Month 1: Mind Decluttering

Perhaps it is largely the effect of a busy schedule, but from the moment I open my eyes in the morning to the moment I close them at night, my mind is full of thoughts. Full of to-do's. Full of things I ought to do, but don't want to or don't have the time for, or don't have the emotional bandwidth for. Welcome to my consciousness, where I can even manage to prevent sleep by thinking too hard about how much I need to fall asleep quickly.

My mind isn't exactly racing with negative, depressive thoughts... It's just racing. But even though the thoughts are generally not self-negative, my mind shares a lot in common with a hamster on an exercise wheel; namely, they both seem to be on the verge of a cardiac event. With so many gritty details vying for my attention, it's no wonder that I forget things and feel overwhelmed. For any given moment, the inconsequential "remember to put away the dishes" gets the same amount of airtime as "test out the model rocket fuel before teaching your teenage students." One might lead to mild roommate disapproval, the other to a headline reading "LOCAL TEACHER ACCIDENTALLY CREATES MINIATURE SUN IN CLASSROOM." Yet somehow my brain can assign them equal priority.

The 80/20 principle doesn't cease to work when it comes to my mind; it just becomes more mockingly apparent. Certainly 80% of my embryonic thoughts inspire less than 20% of the productivity in my life. The other 80% of productivity apparently comes from the 20% of thoughts I have while staring vacantly at my fruit trees. At times, my mental landscape can resemble a tornado of fortune cookie papers, bearing thoughts such as, “I need more copper wire”, “I forgot to email my boss that thing”, and “What was the difference between a Sharp-shinned and Coopers hawk?” If I'm dwelling on gratitude or daydreaming about sheep, great. If I'm contemplating the time I cheerfully told a funeral attendee to "have a great day!" fourteen years ago, perhaps less great.

A few weeks ago, when I considered my relationship with digital entertainment, I realized it wasn't fair for me to be unhappy with my overbooked schedule while signing untold hours into digital oblivion. Similarly, is it really fair for me to be unhappy about not having the bandwidth to solve physics problems, write lectures, or cultivate wisdom which might bless others, while I develop neither environment nor habit to make this mental space?

Do The Task

To declutter this perpetually buzzing mind of mine, I've started with a simple rule: Do it now if it takes less than a minute. See a sock on the floor? Pick it up. Buy groceries? Put them all away (even the ones that don’t need refrigeration). Still cooking dinner, but know you won’t use the peeler again? Wash it while waiting for the onions to caramelize.

While it has never bothered me to see a few dishes in the sink, a little dust on the floor, or an unsent email, I'm now able to get more done and feel freer. It's easier to stay focused because there are simply fewer tasks to remember and be distracted by. Unlike Marie Condo or Martha Stewart, I often drag myself into the one-minute tasks... But they work, so I'm happy to give an honest effort to the formation of a new habit.

For everything else, I've embraced the radical concept of writing things down. Getting tasks out of my head and onto paper gives my brain permission to stop its endless "don't forget" loops. Unlike me, my scrappy ‘to-do’ lists have never once jolted upright in bed gasping "DENTAL APPOINTMENT!"

I appreciate this about them.

Of course, the idea of simply doing the task rather than procrastinating and agonizing over it expands to undertakings I’ve been delaying for months. My current Everest? Devising lectures on rocketry and combustion for my physics class. As a theoretical physicist who studies dark energy, dark matter, and black holes, designing rockets sounds a lot more like, “uuugh” than, “ooooh.” But after assembling materials on the history of rocketry, evolution of rocket design, and basics of combustion, the task became significantly less daunting.

Another big win for both my schedule and mental freedom was in clearing up my future research plans with my advisor. By setting firm schedule boundaries, I wasn’t anxious about overexerting myself, and through establishing a plan, the air was clearer, and my mind was lighter.

Arrival Fallacy

Earlier this month, I reread The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry and was particularly struck by a line that I will paraphrase as, "You will always have unfulfilled desires—the key is to not allow these unfulfilled desires to prevent you from being happy and loving." [1]

My relentless mental racing seems directly connected to this problem - I'm always rushing toward some future milestone. I don’t even bother lying to myself about it – I know that as soon as I finish one project, I’ll be looking for another. I know that if I marry someone, there will be a whole new set of difficulties to work through. I know that as soon as I finish writing one blog post, I’ll be planning the next.

