I received a free e-book copy of this title from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Reading books about organizing is always so hopeful. Anytime I start one, I am just a few easy steps away from becoming a new, better, more organized person. And this is why I picked <i>Decluttering at the Speed of Life</i> out at NetGalley - it's New Year! Time to become a better me!

And then Dana K. White writes that hers is a book about decluttering, not organizing.

*record scratch*

And do you know what? It actually made sense. In just a few chapters, not only was I reading the book and nodding along - I actually felt inspired by White's ideas. A few of them gave me major OH THIS SO RIGHT moments: one standout was when White was talking about forever putting aside a can of pie stuffing and then realizing that while it might be technically good for use, it just wasn't going to happen, and keeping it in the pantry only increased the clutter there. And of course, this is so right. The jars of preserves I've been putting aside for a long time now aren't going to get eaten anytime this century.

White provides her reader with a lot of easy-to-follow tips on how to get rid of clutter. Most importantly, she illustrates her book with stories from her own life and her own experiences in decluttering. She doesn't pretend that decluttering is going to be easy or painless, but she stresses that making even a small progress counts for a lot. She also emphasises that successful decluttering doesn't require coming up with new organizing systems for one's stuff, because the goal of decluttering is to have fewer things, not to come up with creative ways to organize what you already have. This might be obvious, but it wasn't necessarily for me. There are also several chapters about helping others (friends, children, loved ones) with decluttering, which help to reframe and re-emphasize the concepts White discusses.

The book is funny, engaging and easy to digest. And helpful! My kitchen is certainly already improved.

So if you need a push to get rid of your clutter, check this out.

Can I be honest with you? I have a problem with clutter. Not stuff. I'm ok with stuff. I don't mind getting rid of things that I'm not using. Moving after years and years of not using something cures you of caring about stuff. Nope, my problem is with clutter.

In her book Decluttering at the Speed of Life, Dana White defines clutter as anything I can't keep under control. Decluttering isn't cleaning. It is the process of deslobification. Yep, that's a real word in this book.

Dana White is the blogger at A Slob Comes Clean. She's is completely open and honest about her issues with clutter. She offers methods that make it easier for chronic clutterers to declutter. They are straight, forward, and easier than you think.

It's not that I never learned how to put things in their proper place. My mom taught me that as well as how to clean our house. I was the duster and bathroom cleaner while my mom vacuumed and did lots of other things. I just put stuff down and never pick it back up again. Then put more stuff down. Then someone else puts something down. And, you get the picture.

I have to admit that Decluttering at the Speed of Life was the first book (or any explanation for that matter) that really hit home for me. Do something. Start somewhere. It doesn't all have to be done in one day, one week, one month...BUT it HAS to be done!

White explains that everything is a container that can only hold so much - your closet, your car, your cabinets, and even your house. Those containers can only hold so much stuff (or people). Stuff can be books, scarves, craft stuffs, or anything that overtakes its container. This container concept is amazing once you wrap your head around it.

Once you really understand the container concept then you have to learn what you value. What you need to value is space over stuff and over money, as White explains. She then walks you through the layers of a clean house and how you need to start the process.

I can't recommend Decluttering at the Speed of Life enough. It's a book I intend to keep and read regularly to help me walk through my clutter difficulties. To encourage you, I admit that I was able to donate bags of stuff in the less than 1 hour of decluttering. I need to get back at it but I've made a start and it felt really good.

This was such a refresing book. I have read numerous books on how to declutter/tidy your home and this was a different approach. I really appreciated that the author has personally dealt with a real clutter problem and is not naturally a neat and put together person. She felt so real, as if it was your good friend giving you advice because she overcame the same issue. Plus she has a personality so no dry self improvement book here.

I have tried the Konmari method and read all of her books and I do still use her folding system but a lot of what she said was lost to me do to cultural differences. No so with this book. I have the rooms, appliances, clothes, etc. that she mentioned. Several times I smiled thinking, "yep, I am guilty of that".

Overall, I feel that it is a very simplistic approach that is very doable and I can't wait to put it into practice and to go pick up her other book.

Even though the advice is not new or ground breaking this book will appeal to many who are setting out on a de-cluttering journey, I think if you can identify with the author or her writing style then it will work for you. It is nicely written and easy to read. There were elements that would definitely not work for me. but a few good bits of information that would. Overall a good read.

A very handy and good book about decluttering. This is one of the best I read and is very useful if you need some advice and tricks on how to declutter and learn to.
Really recommended.
Many thanks to Thomas Nelson--W Publishing and Netgalley

I have read quite a few decluttering books this year and I think this is one of the best. It lays out things room by room and step by step in an easy to follow manner. The author seemed so real and like an actual human who has clutter like the rest of us.

