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Summary

Have you ever been told, or told yourself, that if you really wanted a tidier home you'd have done it by now? In this episode Heather gets into why that message is so untrue, and why wanting it badly is rarely the missing piece. Money, health, energy, the people you live with, inherited stuff and sheer volume all play their part, and so do systems that were built for someone else's brain. Sometimes, though, what keeps you stuck is more psychological than that.

Heather talks about how every blitz that slid back and every borrowed system that never stuck quietly gets filed away as evidence that you can't do this. If you're neurodivergent and have spent years braced for criticism, it's no wonder your brain eventually asks why you're even bothering.

She shares three stories she sees over and over with clients. The first is the quiet belief that you don't deserve a nice home, or that you'd never keep it nice anyway. The second is the feeling that there's no point until you move or the extension gets built. The third is the idea that nice homes just aren't who you are. That last one is personal. Heather opens up about growing up in doer uppers, envying friends with freshly plastered new builds, nearly writing to DIY SOS, and realising it was never the walls that made her home feel wrong.

There's a lot here about perfectionism, and why you're allowed one lovely corner, one comfy nook or one finished drawer even when the rest of the room still needs work. Heather explains avoidance as self preservation: your brain protecting you from disappointment. What breaks the cycle is trusting yourself (or trusting her, if that feels like too much right now), with mindset and action working together. There's also an HSIO moment giving you permission to want and keep a nice home, whatever your family's homes looked like.

This is the penultimate episode before DeclutterCon on 10th October at the Radisson Blu, Sheffield, UK. Tickets are on sale until Sunday 4th October, now with live stream tickets available if you can't be there in person. You'll find them at www.decluttercon.co.uk 

Timestamps

00:00 - Why decluttering failures are usually psychological, not proof of laziness
00:57 - Why “you don't want it enough” is a damaging myth
03:21 - Why self-help advice often misses the real problem
05:15 - Wanting it badly can become part of the overwhelm
06:14 - When the issue is systems, not mindset
06:43 - Why blitz decluttering works briefly and then falls apart
09:07 - The hidden belief that you do not deserve a nice home
10:31 - “It is temporary” and why waiting can last for years
13:49 - Perfectionism and the belief that a home must be fully finished to be worth loving
15:40 - Self-preservation, avoidance, and the cycle that keeps people stuck
19:07 - Why mindset and action both have to change together
19:37 - Heather Says It Is Okay: permission to want and keep a nice home
20:36 - Choosing one tiny change instead of copying someone else's system
21:59 - Final encouragement and reminder to be kind to yourself

Support the show

If you'd like to say 'Thank you', by buying me a virtual coffee (it'll actually buy me a cup of tea!), you can do so HERE. It will mean I can afford to continue to give help for free and continue with this podcast.

Get started with my Zoning and Getting Started Workshop, everything you need to know on how to get started and have the best success when decluttering.

Join my free Declutter Community for real support, tips and advice from Heather and other Untanglers that are just like you!

Follow me on Facebook

Buy my Declutter Your Home Planner from Amazon to start to declutter your home yourself! (affiliate link)

Grab my current freebies to support a cleaner, tidier home.

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Feel free to email me: [email protected] 
Please note, I may not be able to reply, but do read all emails to me and appreciate them massively.

Send me a text message about this podcast

Summary

Heather Tingle shares a personal reflection on why decluttering sometimes means releasing more than objects. In this episode, she unpacks how a box of old business supplies surfaced an abandoned subscription box idea and what that revealed about identity, sunk cost, and the difference between a dream and the stuff attached to it. Letting go of stored items can also mean letting go of guilt, without giving up the possibility of a future version of the dream.

Timestamps

00:00 — Why this episode is about letting go of a dream
 00:29 — The maintenance declutter that surfaced an old box
 00:58 — Why Heather had not decluttered her home in 10 years
 02:53 — Discovering autism and ADHD during lockdown
 05:44 — Why the abandoned idea felt sad, not silly
 07:41 — Sunk cost, identity, and staying in limbo
 08:35 — Letting go of the stuff without killing the dream
 10:32 — Other examples of unfinished dreams and projects
 11:30 — How hope turns into guilt and obligation
 12:00 — Why the dream was never in the objects
 12:22 — Releasing the nagging feeling of unfinished potential
 12:51 — Dreams can rest and return in a different form
 13:20 — A “Heather says it’s okay” moment about choosing the present
 13:49 — Reality over fantasy and prioritising peace of mind
 14:46 — Letting go now does not prevent revisiting the idea later

Support the show

If you'd like to say 'Thank you', by buying me a virtual coffee (it'll actually buy me a cup of tea!), you can do so HERE. It will mean I can afford to continue to give help for free and continue with this podcast.

