We Malaysians are world-class accumulators. Shoes, clothes, gadgets, Tupperware, free tote bags from expos, and souvenirs find their way into our houses every single week. Buying them is easy—especially when there is a tempting “Buy 1 Free 1” sale around the corner. Letting them go? That is the real battle, lah. Over the years, our cupboards overflow, drawers jam shut, and the storeroom turns into a dark museum of things untouched since the late 1990s.
The biggest obstacle is not the clutter itself, but our classic mindset. Four dangerous words stand between us and a clean, spacious house: “Just in case, lah.”
Combined with our favourite excuse— “So sayang to throw!”—we end up hoarding endlessly. We convince ourselves that the blouse we have not worn for ten years will magically fit next Raya or Chinese New Year. Shoes sit forgotten inside their boxes until the rubber soles crumble into dust. Old handphones, magazines, and electrical appliances stay tucked away because one day, somehow, we might use them. Or let us be completely honest with ourselves: we are just too lazy to clear them out. But if you have not touched an item in five or ten years, how likely are you to use it tomorrow? Zero percent, lah.
We need to be brave and decisive. Saying goodbye to clutter does not mean throwing everything straight into the rubbish bin. A blouse gathering dust could be worn and appreciated by someone in need. Shoes we forgot about could bring comfort to someone who cannot afford a new pair. Books sitting untouched on our shelves could bring immense joy to another reader.
Anyone who has ever moved house understands this lesson instantly. Moving forces us to confront our hoarding habits head-on. Faced with packing 50 heavy cardboard boxes, we suddenly become remarkably decisive! Things we faithfully kept for twenty years are suddenly let go without a single tear. We also become surprisingly generous—gifting bulky furniture to relatives, donating bags of clothes, and passing extra kitchenware to neighbours. Why wait until we move house to realise we never needed half this stuff? We should act as if we are moving house once a year—even while staying exactly where we are!
For seniors, this lesson is especially important. We have spent an entire lifetime accumulating; now is the time to lighten our daily load. Keep the genuine heirlooms and precious memories, but let go of the rest. The next time you go shopping and spot a nice handbag, please do not buy it in all six available colours just to match six different outfits! Buy one enough already, lah. Later on, you will realise even two is more than enough.
Office Premises: The Storeroom Horror Movie
This hoarding habit does not stop at home; it follows us straight into the workplace. Take a look at our offices, SMEs, corporate suites, and NGO premises. Every workplace has that one room—the forgotten storeroom. Inside, you will find event T-shirts from 2012, faded banners, outdated letterheads, expired hampers, and mountains of yellowed paper files. Because management never gives clear instructions, staff simply turn a blind eye and ignore the mess. Years pass, staff resign, and nobody remembers why those boxes were kept in the first place. Valuable square footage is wasted while dust builds up—and rats and cockroaches end up holding their daily AGM inside!
Instead of sitting in air-conditioned rooms waiting for quarterly reports, bosses and managers need to become a bit busybody—or what we fondly call a proper nosy poker! Put on your detective hats, roll up your sleeves, and go conduct an official "Inspection of Forgotten Spaces." Once a year, the boss should personally march down the corridor, open those mysterious storeroom doors, and start poking around.
Bosses and Board members need to personally order and lead this annual clear-out. Open those dusty boxes, inspect those suspicious piles, and ask out loud, "Boss, why do we still have 200 T-shirts from our 2015 Merdeka treasure hunt ah?" Dump the useless junk, send old paper for recycling, and donate usable event leftovers before the pests claim them as official company assets.
When the manager pokes into the dark corners and finds physical files from decades ago, it is time to ask the obvious question: why are we paying high commercial rent just to store dust? In this digital age, scan those old records, photos, and documents into neat, secure digital archives on the cloud, and host a satisfying shredding party for the rest.
Staff usually do not throw anything away because they are terrified the boss will suddenly ask for a ten-year-old document next week! Management needs to give explicit clearance: "If it has no legal purpose and nobody has used it since the last FIFA World Cup, throw it away, lah!" Create a workplace culture where keeping a clean, spacious office is praised rather than questioned.
Ultimately, decluttering is about changing our daily mindset. We spend half our lives acquiring things. In our senior years and within modern workplaces, we must master the fine art of letting go. So open that home cupboard you have been avoiding. Visit that spooky office storeroom. Before automatically saying, “Just in case I need it,” ask yourself: “Could someone else use this right now?” Letting go is not a loss at all—it is an act of generosity and a wonderful way to make our homes, offices, and minds a whole lot lighter!
Pola Singh (mediaplayer1717@gmail.com) is a content creator under the Newswav Creator programme, where you get to express yourself, be a citizen journalist, and at the same time monetize your content & reach millions of users on Newswav. Log in to creator.newswav.com and become a Newswav Creator now!
The User Content (as defined on Newswav Terms of Use) above including the views expressed and media (pictures, videos, citations etc) were submitted & posted by the author. Newswav is solely an aggregation platform that hosts the User Content. If you have any questions about the content, copyright or other issues of the work, please contact creator@newswav.com.