I liked how the book was laid out with an introduction to the concept and way of decluttering, a room by room example, and then tips for decluttering with others which can be even harder.

This book was insightful and helpful for anyone on their decluttering journey.

This is a really handy book about decluttering your living space, and disconnecting the material things from the feelings behind them. The only downside is that it won't work with anyone that doesn't realise they're a hoarder and isn't ready to change, and for the people that recognise they are hoarding, they are likely to take all of these steps anyway. So I can't work out whether the purpose of this book is slightly redundant or not! The advice is great, and the anecdotes from Dana's own life really help to make sense of the advice she gives.

Great book to read and learn from. Cant recommend this book highly enough

Great read for someone that's overwhelmed with things in there home. I love that the author isn't naturally a neat freak, it makes her very relatable. definitely a book to keep on your shelf to reference if you're on a journey to minimalism.

Who hasn't read a book on decluttering? And organizing, feng shui, how to clean everything, etc. From the Sidetracked Home Executives to Peter Walsh's psychological approach to the Queen of Clean, everywhere you turn someone has advice for you. I have read them all, and had some short term success. The difference with Dana is she gets it! She knows how I think. She understands how a person can see future potential in any object.
"Future potential" That is the key and she address the mindset as much as the steps to a less cluttered room.
If you cringe at a friend or relative's style of "housekeeping" or of you are the one who never allows anyone into your home, this book is a wonderful place to start.

I received a copy of this book from Netgalley to review.
I am doing and redoing the process.

This is one of the best books on decluttering I have ever read, and I've read almost all of them. The authors approach is most unique and really sends home the message of why and how we need to declutter. It is just one of the best.

I have de-cluttered my life on a couple of occasions and am in need of doing it again. This book has lots of great suggestions on how to get started. It's really not that difficult (unless you hoard...I hoard craft supplies!) This book will aid in creating order out of chaos!

Right now we have five large boxes in the car to be donated to our local thrift store. Last week we took three boxes. This is after reading Dana White's book, DECLUTTERING AT THE SPEED OF LIFE. With wry humor and down to earth common sense, the book was the kick in the "you know what" that finally got the ball rolling in our house.

Thank you to the publisher, author, and NetGalley for the opportunity to preview the book.

This is a book based on Dana White's personal experience with stuff. There are some good tips and tricks in the book. However, copy and paste can be monotonous for a while, I think she should declutter this book too.

I will be posting a review on my blog at www.hautemommyblog.com

This book makes me move my clutter out of the house.
I really enjoyed reading Decluttering at the Speed of Life by Dana K. White. She has a wonderful sense of humor writing about the many decluttering dilemmas that she has faced in her own life and how she deals with them. Her container concept makes a lot of sense. After all, we only have a certain amount of space to keep our belongings. Like Dana I long for more open space in my house. When my husband and I moved into our house it was spacious and easy to clean. After many years of raising kids and accumulating a lot of stuff along the way, the house hast lost a lot of spaciousness, and it is time to put our house on a diet. Dana breaks the overwhelming task of decluttering down into manageable steps. Reading her book has inspired me to follow her lead and declutter my belongings. Today, I already got rid of an old rocking chair that for the longest time has served as a place to hold laundry baskets full of clean clothes. Right now, the whole back of my car is full of stuff that I will donate tomorrow and I thank Dana for motivating me to do so.

Very inspirational! I’ve read other decluttering book and loved many of them. This was book introduced a concept I haven’t read about before, the purpose of containers. My stuff is pretty minimal, yet this inspired me to decluttering even more. Highly recommended.

I have a review of the book on YouTube.

This is exactly the type of decluttering book I needed in my life without every realizing it. I have felt smothered by excess stuff for years and no sooner do I seem to finally get a handle on things and clear the junk out that I'm right back to where i started! But Dana White has helped me actually change my thinking and habits to get control of the situation before it starts to landslide. I've read plenty of organizing books and have studied all of the thousands of cute organizing boards on Pinterest, but I never actually follow through with the ideas. It all comes down to motivation and how I view the particular objects I honestly need to move along. Through very insightful and thoughtful word Illustrations, I finally got it. I can't fit everything I want into the space I have. Which does not mean I need more space; it means I need to limit the stuff to fit in the space comfortably. There's an entire analogy about the proper number of scarves one should own and it can apply to just about anything, My new favorite quote from the book to live by: accept the limitations of the space you have. Love all of the suggestions in this book and wold definitely recommend

I liked the advice to start clearing the visible areas of your house- the parts you see as you walk in. Everything needs to be contained within its contraints. If it doesn't fit within the storage containers in your house you do not have room for it in your house and need to get rid of things that you use less. You need to think of your house as a container!
It makes you think that hobby supplies have to be used regularly to have a space in your house and if they truly are- something else in your house needs to give way to make a space for them.