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Swedish Death Cleaning: What It Is, and How You Can Try It
Make it easier for your loved ones to claim or clear out your possessions once you pass
Swedish death cleaning is the Swedish approach to organizing and decluttering once you approach old age. The aim is to make it easier for your loved ones to claim or clear out your possessions once you pass.
Marie Kondo’s KonMari tidying up method requires people to consider getting rid of possessions that don’t spark joy in their hearts anymore. There’s another cleaning method to consider, however, that’s gaining in popularity — the Swedish method of döstädning, or death cleaning.
Death cleaning may sound morbid, but it’s a practical way to deal with your ballooning list of possessions. Once you get to late middle age, you need to begin thinking about what will happen to all the stuff that you’ve accumulated once you pass.
Death cleaning is essentially about taking stock of your possessions, and determining what will happen to them when you’re no longer around. Will your children or grandchildren want them? If they won’t, giving them away, selling them, or otherwise getting rid of them, is the considerate thing to do to help minimize their burden once you’re no longer around. Deciding what to do with the belongings of a…
