Decluttering at the Speed of Life:

Decluttering at the Speed of Life: Winning Your Never-Ending Battle With Stuff by Dana K. White           Audiobook:  6 hours, 7 minutes       Paperback Book:  240 pages       

I loved this book.    Dana’s style is so down to earth and so comical that she inspires the reader both empathetically – she gets it, she’s been there, too, and shares the greatest stories about her overcoming her clutter and compulsion to buy when it is such a good deal even though she probably won’t actually take up welding like she thought she would when she bought all the welding equipment and scrap metal.    Dana is like so many of us who think to ourselves that some thing is useful and we could repurpose it so we gather lots of them only to find 2 or more years later, we are paying rent on a home or apartment that we aren’t getting full use of because now the few things we collected for a purpose are now a stockpile of dusty whatever because after stockpiling we neglect to ever follow through and do what it was we considered doing at the time to make a new gadget, or décor enhancement or collage project with the kids – whatever our teeming thoughts promised of the glories of repurposing only to find out we honestly weren’t interested enough to actually do the work entailed in the repurposing of all those papertowel rolls we were planning to give new life to.    I am so fond of this gal, she is my alter-ego, my twin separated at birth and I laughed so much in listening to this audiobook because I saw so much of myself in it.   So many phases and half done projects have been dredged from the back of closets when I was gung-ho to make rugs or beaded necklaces, whatever stage I was in and enjoying – for a while – till I moved on to something else but neglected to move my left-overs out and donated to someone else who might just find it as interesting as I once did.   You will laugh, you will so enjoy the reflection pool that this book can be, and you will be so motivated by Dana White that you will be moved to actually tackle that junk room.    She is like mental adrenaline – her words and stories get into your head and you want to do yourself proud in accomplishing the de-cumulation of stuff in your home.   I truly, truly, loved this book and I wish Dana and I were besties so we could laugh over our mutual foibles then go gangbusters on clutter busting.    If I had a book of hers to read every day and I would if she had that many books in print or on audio, I would go through my house like Mary Poppins with a spoon full of sugar – a place for everything and everything in its place.   Dang, this gal is good.   I am on a hunt for everything else she has written – she is awesome and she is realistic.   She doesn’t recommend, like so many other declutter tomes do to take everything out of the closet then go through the pile and put back only what fits.   Like I said, she gets it.     She says delutter at the speed of life which dictates that you won’t have time to go through everything in one declutter session – so do what you can.    Five minutes counts in her world (and mine) toward making a way in the right direction and making a dent in that stack of stuff we keep walking by and ignoring.    All good deeds done are DONE and get you where you want to go and inspire you to keep on keeping on.    Life is not about making decluttering torment its about progress no matter how much or how little and enjoying the journey.  I like her style.