How Tidying Up Can Help With Weight Loss

Consider tidying up if you want to lose more weight. Here’s why keeping a clean home can help with weight loss efforts and improve overall well-being. Note: This post contains affiliate links.

First of all, I have to admit that like everyone and their mother, I just got done watching Marie Kondo’s Tidying Up on Netflix.

If you haven’t watched it yet, let’s just say that it’s going to inspire you to do some serious cleaning around the house. And not just cleaning, but organizing.

I was so inspired by Marie and her methods (check out her book) that I felt compelled to clean out a new area of my house after almost every episode. And then, when I’d finished all of the episodes of Tidying Up, I felt a little ripped off.

I wanted more!

I wanted to keep the ball rolling inspiration-wise. So then I started watching Hoarders on Amazon Prime. Haha. That kept me wanting to declutter and organize everything!

Maybe I’m a weirdo, but I seriously enjoyed cleaning up and organizing things. And that got me thinking about how I feel when things aren’t clean and tidy at home.

What Does Tidying Up Have To Do With Weight Loss?

I’m glad you asked. (It’s not a straight answer, so if you’re into that mathematical stuff, you might as well leave now.)

On a personal level, it’s about overwhelm. It’s about clarity and responsibility. It’s about positive thinking, and how everything in my brain spills over into every aspect of my health.

Basically, the messier and more cluttered my home is, the messier my brain and emotions become. And when those things get messy, health takes the back burner.

If you’re a mom, this might be easier to understand.

When you look around your house and see a sink full a dishes, an avalanche of laundry, and a crumb-ridden kitchen floor, how do you feel?

Overwhelmed, right?

It makes you feel like you definitely don’t have time for yourself. There’s no way you can just go take a bath or go running with things looking like that! There’s definitely no time to eat a healthy meal!

At least that’s the sort of thinking that ensues for many of us.

Mom guilt, ya know?

And when the mom guilt starts, the cortisol (stress hormones) starts flowin’. And when the stress sets in, moms typically put themselves last.

It’s kind of a vicious cycle.

Now, you don’t have to be a mom to understand feelings of being overwhelmed.

The overall point is that if you look around and feel that there’s too much work to be done, stress levels go up and your ability to think clearly wanes.

And when that happens, you hit survival mode and just eat what’s easy, convenient, and comforting.

How Tidying Up Can Help With Weight Loss

Just imagine that your home is *almost* sparkling clean. You don’t have to spend your free time cleaning. You can do what you want.

The peacefulness that you feel helps you to feel positive in your mind.

Your mind is thinking positive thoughts, so your stress levels go down.

When your stress levels are lower, you have more energy.

You feel that you have choices.

Now you can do something that you enjoy, or something that you’ve been meaning to do, but haven’t in some time. (Ahem, meal prep.)

Not only do you have time, you have a different set of emotions and your body is physically healthier. Since you’re not busy spending all of your time tidying up, you can do so much more!

(Plus, you surely burned some serious calories by cleaning up!)

Things You Can Do Once You’ve Cleaned Up

Besides the mental and emotional changes that happen when you’ve cleaned up, there are a lot of other things you have time for! Here are just a few:

1. Meal Prep

Failure to plan is planning to fail, after all! When you free up time, you have less excuses regarding eating well. Spend less time tidying up, and you’ll have more time to meal prep nutrient dense foods, like my quick and easy spinach egg muffin cups.

2. Exercise Regularly

Once you’ve gotten your messes under control, you have the opportunity to see where exercise fits best in your day.

For me, exercising in the morning is critical to a good workout versus a half-assed workout. I only know this because I’ve made tidying up a priority, which gives me some more time during the day to exercise.

Related Reading: How To Make Working Out A Habit

3. Personal Development

If you’re not stressed by the mess, you can spend more time working on yourself! I find that I need personal development time pretty regularly in order to stay healthy and motivated mentally and emotionally.

I love to listen to podcasts (think Rachel Hollis and Tony Robbins) while I walk on the treadmill. I also love to read inspirational books like these mindset books!

4. Family Time

I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to be on my death bed wishing I’d spent more time with my family and less time worrying about little things like getting the dishes done.

Tidying up consistently makes me feel more in control of my family time, and that makes me feel good as a mom.

5. Hobbies

Okay, trying to pursue your own personal interests when you’re mom is kind of hard. But removing messes from my home has made me feel like I can have my own hobbies without feeling mom guilt. (Mom guilt is a serious thing!)

When my house is clean, I don’t feel bad about wanting to spend time doing my own things!

All of these things will help you feel healthier overall, and they are a big part of why I think tidying up is important!

Trying To Do Everything = A Recipe For “QUITTING”

Obviously there is always something that needs to be cleaned. I am at peace with the fact that with kids in the house, there will always be a mess somewhere in the house. But my home is clean enough that my family is comfortable and I’m happy to have people over any time!

I firmly believe that a schedule/plan is the best way to be successful in anything. But since there’s always so much to do, letting things get out of control is one of the worst things you can do.

My advice?

Try not to get stressed out by looking at the total amount of work to be done. 

When it comes to cleaning, I try to compartmentalize a little bit. There are things I clean daily – i.e. dishes and laundry – and there are areas that get a little attention each week, month, etc.

How To Start Tidying Up Without Added Stress

Now, obviously you don’t have that magic wand that every woman fantasizes about. But with time, patience, and a little elbow grease, you can have a tidy home. (And keep it that way!)

If you are more focused on decluttering than deep cleaning, or are far from the stages of being able to deep clean, no worries! Here are a few ways to strategically tidy up without going nuts:

• Make a month-long schedule to clean out various areas of your house. Clean out one area for 15 minutes per day (on top of your regular routine).
• Tackle one drawer, closet, or shelf at a time. Tackle only what won’t overwhelm you.
• If you feel the inspiration, roll with it! Some days you’ll want to empty out the whole house, other days you may only be able to manage a drawer or two.
• Turn up the tunes. I cannot clean without upbeat music. Everyone knows this about me. It helps keep me going. Science even says that it helps us keep tempo, aka work faster than we might without  music.
• Try a clean-up challenge to help you stay on track. Pinterest is full of decluttering challenges, but here’s one of my favorites.

I Want To Know

Do you think that your home and it’s tidiness takes away from your health and quality of life? What are your biggest challenges in keeping a tidy home? Tell me below!

Thanks for stopping by,

Chantal

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