Taking matters into your own hands
Third solution: Sometimes you can toss out someone else's clutter when that person isn't looking, and sometimes you can't. You've got to figure out this one for yourself.
Shannon, who has had some success fighting stealth clutter with stealth clutter-busting, offers the following advice: Most true Clutter Culprits can't find half their stuff anyway, so when they're not around, you begin to dispose of it -- discreetly. Don't start with clutter that is right in front of them every day. Start with the stuff they can't see that is hidden and buried under other clutter, and remove it gradually.
Sometimes Clutter Culprits will agree to get rid of clutter, but they just don't want to do it themselves or be around when it's being tossed out. Don't force them to be present during the clutter-busting. Otherwise, you'll be tossing stuff out, and they'll be right behind you dragging it all back in.
It doesn't seem fair that you should be stuck with getting rid of all their stuff, but this is not the time to get into "your stuff and my stuff; your job and my job." If you are capable of throwing out clutter and your Clutter Culprit is not, but is willing to let you be the tosser-outer, then seize the moment and start tossing. Sometimes that's the only way you'll ever dig out from all that clutter.
When Juanita's children grew up and moved out of her house, they became Clutter Culprits in absentia by leaving behind boxes, bikes, and all sorts of cluttery stuff.
She learned to say, "I'm trying to do without tons of stuff so there's not clutter everywhere. One way you can help is to remove your [fill in the blank] from my place, or on the fifteenth the Salvation Army is picking up everything." The first time she spoke those words, she had expected to be terrified, but it was not at all as difficult as she had feared.
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