You don’t have to save your major house cleaning projects for the spring. At any time of the year, cleansing your house can be a great way to burn calories and rid yourself of any stuff you’re not actually using. The latest technique to get your home organized is known as Swedish Death Cleaning. Sounds severe, right? If you’ve been collecting stuff for years, it might be just what you need to get your house in order.

Based on a book by Margareta Magnusson, the Swedish Death Cleaning technique advises that you declutter with a specific goal in mind: as though you’ll die tomorrow.

Like Marie Kondo’s famous Kondo method of decluttering, Swedish Death Cleaning encourages a minimalist lifestyle, but with a morbid twist. Rather than getting rid of anything that doesn’t bring you joy, as with the Kondo Method, Swedish Death Cleaning encourages you to get rid of things while you’re alive. So that the relatives and friends that go through your stuff after you die aren’t faced with the burden. Because people famously leave behind a lot of baggage after death — after all, you can’t take it with you.

According to Magnusson, Swedish Death Cleaning should begin at an age when you are able to understand the concept of death and then start preparing your home. She writes, “Don’t collect things you don’t want,” she says. “One day when you’re not around anymore, your family would have to take care of all that stuff, and I don’t think that’s fair.”

So how do you start your Swedish Death Cleaning lifestyle? The same way you would after you pass — by giving away your tokens, mementos, and other things to the friends and family members that would want it.

For more advice, and a look into a Swedish way of life that inspired the method, pick up the book.

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