Get started with my Zoning and Getting Started Workshop, everything you need to know on how to get started and have the best success when decluttering.

Join my free Declutter Community for real support, tips and advice from Heather and other Untanglers that are just like you!

Follow me on Facebook

Buy my Declutter Your Home Planner from Amazon to start to declutter your home yourself! (affiliate link)

Grab my current freebies to support a cleaner, tidier home.

Follow me on instagram

Feel free to email me: [email protected] 
Please note, I may not be able to reply, but do read all emails to me and appreciate them massively.

Send me a text message about this podcast

Summary

This episode started with a comment from an Untangled Life member: "but that's the missing piece, isn't it, no accountability." Heather takes that and runs with a live confession: she set herself a DeclutterCon bonus challenge to find and sell £60 worth of stuff from her own home to pay for a course she's doing. She's found £90 to £100 worth. She's sold none of it, because she hasn't listed a single item. Heather unpacks why announcing something publicly isn't the same as being accountable for finishing it, why the classic "pretend someone's coming over" trick doesn't work for her brain, and shares two real examples from her own life (a disastrous A level project and a course she completed in her 40's) that show the actual difference between a deadline that works and one that doesn't. She ends with specific, small, immediate accountability tactics, and a public commitment you can hold her accountable to!

What you'll walk away with

• Why announcing a goal isn't the same as building real accountability into it
• Why "pretend someone's coming over in 20 minutes" doesn't work, and why even a real visitor deadline doesn't help
• The difference between a single distant deadline and a long term goal broken into fixed short term checkpoints
• Practical, small scale accountability tactics you can use as you declutter and organise your home
• Why client "homework" between sessions rarely works, and what Heather does instead

Chapters

00:00
Introduction: The importance of accountability in decluttering

02:11
Heather's personal decluttering challenge and honesty about progress

04:21
Why accountability often fails when only self-imposed

06:28
The significance of fixed deadlines from Heather's academic experience

08:36
Using short-term checkpoints to stay on track

09:54
The problem with vague goals and how to make them specific

12:30
Practical strategies: body doubling, public declarations, and micro deadlines

13:49
Encouragement to start small and find accountability partners

Support the show

If you'd like to say 'Thank you', by buying me a virtual coffee (it'll actually buy me a cup of tea!), you can do so HERE. It will mean I can afford to continue to give help for free and continue with this podcast.

Get started with my Zoning and Getting Started Workshop, everything you need to know on how to get started and have the best success when decluttering.

Join my free Declutter Community for real support, tips and advice from Heather and other Untanglers that are just like you!

Follow me on Facebook

Buy my Declutter Your Home Planner from Amazon to start to declutter your home yourself! (affiliate link)

Grab my current freebies to support a cleaner, tidier home.

Follow me on instagram

Feel free to email me: [email protected] 
Please note, I may not be able to reply, but do read all emails to me and appreciate them massively.

Send me a text message about this podcast

Summary

Is Your Tidying Actually Making Your Home Worse?

We've all done it, shoved something into whatever drawer had space, told ourselves "away" counted as "organised," and called it a day. In this episode Heather digs into a pattern she sees in almost every client's home: drawers and cupboards with no real system, no zoning, just wherever things happened to end up. She walks through exactly how this spirals, the hunting, the giving up, the leaving things out "so I'll remember where it is," the piles that build on piles, the doom drawers and doom bags, and how it all ends with owning ten of the same item because you can never trust you'll find the original. She unpacks why this is so exhausting on a deeper level too.  Your working memory was never built to hold onto "which of six random drawers has the batteries in it today," and it's not laziness when things get left out, it's a system asking your brain to do a job it can't do. The fix is zoning before organising: deciding where something actually lives based on how you use it, then trusting that home enough to put things back there every time. Heather also shares one of her favourite parts of a declutter session: the moment a client finds something they'd forgotten they even owned, tucked away in a drawer that never had a proper place before.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction: Why tidiness isn't enough
02:13 The problem with random drawers and cupboards
04:47 The cycle of clutter and why it happens
06:28 The broken windows theory of clutter
09:53 Why your brain can't remember everything
11:58 The importance of zoning and categorisation
12:51 How trusting your system creates lasting order
13:17 The joy of rediscovering forgotten items

