source of my own clutter, but it just turns out that if I look, I am fairly likely to see something I like, and once I see it it is just much harder to get distanced from it again. So rather than beat myself up about not having willpower, it's better to recognize that I "attach" to things if I see them, but am less likely to just dream them up if I don't.

Another source is a combination of SIMPLIFY and "do today's work today" . You're probably all familiar with that as an office issue--a big source of getting behind at work is putting off a few things each day or getting dsitracted from finishing the things that are usually done on a certain day, until finally there's a backlog.

The same at home, though it's okay that weekends, say, are typical catch-up times, I have really started to notice well, hmm, the reason why I get overwhelmed is that really every day there are a LOT of things that need to be done, and if left, then there will be too much to do or pick up in any reasonable timeframe (like in the Cat in the Hat).

But to swim even farther upstream, I've been able to look at that source, too, and say, did I really try to simplify that as much as I could--did I cook a simpler meal so there would be less mess; did I start some unnecessary "project" when I needed to do laundry; why did I go to the grocery store on the way home from work for that item when I could have done without it and then had more energy to finish the regular day's chores--or whatever.

It is so nice to be at home today with a rare moment to play on this forum, where I am again impressed--after a long absence--of the good writing and interesting thinking.

Since one of the day's chores is to weed closets, I was tempted to respond to "Clothes as perishable" but Source of Clutter ties in with my thinking today, so I'll post here.

After my renovation (as those long-time posters here will remember) I agonized about my lack of an organized desk and household. I worked really hard to keep the organization up -- and for a time I did, thinking about each object, every action, spurred on by this forum. Then I lost focus -- grandchildren, a compelling life-changing job opportunity, and INATTENTION meant I have back slid. Plus (and this is very much on my mind today), times change. The central air I craved so much, installed during the renovation, and turned on today for the first time this season, feels now wasteful of all kinds of resources. Whole space cooling just for me! We are in a different economic time and the idea of re-purposing and re-using and cutting down on excess seems more important.

On the cultural differences--no one mentioned Potlatch, the Native American tradition of celebrating while "re-distributing the wealth" (Wikopedia --see link below). I never knew (or had forgotten in our consuming culture) that the Potlatch was banned by law at a time our capitalist culture was developing apace. The capitalist message seems clear: Don't share, do hoard, consume, accumulate.

Perhaps we need to bring back the Potlatch.

Here is a link that might be useful: Potlatch

I don't have to much clutter but papers on top of papers. I don't know how that happened because I was always a pay it and through it out. My DH has MS and when you see some doctor he wants to know when was the last time you had this test, how long been on that med. etc. My kitchen island always ends up being the mail dumping ground and everything else no one knows what to do with.

If someone is coming over I figure I have time to put that away and find that I run out of time and grab a shopping bag and put papers and other things that have collected on the counter and through it in the pantry or if to much in my bedroom closet.

I am making a little head way because every night I take a pile and decide what to do with it at that moment. File, shred, trash, etc. and do it but I really have to force myself because I really want to pile the sorted stuff and put it back on the counter.

As far as purchasing things I am pretty good with that now because I tell myself I need a place for it before I purchase it and I don't want to stress about that so I leave it in the store.

Use to love to buy kitchen gadgets and usually never used more than once or twice. Needed a bread machine when they came out it sat on the floor in my pantry for a year then I opened it but decided I didn't want to read the directions that day and it sat there for another year or so until my friend said that hers broke and she was going to buy another one. I gave it to her the next day.

I never use to be like that but I guess I have had some live changing things happen in the last 10 years and can't seem to get it all together. Got overwhelmed years ago and still there.

To RachelRachel (and maybe others on this thread):

I admire your articulate list. You may not be aware that these numerous "frugal" behaviors meet the criteria of compulsive hoarding syndrome. I bring this up because the original question was about the 'headwaters of clutter' and whether it was primarily a social/cultural phenomenon of easy and inexpensive availability of useless stuff affecting otherwise normal people. In the context of compulsive hoarding, which is a form of obsessive compulsive disorder, this is a fascinating question. Has this problem (which has strong genetic elements) always been with us, but it was so anti-survival that it couldn't be expressed? Please note storing (pro-survival) is not the same as hoarding. Thoughts, anyone?

Interesting point, Rileysmom.

The fact that we even need to have these conversations indicates that something is busted in our brains. But at the same time, we are analyzing the problem, and fixing it. I'm no psychologist, but I think that our ability and desire to learn new habits is evidence that the behavior has not taken over our lives completely. The "hoarding behavior" has made our lives more difficult, and it has finally gotten to the point where it breaks through to our consciousness. I guess the difference between a cluttered house and the house of a true hoarder is: how bad does it have to get before you start to notice? The people that end up on public display with the latest decluttering expert on TV, they are the worst examples. We all have that behavior to a certain extent.

In my unprofessional opinion, it is all a continuum, and most of us are really not that bad with the hoarding.

Perhaps some of us (including me) have had periods in our life when the only way we acquired new stuff was to dumpster dive it. The scarcity gave us the "conserve" message loud and clear. But then things get better, our life is less stressful, our living situation changes, and the stuff is no longer useful or appropriate to our situation.

Once we get down to the low-level "beliefs" about what to do with all our stuff, under what conditions we should part with stuff, how and when to acquire new stuff, etc., we start to change. We start to be truly conscious of how the stuff affects our lives, and choose to change.

Once we realize that the voices echoing in our head -- telling us to hold onto all this junk -- are just STUPID, we start to tell ourselves new things. "Get rid of it, if it bothers you to possess it!" Fearlessly, we let go. It is a relief to be rid of the clutter. More importantly, we start to see what IS and IS NOT clutter in our lives.

