Even before I fully understood the limits of the brain’s conscious attention, I created a list titled “things taking up headspace.” I wrote down every single I could think of that needed to be started, needed to be finished, or needed to be attended to in some way.

I had already recognized that these things were occupying precious mental space. I thought about them repeatedly—sometimes daily or even more frequently. I wanted them taken care of, I wished they would get taken care of, I occasionally had an impulse to take care of them, yet they remained unattended to. Unfortunately, thinking about doing something is not the same as actually doing it.

Making the list was sobering. So I set out to cross as many things off as I could, going at it with a vengeance. As I worked on the initial list, a few new things popped up and were duly added. I found that the time period in between identifying something that needed to be dealt with and taking care of it shrank considerably. When I was done with almost everything on the original list—which included items I’d been renting headspace to for up to three years!—I no longer had a massive headspace list. I had…some clarity!

It can be tempting to try to ignore the small stuff when there are bigger things to do and to deal with. The problem is that ignoring the small stuff makes it that much harder to deal with the bigger things. For one thing, something that started out as minor might, over time, develop into something major. The bigger problem is that ignoring the small stuff becomes a habit. As a result, we consume precious conscious attention trying to not think about all those bothersome things. That leaves less conscious attention available for what really matters. As I wrote at the beginning of this year:

We can’t reach for the stars by climbing that mountain of clutter. We may manage a few steps, but inevitably we’re sucked back down into all that…stuff. We won’t get anywhere by trying to manage or rearrange our clutter, either. Let’s face it; we have developed the habit of creating clutter. We have become clutter junkies. We’re convinced we can’t live without it.

So we rationalize, justify, and explain it away.
Or we deny we have a problem.
Or we admit we have a problem but insist we’re working on it.

The result is always more clutter. Yes, our attempts to deal with our clutter add to the mountain of clutter. So do our failed attempts to Step It Up. In my experience, this is the real “law of attraction”: clutter attracts more clutter. It’s as if the mountain of clutter has magnetic properties. The more undone, unfinished, messy stuff there is in our lives (the bigger our mountain of clutter), the more likely it is that we’ll just keep adding to it.

Clutter is not innocuous; we pay a huge toll for keeping it in our lives. Clutter not only takes up physical space, it also uses precious mental resources. Clutter that preoccupies us taxes our brain’s bandwidth and can literally make us dumber, at least temporarily, by as many as 10 to 14 I.Q. points. The effect is like being sleep deprived all the time. This kind of preoccupation also negatively impacts the brain’s executive function, which results in diminished ability to focus our attention and a decrease in self-control.

The absurd thing is that whatever we’re not doing or not dealing with is likely taking up more of our attention than it would if we were actually doing it or dealing with it. But habits are hard to break. For clutter junkies, there’s only one way out: we have to get rid of the mountain of clutter. Pick a corner, start shoveling, and keep going until it’s all gone. No excuses, no rationalizations, no explanations. Just do it:

• Clean it out
• Fix it
• Address it
• Replace it
• Finish it
• Toss it out

Then declare yourself a clutter-free zone!

If you do, you’ll have greater clarity—and more conscious attention available—when the going gets grueling.

[NOTE: This post is the last in a series. See also When the Going Gets Grueling, Fortitude: Don’t Leave Home Without It,  Focus: Keep Your Eyes on the Prize, Patience: Learn to Play the Waiting Game, Embrace Uncertainty and Know When to Get Assistance.]