Support the show

If you'd like to say 'Thank you', by buying me a virtual coffee (it'll actually buy me a cup of tea!), you can do so HERE. It will mean I can afford to continue to give help for free and continue with this podcast.

Get started with my Zoning and Getting Started Workshop, everything you need to know on how to get started and have the best success when decluttering.

Join my free Declutter Community for real support, tips and advice from Heather and other Untanglers that are just like you!

Follow me on Facebook

Buy my Declutter Your Home Planner from Amazon to start to declutter your home yourself! (affiliate link)

Grab my current freebies to support a cleaner, tidier home.

Follow me on instagram

Feel free to email me: [email protected] 
Please note, I may not be able to reply, but do read all emails to me and appreciate them massively.

Send me a text message about this podcast

Summary

Ever hit the point in decluttering where it feels like nothing's changing, no matter how much work you've put in? In this episode Heather talks about the invisible wall so many people hit partway through their decluttering journey.  The point where progress feels invisible and it's easy to think "what's the point, nothing's ever going to change."

Heather breaks down why this happens: shrinking dopamine rewards as you get used to letting go of more, the shift away from delayed gratification, working by area instead of by category (which makes progress harder to see), fatigue from treating decluttering as a marathon rather than a sprint, and still putting things down rather than putting them away.

She also shares the broken windows theory and how it applies both to relapsing into clutter and to the moment things finally click, plus her own snowball-up-the-hill metaphor for where you might be in the process right now.

If you're feeling demoralised and like you'll never get there: this one's for you.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to the decluttering wall and emotional challenges
02:20 How initial decluttering efforts feel more rewarding
05:03 The 'click point' and reaching decluttering milestones
06:22 Decluttering as a slow marathon, not a sprint
07:16 The challenge of putting things away consistently
08:10 The benefits of proper organization and how mess becomes easier to manage
09:36 Dealing with frustration when things are out of place
10:33 Taking breaks and managing capacity during decluttering
11:28 Encouragement to keep pushing and recognising progress
11:55 Final motivation: you're making progress and not alone

Support the show

If you'd like to say 'Thank you', by buying me a virtual coffee (it'll actually buy me a cup of tea!), you can do so HERE. It will mean I can afford to continue to give help for free and continue with this podcast.

Get started with my Zoning and Getting Started Workshop, everything you need to know on how to get started and have the best success when decluttering.

Join my free Declutter Community for real support, tips and advice from Heather and other Untanglers that are just like you!

Follow me on Facebook

Buy my Declutter Your Home Planner from Amazon to start to declutter your home yourself! (affiliate link)

Grab my current freebies to support a cleaner, tidier home.

Follow me on instagram

Feel free to email me: [email protected] 
Please note, I may not be able to reply, but do read all emails to me and appreciate them massively.

Send me a text message about this podcast

Summary

147 episodes in, and Heather realises she's never actually done a full episode on one of her favourite neurodivergent-friendly storage solutions: hooks. In this episode she talks through why hooks work so well for messy brains, busy lives, and anyone who forgets things exist the second they're out of sight. Starting with the fruit-bowl-turned-doom-pile most of us have by the front door, and a client's tiny porch that had become a genuine shoe-related fire hazard. From there, Heather walks room by room through where hooks quietly solve problems that baskets and boxes don't: the entryway, the kitchen, and all the small stuff that "doesn't really have a home" :  TV remotes, towels, clothes brushes, and the chair-pile of not-quite-dirty clothes.

