on Jane Friedman site:

When we feel in opposition to our surroundings, we suffer needlessly. When things are too chaotic, we sometimes push to reduce the chaos—cleaning, sorting, donating, pruning—while sometimes, paradoxically, we blunder toward denial, distraction, and further cluttering. One more aspect of the clutter–tidiness continuum is the recognition that your own preferences may change. For example, does the occasional tidying sweep of your desk cheer you up? Do you discover, while tidying, those notes and files that you knew had gone missing? Or do you enjoy piling things up for the duration of a project and then doing a massive celebratory cleanup at the end?

External objects aren’t the only things to consider. When a project itself is confusing to you, that can be a sign that it’s time to stop ignoring the skewed relationships and cluttered thinking that may have gotten you there. Following is a quick look at ways to unclutter stuff, people, and the words we write.