I just had a look at the Wikipedia article on potlatch. How neat. The original Freecycle! By the way, I love the way I can Freecycle something directly to someone who thinks they have a place for it in their life and their home. It makes it easy to silence the voice that says, "But it's still useful to somebody. Even if it's not useful to you. So that's why you have to keep it."

I poked around on Wikipedia, and found these articles that might be pertinent to our discussion:

Gift Economyhref>

Waste Heirarchyhref>

My source of clutter is paper. Mail! I used to have baskets of mail in the kitchen, and then in the bedroom, and then the stuff was tossed into a huge hamper, then moved to the attic.... totally out of control!

One day I had just reached my limit. I bought a shredder and decided that 'one bag at a time' would do it on a Sunday afternoon. Well, I burned out the shredder that afternoon, so I asked my best friend if I could use her fireplace. I went through the bags and was shocked. Most of it was sales circulars, catalogs, direct mailings, etc. Not very much of anything - just crap.

I decided I had to make some changes. First we bought a new, heavy duty shredder. We put it in the room we use as an office, just beyond the front door. I come in with the mail and it gets separated immediately. Bills go into the bill box (HomeGods, $19.99, looks like a miniature treasure chest and I love it!). Catalogs go directly into the newspaper recycling basket. No, I don't look at them. What a waste of time they are! Credit card offers, which we receive daily, are shredded immediately, along with anything that may contain any personal information.

I have opted out of many catalogs via catalog choice, (www.catalogchoice.org) to cut down on clutter and try to help the environment. And really, how many catalogs come into the house and have something you really NEED in them? Probably none. If I need something I search online for it or I shop for it. Catalogs are a terrible waste of my time and of natural resources. My best friend and also my SIL were horrified that I don't usually even look at the catalogs I receive. I asked them how many things they actually orderd from those catalogs and their answer was very seldom. Why waste my time looking at stuff I don't need and won't buy? My time is precious to me.

I pay all of my bills online. I cannot tell you how wonderfully easy this is. Many companies now send me bills online instead of by mail and I love it!

I seem to have tamed the paper tiger.

Rachel, so you have those black nubby round plastic things at your house too? I thought they only popped out at our house? LOL.

I think the disease is mutating as it spread. Every nubby round plastic thing at MY house is white. All 14 of them.

(note: you don't have to shred every piece of paper that comes in the mail, even if it has your name and address on it. It's really only papers that have any financial connection)

I don't think you have to be a compulsive hoarder to find that RachelRachel's list describes the reasons you hold on to things.

LOL Talley Sue, re the black (and now the white) nubby round plastic things. That means I can happily throw all mine, because I know just who I can contact if I do find the thing they came from, and I need it. I'll just send the postage cost to you and Rachelrachel for one of yours.

In a previous thread, one of you (Talley Sue?)talked about finding the obstacle in all the tasks we avoid. I wonder as I read these articulate posts if it wouldn't be useful to look for the payoff, too...what is it that we think we gain at the moment when we do the cluttering thing. I know that my paper struggle comes when I put things into all sorts of "do it later" categories...here's a charity I might give to, and here's a catalog I might enjoy looking at, and here's a gallery opening I might go to, and a special product or service I might consider, or a coupon I might redeem. Sheesh! When, exactly, do I think "later" is? And do I not get that tomorrow a whole 'nother pile of things I might be interested in will arrive? I think my "cognitive error" (thanks to a therapist friend for that concept!) is in thinking that time will stand still after today, and I will have all this time in which to do all these things. And what a good person I will be, when I do them...how charitable, and how cultured, and how organized, and frugal. Somewhere deep in my idea of myself, there is the fear that someone will ask me for, or about, something, and what if I threw it away! Or that inside that catalog, there is the perfect lamp, or casserole dish, or beach jacket, that I will never find again if I throw it away...
When I put it that way, how nutty is that!
So I offer to myself and to you one of the best and funniest things my mother ever said to me. You have to imagine this in a soft, cultivated Southern accent...she said, "Deah, you wouldn't worry nearly so much about what people think of you if you could know how seldom they do!"

To Rileysmom

You may not be aware that these numerous "frugal" behaviors meet the criteria of compulsive hoarding syndrome.

You are right. My father is a bad clutterer. I thought he might be a hoarder. Then I bartered to have a child's rocker handpainted by an artist I met at a craft store. In exchange I would help her move out of her apartment - I agreed to this sight unseen - lesson to self! OMG. I saw what hoarding was for the first time. I realized that my father is a clutterer of books and papers. But after what I saw - he is certainly not a hoarder. Unless you've seen hoarding firsthand, you wouldn't understand. That experience last Fall was my first view of hoarding. It was undescribeable.

When I look at my clutter - which I like to contain in closets, boxes, the shed, the attic, under the beds - I realize that I have the beginning signs. But when clean my house looks relatively sparse, nicely decorated, and open. It is INSIDE THE THINGS - that I stuff it all!!! For me "out of sight, out of mind". So I do see that I have the beginning signs of something which can be measured on a scale of badness.

All this has been compounded by: Having my kitchen remodeled - boxing stuff up, buying new kitchen stuff
Having my small, built on a slab house flood - again having to box everything up - not having the energy to deal with
Trying to sell my house - boxing tons of stuff up and putting it into storage. Then not selling and having to take the boxes back into the house

Of course I would like to deal with all this and have to realize that the financial value of all the stuff is probably very small (under $500 on a good day). And that the stress and lack of relaxation I feel about the clutter is worth so much more - unsettling. So I guess I should just get rid of almost everything which I am not currently wearing, using, enjoying, or learning from.

(I forgot to mention all the binders and notebooks filled with adult ed course material on stuff I didn't read and use the first time.)