The Old Kitchen Table / THE Book You Need for Decluttering Your Home

Y’all know how I’m always saying that decluttering your home will do wonders for your mental health, especially if you have anxiety? A copy of Cassandra Aarssen’s The Clutter Connection: How Your Personality Type Determines Why You Organize the Way You Do was sent to me for review and my mind was blown before I even got halfway through it. I read it over the course of two days (a record for me, lately) and now I want to go all in and reorganize my house.

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Decluttering Your Home in a Way That Sticks

I know people are freaking out about the Marie Kondo method and her new show–and I do want to watch it–but let me tell you… Konmari is great and all (I did my whole house a few years ago), but it is not customized to your personality type and how your brain works. You could be organizing your stuff all wrong! That means it might not stick. Some pieces of her method are still working for me, but not all.

There’s nothing wrong with you or the method, but if you’re not a match, it just won’t last. Before you start decluttering your home, read The Clutter Connection or at least check out theClutterbug.me site or Cassandra’s YouTube channel.

How Your Personality Type Affects the Clutter

If you love taking personality quizzes and reading up on different personality types, you’ll love this Clutterbug method. It doesn’t have anything to do with your Myers-Briggs personality type (INFJ here, though, just for the record), another popular thing at the moment.

Instead, you take the quiz (free on the website and included in the book, too), get your type, and then find the best methods you can use to organize your space. Share a space with other types? No big deal. There are tips for making your home a harmonious, organized place for everyone in your house. The Clutterbug types are:

• Ladybug: Likes visual simplicity and organizational simplicity
• Cricket: Likes visual simplicity and organizational abundance
• Bee: Likes visual abundance and organizational abundance
• Butterfly: Likes visual abundance and organizational simplicity

At the beginning of the book, you’ll probably think you know which one you are. I encourage you to read the whole thing to make sure. I saw bits of myself in all the different types. Once I’d read the whole thing, I had a better grasp of the differences between types.

The Clutter Connection Book Review

I didn’t even know I needed another cleaning or decluttering book before I was contacted about reviewing this one. I just thought I needed time. I’d never heard of Cassandra Aarssen before a few days ago, but I’m so glad I do now. The book is well-written, conversational, and–ha!–clearly organized. 

Fun and Practical

Her infectious personality shined through the pages before I ever watched a video on her YouTube account. This book is a fun read packed with practical information, including tips for living with each type and action steps you can take to get started clearing out the clutter today.

There’s no pressure to be perfect. In fact, holding tightly to perfectionism is discouraged. I felt fired up and ready to tackle the whole house as I read. However, I didn’t feel like I needed to have everything just right, right off the bat, and it didn’t feel like I had to block off a whole weekend to do the whole house at once (even though I still kind of want to). 

The Methods Make SO Much Sense

The macro vs. micro organizing methods alone made a huge difference for me. I had never heard of decluttering your home that way, in those terms, but it makes so much sense. Not everything you organize needs to be especially detailed unless that’s just your thing and you enjoy it (that would be the Crickets and Bees). Sometimes you’ll need to leave that level of organization to the spaces only you use, like if you live with a Butterfly or Ladybug. A couple of labeled bins with no lids can be all it takes to let you and everyone else you live with breathe easy in your space.

The visual abundance vs. visual simplicity made a ton of sense, too. I’d never thought of it that way, but now I know why some rooms are more comfortable for me to spend time in than others and why I keep rearranging things in my bathroom, kitchen, and office. 

Which Type Am I?

I will be honest: I have no idea which type I am, even after taking the quiz twice (once before reading the book and then once after reading it and really thinking hard about my tendencies). That’s not the author’s fault. I’m complicated. Lol

First, the quiz said I was a Butterfly.After reading the book and comparing it to my life and tendencies, I realized I should’ve answered some of the questions differently. The quiz said Ladybug the second time.

Right now, with all of the information from the book and a couple of videos, I’m thinking I’m somewhere between a Ladybug and a Cricket. I think that’s probably pretty fitting for an INFJ, considering my mind is kind of a balance between creative and analytical. 

If gradients are allowed, I am there. I do not like visual clutter, no matter how pretty it is (neither do Crickets or Ladybugs). I do not like removing lids to put things away (Ladybugs don’t, either). However, I will have little piles of stuff waiting for the perfect system forever and refuse to shove those piles into a drawer just to get them out of sight (sounds like a Cricket). Piles make me anxious, but they’re there.

No matter which Clutterbug I am, I learned a lot of new organizing concepts to try. I know which ones sound good to me that I think I can implement over the next several weeks or months without stressing myself or my family out. 

Which Type Are You?

If you get the book or take the free quiz, let me know which Clutterbug you are.