What you'll walk away with

• Why hooks work so well for ADHD brains and anyone who struggles with "out of sight, out of mind"
• The difference between a container that helps and a container that quietly becomes a doom pile
• How a client's small porch and a big shoe problem got solved with hooks instead of baskets
• Why giving something a finite number of hooks is more useful than it sounds (especially with kids' shoes)
• A room-by-room walkthrough: entryway, kitchen, and the "floating" stuff that never has a proper home
• The one question to ask yourself about any storage solution: can I put this away easily?

Who this episode is for

Anyone with a spot in their home that keeps quietly filling up no matter how many pretty containers they buy for it — especially if you're ADHD, have a busy household, or just tend to forget things exist the moment they're out of sight.

Timestamps

00:00 - Why hooks are the storage solution Heather had not talked about yet

00:30 - Why open containers become doom piles for ADHD and messy brains

01:00 - The fruit bowl problem and why hallway catchalls fail

02:29 - When containers turn into extra dumping grounds

03:27 - Why hooks work: visible, finite, and instant

03:56 - Preparing items so they can actually hang on hooks

05:22 - How visible storage stops losing, rebuying, and tripping over items

06:46 - Why floor space and safety improve with hook systems

07:15 - A tiny porch, too many shoes, and why baskets failed

08:40 - Replacing shoe baskets with wall hooks in pairs

09:38 - Finite wall space as a built-in boundary for growing children’s shoes

10:30 - Entryway items that work well on hooks

11:58 - Hooks in the hallway and choosing styles that fit your home

12:27 - Kitchen tools, pans, and utensils on hooks and racks

13:24 - Using a bulldog clip on a hook for receipts and paper piles

14:22 - Solving the problem of items that “float” around the house

14:46 - Anchoring the TV remote near the sofa

15:15 - Towels, colour coding, and preventing damp piles

15:43 - Clothes brushes, torches, and worn clothes that need a temporary home

16:37 - The final test: can you put it away easily?

Affiliate links to great hooks:

Dog tail hooks

Pet station

Heavy duty hook

Shower glass door hooks

Over door hooks

Remote control bungee

Phone lanyard

Support the show

If you'd like to say 'Thank you', by buying me a virtual coffee (it'll actually buy me a cup of tea!), you can do so HERE. It will mean I can afford to continue to give help for free and continue with this podcast.

Get started with my Zoning and Getting Started Workshop, everything you need to know on how to get started and have the best success when decluttering.

Join my free Declutter Community for real support, tips and advice from Heather and other Untanglers that are just like you!

Follow me on Facebook

Buy my Declutter Your Home Planner from Amazon to start to declutter your home yourself! (affiliate link)

Grab my current freebies to support a cleaner, tidier home.

Follow me on instagram

Feel free to email me: [email protected] 
Please note, I may not be able to reply, but do read all emails to me and appreciate them massively.

Send me a text message about this podcast

Summary

You said you'd "just tidy the side" at 11 o'clock. You look up and it's half past one, the kitchen looks worse than when you started, and you genuinely can't account for the last two hours. In this episode, Heather Tingle talks about time blindness. A genuine, documented part of how many ADHD brains work.  Drawing on her own experience of starting ADHD medication and noticing, for the first time, what time feels like when it isn't "bendy." She breaks down the three ways time blindness shows up in decluttering and daily life: losing hours to a task with no sense of time passing, avoiding tasks because they feel far longer than they actually take, and "waiting mode".... the habit of doing nothing before an appointment so you don't lose track of time. Heather explains why this isn't a discipline problem, why generic productivity advice (yes, including all those planners and the Pomodoro technique) hasn't worked for you, and shares practical, decluttering-specific ways to work with it instead of fighting it.

What you'll walk away with

• Why time blindness is different from poor time management, and why productivity advice hasn't worked for you
• The three ways time blindness shows up: the "Bermuda triangle of time," the overestimation trap, and waiting mode
• Why a visible, physical timer works where phone timers don't
• How timing a task once (like putting laundry away) can chip away at the "everything feels bigger than it is" feeling
• Why setting a hard "leave by" time works better than a vague window before an appointment
• How accountability — a lift arriving at your cutoff time, or body doubling — can anchor your sense of time passing
• The one habit to take away that interrupts all three patterns

