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Life in Jeneral: A Joyful Guide to Organizing Your Home and Creating the Space for What Matters Most – The Soul Work of Emotional Decluttering
In this essential guide, the creative force behind the popular organization company Life in Jeneral reveals her emotionally engaged approach to decluttering—a unique process that empowers people to re-envision their spaces to suit their evolving needs.
Life is about connection, not collection.
Jen Robin’s company, Life in Jeneral, focuses on the “soul work” of home organization—the psychological and emotional foundation necessary for creating a streamlined and sustainable lifestyle. For Jen, change comes from within—a process that to succeed, must begin with the heart.
Americans are spending more time at home than ever before, and many have come to realize that their living spaces aren’t serving them. We have too many things, resulting in physical and mental clutter. And the organizational strategies we try only go so far, leaving us feeling disconnected and disheartened.
Life in Jeneral helps you build healthier mental habits that allow us to break free from the clutter, while providing traditional strategies to get—and stay—organized. Beautifully designed and featuring examples from Jen’s personal experiences and those of her clients, Life in Jeneral teaches us how
Flip common mental blocks that prevent us from organizational success
Identify and tackle “clutter magnets”—the spaces where things seem to gather
Discover common emotional baggage keyed to specific types of clutter
Organize and evolve specific spaces in the home, room by room
Life in Jeneral offers a holistic approach to organization; once we understand what we want from our spaces—how they can nurture and support our emotional well-being—we can create a home that feels both practical and joyful.
Life is about connection, not collection.
Jen Robin’s company, Life in Jeneral, focuses on the “soul work” of home organization—the psychological and emotional foundation necessary for creating a streamlined and sustainable lifestyle. For Jen, change comes from within—a process that to succeed, must begin with the heart.
Americans are spending more time at home than ever before, and many have come to realize that their living spaces aren’t serving them. We have too many things, resulting in physical and mental clutter. And the organizational strategies we try only go so far, leaving us feeling disconnected and disheartened.
Life in Jeneral helps you build healthier mental habits that allow us to break free from the clutter, while providing traditional strategies to get—and stay—organized. Beautifully designed and featuring examples from Jen’s personal experiences and those of her clients, Life in Jeneral teaches us how
Flip common mental blocks that prevent us from organizational success
Identify and tackle “clutter magnets”—the spaces where things seem to gather
Discover common emotional baggage keyed to specific types of clutter
Organize and evolve specific spaces in the home, room by room
Life in Jeneral offers a holistic approach to organization; once we understand what we want from our spaces—how they can nurture and support our emotional well-being—we can create a home that feels both practical and joyful.
256 pages, Kindle Edition
First published December 7, 2021
32 people are currently reading
89 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
April 26, 2022
I enjoyed both reading and listening to Jen Robin’s “life in jeneral: a joyful guide to organizing your home and creating the space for what matters most.” I have read many other organizing books over the years by organizers such as Peter Walsh, Marie Kondo, and Christopher Lowell, to name a few. I found Jen‘s wholehearted and gentle approach to the psychology behind clutter to be insightful, followed by plentiful and useful tips to tackle real-life challenges. This book provides a great start to anyone looking to simplify and enjoy a stress-free home so you can then focus on what matters.
May 7, 2022
My Dad told me in his last few weeks that sometimes he was surprised by what I chose to read, and I didn't press him on that for specifics, but when I finished reading this book this morning, I realized this is likely what he meant. I don't know why I read this. I heard her on a podcast and must've put this on hold at the library in a fugue state. There is nothing necessary here.
April 4, 2022
Part 1: soul work. The essence of the book and the most useful pp 1-105. The rest of the book, ~144 pages, is fluff, and truly useless.
July 13, 2023
The voice and full exploration is really helpful for confronting those spaces that always seem to get overstuffed. The sections at back are easy and convenient to survey, with the writer’s favorite strategies by area category. But especially the beginning parts offer a lot of approaches for tackling areas that can feel like they get out of control.
The writer does a particularly good job organizing indicative anecdotes among 6 main categories of obstacles and objections she’s experienced in home projects. As much as our stuff can pile onto us, others’ stuff becomes an additional matter, for which her trudging onward offers maybe embarrassingly simple answers proctoring one to “just keep going” and to persist these arguments that matter, for our healthiest spaces. She only lightly probes but her probes are about core functionality of your unit, and it is heart rendering to spend the time and to let your family come to better appreciate the processes too.
Namely, it gives a few persistent approaches for our garage and basement areas, where enough does not have reliable places to find it and instead just crowds and congests.
I so appreciate that she’s articulated so many of her clients wins in ways that have mattered most.
The writer does a particularly good job organizing indicative anecdotes among 6 main categories of obstacles and objections she’s experienced in home projects. As much as our stuff can pile onto us, others’ stuff becomes an additional matter, for which her trudging onward offers maybe embarrassingly simple answers proctoring one to “just keep going” and to persist these arguments that matter, for our healthiest spaces. She only lightly probes but her probes are about core functionality of your unit, and it is heart rendering to spend the time and to let your family come to better appreciate the processes too.
Namely, it gives a few persistent approaches for our garage and basement areas, where enough does not have reliable places to find it and instead just crowds and congests.
I so appreciate that she’s articulated so many of her clients wins in ways that have mattered most.
January 21, 2022
I've read a lot of design books. This book doesn't really bring anything new to the table.
The first half is devoted to the psychology of cleaning and organizing. The second half is the act of cleaning and organizing.
The first half is devoted to the psychology of cleaning and organizing. The second half is the act of cleaning and organizing.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews