If your house is too cluttered and you don’t know how to tackle it, Karen Hayns is the person to work with.

I choose the word ‘with’ carefully as Karen does not come in and ‘tell’ you what to do or just to throw it away, as I thought would be the case in a situation like this. She works collaboratively with you to get a result that leaves you feeling liberated.

Karen helped me do something I was dreading – to clear out our family home of 40 years and get it rent ready.

There were a few tricky factors involved:

The house was abroad

We only had 3 days

There was 4 decades worth of accumulated stuff!

Not only did we achieve this objective, but I found it a surprisingly enjoyable and edifying journey.

Her mix of logic, calmness and empathy pervades. She made the experience high energy and fun whilst retaining interminable patience and understanding.​

If I had been doing this, there would have been a frenzied explosion of bin liners, general chaos and everything piled high. But it was not like that at all…

Her approach is methodical, completing one room at a time.

Completing does not simply mean that the room now has less things in it, it means that the room is cleared, vacuumed, polished, beds made, surfaces cleared, ornaments positioned to leave a show home finish. This room is now complete and we need to adhere to her rule that we cannot re-enter and mess it up or use it for storage or sorting.

I was not expecting this sort of order, but it was clever as it immediately gave me feel a sense of accomplishment, motivated me to get the next room complete and propelled us into a rhythm.

This rhythm was perpetuated by our carefully chosen de-clutter playlist which kept our energy levels flowing and the whole experience upbeat.

​Karen had an abundance of simple but extremely handy tips which she offered me along the way. They made a massive difference and I also now apply them to everyday life.

And then there was my old soft toy and childhood companion, Mickey the Monkey who was not, despite Karen’s initial thoughts about him, being disposed of.

Instead we adopted him as our mascot, and he was proudly positioned in every room once it was finished ready for the ‘completed’ photoshoot – an essential record of our progress.

Once Mickey was in there, we know another goal had been achieved and it felt uplifting as well as injecting some comedy into the proceedings.

​Karen encouraged me to ascertain what my ‘treasures’ were and to put them aside to keep, other items were put into colour coded bin or charity bags and then there was the other stuff – the difficult to decide stuff….

There is a psychology around why some of us want to keep things and this is where Karen really brings her skills and taps into that so that she can understand those motivations.

She worked with me to find a compromise so that I felt comfortable with the end result without feeling like I had lost anything.

As the journey progressed, my mindset changed. Space was created not only in my house but also in my head with a noticeable calm that descended, and a different perspective emerged.

It was a very cathartic experience and I certainly felt so much better for it by the time we had finished, as well as having a rent ready house achieved in just 3 days!

In summary, working with Karen lifted a huge weight from my shoulders.

I found that working collaboratively with her, having a bespoke plan, hitting targets and her ability to keep energy levels high, made the whole experience an absolute pleasure.

Her guidance, advice and insights were invaluable. She took me on a journey that I wasn’t expecting, I discovered that someone helping you to look the issue in the face rather than popping it back in the wardrobe is extremely therapeutic as well as achieving the key objective of a clutter free environment.