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Time Blindness and Its Impact
02:17 Common Patterns of Time Misjudgment in Daily Life
04:10 Time Blindness vs. Time Management: Key Differences
06:03 Three Common Patterns in Time Blindness
07:28 Overcoming the Overestimation of Task Duration
08:52 Waiting Mode and Its Hidden Costs
10:41 Practical Tools: Timers and Deadlines
12:22 Using Time Awareness to Reduce Clutter and Anxiety
14:13 Accountability and Body Doubling Strategies
15:10 Final Tips and Encouragement for Managing Time Blindness

Visual timer (Amazon Affiliate link) 

Support the show

If you'd like to say 'Thank you', by buying me a virtual coffee (it'll actually buy me a cup of tea!), you can do so HERE. It will mean I can afford to continue to give help for free and continue with this podcast.

Get started with my Zoning and Getting Started Workshop, everything you need to know on how to get started and have the best success when decluttering.

Join my free Declutter Community for real support, tips and advice from Heather and other Untanglers that are just like you!

Follow me on Facebook

Buy my Declutter Your Home Planner from Amazon to start to declutter your home yourself! (affiliate link)

Grab my current freebies to support a cleaner, tidier home.

Follow me on instagram

Feel free to email me: [email protected] 
Please note, I may not be able to reply, but do read all emails to me and appreciate them massively.

Send me a text message about this podcast

 Summary

In this episode of Decluttering Untangled, host Heather Tingle speaks with Emma Sales about the unique challenges neurodivergent individuals face when moving house. They discuss the importance of planning, the emotional aspects of moving, and practical tips for decluttering and packing. Emma shares insights from her book, 'Unpacked Neurodivergence and Moving House,' emphasising the need for personalised strategies and the acceptance of one's own moving process. The conversation highlights the significance of creating a safe space during the transition and managing stress effectively.

In this conversation, Emma Sails shares her experiences and insights on moving, particularly from the perspective of neurodivergence. She discusses the challenges faced during her own moving day, the importance of having backup plans, and the need for clear communication and organisation. Emma emphasises the significance of creating a safe space during transitions and reflects on her past moves, highlighting the lessons learned. The discussion culminates in practical tips for a successful move.

Key  topics

Challenges of moving house with neurodivergence
Strategies for planning and decluttering
Importance of safe spaces and routines during move
Using tools like spreadsheets and labels effectively
Managing stress and overwhelm in the moving process

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Emma Sales and her book
02:00 Why moving house is especially stressful for neurodivergent individuals
03:58 Personal experiences and motivations for writing the book
07:08 Planning and organizing the move: tips for neurodivergent minds
10:11 Using visual plans and spreadsheets to aid packing
12:04 Labeling and prioritizing items for easier unpacking
14:57 Creating safe spaces and managing overwhelm during the move
17:55 Dealing with last-minute packing and unexpected challenges
22:01 Supporting neurodivergent family members during the move
26:01 Reflections on past moves and lessons learned
30:06 Final tips and encouragement for a successful move

Link to Emma Sails: 

https://navigatingneurodivergence.co.uk 

Link to Emmas Book: Unpacked: Neurodivergence and Moving House - (Amazon affiliate link)

courses.untangledbytingle.com Getting Started and Zoning Workshop

Support the show

If you'd like to say 'Thank you', by buying me a virtual coffee (it'll actually buy me a cup of tea!), you can do so HERE. It will mean I can afford to continue to give help for free and continue with this podcast.

Get started with my Zoning and Getting Started Workshop, everything you need to know on how to get started and have the best success when decluttering.

Join my free Declutter Community for real support, tips and advice from Heather and other Untanglers that are just like you!

Follow me on Facebook

Buy my Declutter Your Home Planner from Amazon to start to declutter your home yourself! (affiliate link)

Grab my current freebies to support a cleaner, tidier home.

Follow me on instagram

Feel free to email me: [email protected] 
Please note, I may not be able to reply, but do read all emails to me and appreciate them massively.

Send me a text message about this podcast

Summary

There is a new decluttering trend doing the rounds called House Hushing, coined by Myquillyn Smith, known online as The Nester. Heather breaks down what it actually involves, where it works brilliantly, and why she has some real reservations about it for anyone with a genuinely full house or an ADHD brain.

