The First Life-changing Experience of Finding Happiness in My Home

The first time I realised how insanely powerful the simple act of decluttering and tweaking the way your home looks and functions, was when I got dumped as a teenager. After the initial phase of heartbreak and sadness, came a wave of anger. Unsure of what to do with all that rage, I got a bunch of bin bags and started throwing things out of my room.

And a really weird and unexpected thing happened: the more stuff I got rid of, the more energised I felt. All of the surfaces normally covered with useless crap that just sat there collecting dust were now finally ‘breathing’. I used that blank canvas to carefully curate a display of items that were close to my heart and I enjoyed looking at.

That’s when I realised that there was a clear correlation between the amount of space around me and my mood. It felt great to be able to find anything I needed. No longer having to look at things I felt indifferent about. To be able to do my homework in half the usual time because I wasn’t distracted. To actually smile when I walked into my room because it was no longer just a functional container where I slept – it actually made me happy to be there and I chose to spend my time there.

And the best thing is – creating an environment that inspires you and makes you happy is fully within your control. It’s not something you have to wish for or hope for. With the right strategies, anyone can do it – which is why I love it so much and dedicated a third of my book to this topic.

Finding Happiness When Things Go Wrong

In my ‘past’ life, I was a ballroom dancer. It all started when I was eight, in my home country – Poland. But what was initially just a hobby, quickly became my whole life and at the age of 19, I decided to pursue my dancing career full-time and represent England, so I packed my bags and moved here. In a short space of time, I placed 4th in British Championships and became a world-class dancer with many international achievements. At that point, I thought I had it all figured out – I was going to be a ballroom dancer forever.

But my dancing career ended quite abruptly, leaving me with nothing but depression, £700 to my name and no education, since I quit university to move to England. But I figured that if I take a tiny step every day, at some point in future things will get better. So in an attempt to piece my life back together, I resumed higher education here in England and got myself a full-time retail job which, even though I hated with passion, paid my bills and motivated me to work even harder to get out of that shithole.

With my budget rather tight, I could only afford to live in tiny, filthy and overcrowded places. But no matter where I lived, I knew that there was always something I could do to make these places more homely – whether it was covering an old damaged desk with a wood effect self-adhesive wrap, getting new bedding or regularly reviewing my belongings to minimise clutter.

Mind Clutter

As I worked my ass off to get myself out of that dark and depressed place and build a better life, I realised that there was more to clutter than just the physical stuff. My mindset stank and my head was full of negative thoughts, false beliefs from childhood and self-pity. Yes, my situation was less than ideal, but all that negativity was only making an already bad situation worse.

That’s when, very slowly, I started to take a closer look at all of these thoughts that made me feel sad, anxious, worried, or like I wasn’t not good enough. I spent the next decade learning about the mindset and its role in creating the life we want, creating better habits and taking action despite the fear.

I still am, and forever will be, a student (I don’t believe in mastery and perfection), and mindset work is now a part of my daily routine. Consistently purging all that mind clutter, allowed me to attract healthy relationships, calm, abundance and happiness I never knew was possible.

Financial Clutter

After finishing my degree and getting a graduate job, I wanted to save up for a bigger purchase, which prompted me to start a budget. Money was a topic which always made me anxious, worried and stressed, so this wasn’t an easy thing to do.

But starting a budget had a very unexpected effect – it put me in control of my money. Which in turn, changed how I viewed money. It went from being a source of stress to being a source of joy. Why? Because the budget highlighted a lot of unnecessary purchases and surprising spending habits, which allowed me to change it. You can’t change something if you’re not aware of it! It also made me better equipped to deal with unexpected expenses as and when they come up – not when it’s too late.

I’ve been budgeting for over eight years now, whilst finessing my methods to make it fun, effective and sustainable.

Piecing It All Together

After almost two decades of personal development, I realised that the areas where I felt the happiest, calmest and most in control, were the areas which I ‘decluttered’ and organised in some way. Where I spent some time figuring out what’s not working and getting deep into the ‘ugly’ (awareness), getting rid of habits or possessions no longer needed (decluttering) and then making it better (taking action/organising).

Which led me to develop my F!ck Chaos Method. It can be applied to any area of life and is centred around three key activities: IDENTIFY – PURGE – ORGANISE.

This framework also forms the basis for my book F*ck You Chaos where I share all the methods which will put you back in the driver’s seat whenever you feel like everything around you is seemingly out of control.

My mission now is to show as many people as possible that whatever your circumstances are, there is always something you can do to improve it instead of hoping that things will magically get better.

‘Fun Facts’

To finish with, here a few random facts about me:

• I enjoy spending time with my guinea pigs, Venus and Saturn.

• In my spare time, I love hanging upside down wherever I can (mostly aerial fitness such as silks and pole).

• I’m an introvert and a ‘highly sensitive person’ (HSP).

• My poison of choice: whiskey (neat – of course!)