‘Decluttering and cleaning brings a sense of internal order and peace’ – psychologist

As part of a campaign to improve mental health awareness, a local organisation has hosted various clean-ups in a township’s streets.

‘Cleaning up the mind’

Soulbent Projects founder Mashudu Makhado said because the project focused on cleaning illegal dump sites, streams, rivers, wetlands and streets, he thought it would benefit cleaning up the mind.

“Many people are depressed and stressed with no income and most people don’t have someone they can share their problems with,” he said. “When you clean, you forget your problem and start to engage with other cleaners.”

Makhado said cleaning up the environment was the best thing to clean a person’s soul and was an act of godliness.

“Mental health destroys a lot of families daily, we need to engage them, connect with them, support them,” he said.

Mental health and volunteers

Makhado said the clean-ups allowed him to speak to the 63 volunteers about mental health and show them how to monitor mental health.

On Mental Health Day, Makhado and his team of volunteers collected 430 black bags of waste in Saulsville. The project is still ongoing.

Expert weighs in

Professor Erica Munnik, a clinical psychologist at the, University of the Western Cape‘s Community and Health Sciences, said cleaning and decluttering can be seen as positive action. It can lead to feelings of accomplishment and can add to life satisfaction.

Munnik said excessive cleaning and cluttering or hoarding are known symptoms of diagnosable disorders and can impact one’s life significantly.

“Cleaning your room or your home generally assists to not only burn calories and release feel-good hormones called endorphins, it also reduces anxiety and stress and generally has a positive effect on one mental health by adding to self-confidence and life satisfaction,” she said.

Order and peace

Munnik said for many, it brought a sense of order and peace and sometimes also personal fulfilment.

“Clients usually also reflect they feel decluttering and cleaning brings a sense of internal order and a release of anxiety,” she added.

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Munnik added that service to others, such as volunteering or being part of a group to, for instance, clean up streets or assist in feeding schemes, brings a sense of being committed to the greater good.

“Volunteering or serving usually reduces stress and increases positive, stress-free feelings.

By spending time in service to others, volunteers report feeling a sense of meaning and appreciation, both given and received, which can have a stress-reducing effect.

“It is known that a stress reduction usually also reduces the risk of many somatic and mental health problems, such as hypertension, stroke, anxiety and depression,” she said.

Munnik said community service or volunteering also created opportunities to meet new people and form new relationships by expanding social networks.

On a personal level, it increases self-belief, self-esteem, a sense of achievement and more general satisfaction with life. More importantly, it also makes people feel like part of their communities.

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