What You Will Learn

• What House Hushing is and the three steps behind it, the Holding Area, the Pause, and the Return
• How House Hushing fits into Myquillyn Smith's wider four part approach, decluttering, quiet decorating, soulful styling, and living seasonally
• When this method genuinely works well, and who it suits
• Why a full house makes this method tricky in practice
• The doom bag risk hiding inside this method, especially for ADHD brains
• Why decluttering by category beats decluttering by room
• Heather's take on how to adapt House Hushing so it actually sticks

Chapters

00:00
Introduction to House Hushing and Its Popularity

00:30
What is House Hushing and Its Core Principles

01:01
The Three Steps of House Hushing: Holding Area, Pause, Return

01:57
The Benefits of a Quiet, Simplified Space

02:26
Personalizing Your Space and Seasonal Living

03:55
Ideal Scenarios for House Hushing: Renovations and Full Projects

06:56
Practical Challenges: Space, Sorting, and Emotional Impact

08:50
Risks of Instant Gratification and Over-Correction

10:13
Limitations: Addressing Underlying Habits and Systems

11:42
Recommendations for Effective House Hushing and Final Thoughts

Support the show

If you'd like to say 'Thank you', by buying me a virtual coffee (it'll actually buy me a cup of tea!), you can do so HERE. It will mean I can afford to continue to give help for free and continue with this podcast.

Get started with my Zoning and Getting Started Workshop, everything you need to know on how to get started and have the best success when decluttering.

Join my free Declutter Community for real support, tips and advice from Heather and other Untanglers that are just like you!

Follow me on Facebook

Buy my Declutter Your Home Planner from Amazon to start to declutter your home yourself! (affiliate link)

Grab my current freebies to support a cleaner, tidier home.

Follow me on instagram

Feel free to email me: [email protected] 
Please note, I may not be able to reply, but do read all emails to me and appreciate them massively.

Send me a text message about this podcast

Summary

You know that moment when the kitchen cupboard finally shuts, because you've moved half of what was in there to a back stock cupboard in the garage or a shelf in the cellar? It feels like a win. It isn't.

In this episode Heather unpacks one of the most common (and sneakiest) decluttering mistakes, splitting or extending a category so some of it can live in a different room. It solves the problem in room one for about five minutes, then quietly creates two new ones, in room one and room two.

Heather explains why this happens (it's not laziness, it's your brain looking for the fastest way out of a hard decision), the three knock on effects that show up later, decision fatigue, forgotten back stock, and a second room that was never designed to hold the extra weight, and walks through real examples including summer and winter clothes, books scattered across the house, and children's toys split between three rooms.

You'll also get the actual fix: how to choose one proper home for a category based on where it's really used, and reduce what you own until it fits comfortably, rather than reaching for a second location every time it doesn't.

If you've got clutter quietly living in more than one place, this episode will help you spot it and, more importantly, sort it for good.

In this episode:

• What "splitting a category" actually means and why it feels like progress
• The three problems it creates over time
• Real examples: seasonal clothing, books, and children's toys
• How to pick one home for a category and make it actually fit
• Why this isn't a willpower issue, and how to give yourself permission to fix it

Chapters

00:00 Introduction: The common decluttering mistake
00:30 The problem with splitting categories
01:26 How splitting causes decision fatigue
02:23 Secondary spaces and their pitfalls
04:15 Examples of category splitting: books and toys
07:07 Strategies for effective decluttering
08:34 Creating space and reducing categories
09:58 The importance of proper decluttering
10:27 Final tips and encouragement

Support the show

If you'd like to say 'Thank you', by buying me a virtual coffee (it'll actually buy me a cup of tea!), you can do so HERE. It will mean I can afford to continue to give help for free and continue with this podcast.

Get started with my Zoning and Getting Started Workshop, everything you need to know on how to get started and have the best success when decluttering.

Join my free Declutter Community for real support, tips and advice from Heather and other Untanglers that are just like you!

Follow me on Facebook

Buy my Declutter Your Home Planner from Amazon to start to declutter your home yourself! (affiliate link)

Grab my current freebies to support a cleaner, tidier home.

Follow me on instagram

Feel free to email me: [email protected] 
Please note, I may not be able to reply, but do read all emails to me and appreciate them massively.