I know contentment isn't something to be arrived at. It's something to be worked through, and (better still) seen through the lens of something greater; I can be content because I know that my struggles, desires, and losses are intimately known by God.

Yet some obnoxious little gremlin deep within me whispers, "But what if contentment actually is a place to arrive at?" and "Contentment requires a lot of work now, but when this happens or that changes, it will be a lot easier to be happy." It's believable because there is an element of truth in it; certain circumstances do lighten our emotional load. I am genuinely less stressed when my schedule isn't overflowing, when I've had enough sleep, or when I'm not facing looming deadlines. The trick is recognizing these temporary states of ease without mistaking them for the contentment that runs deeper.

It’s incredibly hard to reject the arrival fallacy, which says, "I'll be happy when I finish this project/get this promotion/find a spouse." I haven’t mastered it, and I don’t know if I ever will. I do know, however, that gratitude and enjoying happy memories lead me to be much more content with the present even as I experience some very strong and unfulfilled desires.

I've noticed in my own experience what research confirms: our focus dramatically shapes our emotional reality. On the extreme end of unhappiness, depression negatively biases memory retrieval, making it difficult for a depressed individual to recall positive events [2]. This is the case even if the individual has experienced a normal number of positive events. Happiness, we are reminded, has a lot to do with what we dwell on.

Perhaps once a day a happy memory will come to mind (be it from childhood or this morning’s breakfast). Until recently, my mind was too busy to entertain the thought, and on it rushed to more practical and adult-like matters. But now, I’ve been indulging the happy memories. Sometimes it only takes thirty seconds to fully remember the episode.

A recently made happy memory; seeing the aurora with my parents in Iceland. Photo by Doug Wilcox (my dad)

I remember running around the garden as a toddler, naked and unashamed – playing in sprinklers and jumping from one sunbaked rock to the next. I remember cheap gas-station milkshakes with my brother when we were teenagers – something which tided our hungry stomachs over during the long drive back from church youth group. I remember sitting in an Adirondack chair, hurt, disappointed, and crying while a friend prayed for me – an incredibly loving and collected act for a young man to do.

And with the un-rushed recollection of these memories, I naturally conclude, “This is a wonderful life.”

It’s entirely possible that ten minutes later I’ll be annoyed, or get dreadful news, but if we are the sum of many small moments more than we are the result of a few earth-shattering ones, then I’m happy to claim these little victories.  

Hobby Guilt

Finally, I'm decluttering my hobbies. No more guilt about abandoned knitting projects or the guitar gathering dust.

I have officially granted myself permission to stop pretending I'll eventually finish that sweater I started two years ago – it is now unwound wool, ready for when I want to pick knitting back up this fall or on a long plane ride.

I have packed up my handheld ham radio to donate to the school where I work.

I have no idea what to do with the chipmunk pelts I processed when I thought I could turn a rodent infestation into a skill-development opportunity. If I don’t want them, nobody will.

I love trying new things, and I’m sure I will keep doing that, but it’s time to assess what I love, and to stop the guilt trips about the hobbies I don't do anymore. My mental space is too valuable to rent out guilt to hobbies I "should" be enjoying. Each discarded hobby has freed up not just physical space in my home but mental bandwidth I didn't realize was being consumed.

After all, I need that mental space for important things—like a model rocket fuel formula that won't accidentally launch my students into orbit. A mind filled with random thoughts may be chaotic, but a classroom of accidental astronauts requires significantly more paperwork.

Of course, that’s the heart of mental-decluttering: making room for what truly matters by letting go of what doesn't - whether that's unnecessary worries, the illusion of future contentment, or guilt over abandoned hobbies. With all the clutter that’s now absent, I’m finding a pleasant sense of presence.

References:

[1] Comer, J. M. (2019). The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry: How to Stay Emotionally Healthy and Spiritually Alive in the Chaos of the Modern World. WaterBrook.

[2] Korb, A. (2015). The Upward Spiral: Using Neuroscience to Reverse the Course of Depression, One Small Change at a Time. New Harbinger Publications.