If there's one room of your house you can't use because it's full of clutter, you need help. How can you clear out the mess, but hold on to your dreams? Olivia Kelleher points the way

Few of us would be prepared to allow the cleaning squad from the British TV show How Clean is Your House? in to our homes. But there is a big difference between being messy and having a house so impaired by clutter that it is hard to function in it.

Your house is cluttered if you can't use significant portions of it for the purpose for which it was intended. Most people reading this are now shaking their heads thinking this isn't a problem that applies to them.

Clutter-clearing is for wacky guests on the Oprah Winfrey Show or the reclusive pensioners you read about occasionally who die in their homes with only their cats for company.

But the odds are that a significant number of readers will have a "guest" room full of old baby clothes, toys, tools and boxes of memories. The room can't be used for guests because it is the storage area for "must keeps" such as old school reports, first-aid certificates, debs dresses and a broken keyboard last used by your son in 1986.

Interior designer Susan Byron from Kinvara, Co Galway, offers advice to people who feel intimidated or powerless when faced with their cluttered homes. She approaches the subject from a personal perspective, as clutter was once an issue in her life.

A few years ago she was considering moving house from Co Meath to Co Clare, but was intimidated by the "de-junking" process. She came across the book Clear Your Clutter with Feng Shui, by Karen Kingston, which she says revolutionised her life.

Byron organised the move in record time and brought only her most basic possessions to her west of Ireland home.

Since then she has carried out extensive research on clutter clearing and incorporates it in to her work as an interior designer. However, she advises people on how to approach clutter clearing rather than going in and doing the job for them.

"People are very ashamed when they come to me. I give them a check list on how to approach de-cluttering. It is important for them to do the de-cluttering themselves because the actual process can bring up wider issues such as why we hang on to things and so on. There is no point in hanging on to stuff you don't use, as a security blanket. It creates an undercurrent of lack. People keep things because they think 'God I might need this in the future'. But by saying that you are imagining this time in which you will be in need."

As a mother of four, Byron understands how a house can become untidy. However, she says, with increased affluence many homes in Ireland are full of useless gadgets bought to reflect a certain lifestyle rather than a need. Step forward the bread-making machine that was purchased in a fit of enthusiasm or the empty wine racks that are crying out to be filled.

Byron says one of the worrying things about clutter is that that many people are filling their houses with luxury items courtesy of their credit card.

"I go in to houses where women literally haven't taken the labels off new clothes. Rails of clothes bought in a feel-good mission. People are buying juicers and blenders that take up all the space in the kitchen and they are paying exorbitant rates for something they will never use or something that will go to a charity shop. You can have too many shoes or too many handbags. There has to be a happy balance."

However, it seems that really wealthy people are the last ones to have cluttered houses. Byron says generally the most financially secure people have clutter-free homes, perhaps reflecting the organised mind which enabled them to make all the money in the first place.

Which brings us to the deeper psychological issues. It seems that having a seriously cluttered home can be a cry for help or a sign of loneliness or deeply-rooted depression.

British clutter expert Karen Kingston, who is in Ireland later this year for a de-cluttering seminar, says many people who are chronically untidy or disorganised behave that way as a form of protest, having lived in a perfect, almost antiseptic house as a child.

She believes there is no such thing as someone who is "just untidy" - there is always a deeper reason why someone creates a mess around themselves, and the outer disarray always reflects an inner chaos of some kind.

"Many people who are untidy or disorganised are actually perfectionists. Try tidying their stuff away and they will soon stop you, with cries of, 'Don't touch that - I won't know how to find it when I need it'. Some people are untidy for a different reason. It is done as an act of rebellion against an authority figure, such as a parent. There are emotional issues that come to the surface during the course of sorting through all the clutter and that can be resolved by doing it."

Kingston says compulsive hoarders who live in cluttered homes often grew up with scarce resources and feel they never had "enough" money, clothes, food, attention or even love. If so, possessing large quantities of stuff as an adult is probably comforting.

Often older people become what Americans call "packrats", hanging on to useless goods because of sentimental attachment. When items symbolise a part of ourselves, a time in our lives, or people we knew, it can be difficult to let go. This explains the drawer in your spare room or garage which contains a Papal flag, a Christy Ring commemorative plate and a miniature Eiffel tower ornament bought on your honeymoon.

Byron recalls one former client, an elderly woman, who wept once she had finished de-cluttering her home.

"She had so much junk she could barely get in to the house. She really needed to de-clutter it herself as she had to let go of all the memories she had attached to various things. You are talking tonnes of books. So much stuff from travels, even tacky souvenirs. She drank a bottle of wine when she finished it and cried her eyes out, but it was great for her. It is very therapeutic. You would be amazed at the problems people solve whilst doing mindless jobs like cleaning the taps. It is like clearing a space in your mind for new things to occur. De-cluttering is about creating new possibilities. Hire a skip, roll up your sleeves and I promise you a new life."

Susan Byron can be contacted at susanmbyron@eircom.net

Karen Kingston's de-cluttering conference and workshops take place from June 25 to 27 in Maynooth, Co Kildare. The first day of the conference will focus specifically on the practical aspect of de-cluttering a home. Day two and three involve exploring space clearing - the Feng Shui art of clearing and consecrating energy in buildings. For information, tel 087 6679145.