I’ve been loving the NatGeo channel lately and watched The Animal Extractors (Episode: Polar Bears in Peril) a couple of weeks ago. One of the featured animals: Nine-banded Armadillos. It turns out that they’re loving a particular cemetery in sunny Orlando, Florida. Well, they don’t care about the sunshine since they only come out at night.

This is a one way love affair because the staff at the cemetery hate that the armadillos are digging up the cemetery grounds. The proverbial icing on the cake is that these critters are not native to Florida. They just like it there.

It occurred to me that the clutter in our lives can be just like these grave digging creatures. Both hang around places they don’t belong and are not wanted. You definitely want to avoid being like armadillos. Besides, they’re not very cute…rabbits are cute…these guys, not so much.

Three Ways to Avoid Being Like Ugly Night Creatures

1. Don’t dig for your stuff.
Have I mentioned that Armadillos are great diggers? Have you seen their claws? Fortunately for us humans, claws are not part of our body landscape, so why go through the trouble of digging? Put things where they belong after each use. Avoid the scavenger hunt – or clutter grave digging – and save yourself some time AND lots of frustration.

2. Don’t create dangerous situations.

Armadillos destroy the grave sites by tunneling through the soil. Can you say collapsing headstones and sinking caskets? You might not have caskets in your home (I hope), but leaving things hanging about can be hazardous to you and your family…and anyone who visits you. Are those stacks and piles of stuff complementing your decor? Or, just letting you practice getting up after you trip over them?

3. Don’t let your stuff get out of control.

Know what else armadillos are good at? Steady breeding. That means lots of them because they have no natural predators in the US. Don’t let your stuff grow and explode out of your space. If you have room for 10 things and you have 50 things, you have to become a natural predator and control the spread of clutter. You may have some hard decisions to make, BUT you’ll be happy in the long run and really start enjoying your space.