simply-org.com Blog

One of the most interesting aspects of life is that it is not stagnant.  It evolves.  It changes.  Your belongings should reflect your life today.  Stop holding on to things from your past.  If they don’t fit your life today that are holding you in your past.

Here’s a great example.
About 10 years ago you spent every available vacation snorkeling.  It has been about 9 years since you last did this activity, yet there are several duffel bags of gear for this in the garage.  Today, that stuff is now clutter.

What items do you have from a hobby or interest that used to hold your attention, but is no longer relevant to your life?

• Are you cooking less?  Too many cookbooks.
• Are you sending less cards and letters?  Too much stationary.
• Did you make elaborate scrapbooks when the kids were younger?  Too many crafting supplies.

• What activities in your life have fallen out of favor?
• Do you still have all the supporting gear?
• Is it taking up space that could be better used to support the activities you do today ?

The supporting gear for activities that are no relevant to your life today have become clutter.  Let them go.  Give them away to a friend or donate them to a local charity that can turn them into cash.  You will feel the freedom as you support the life you are living today.

Tip #3 for De-Cluttering:

Tip #1 for De-Cluttering:

How is 2011 going so far? Are you making some headway with your organizing goals? I hope so, but if not, don’t fret. Maybe you are zigging and zagging too much.

A definite hazard of getting things done, be they cleaning out the linen closet or a major project at work is the zig zag. You know what I mean. Instead to pursuing a project in a methodical, straight forward manner you meander. This can be physical or mental (or a little bit of both).

Let’s take the linen closet as an example. You begin the project by pulling things out of the closet. Some of the items should go to the laundry which is in another room. You wander over there and get distracted by the pile on the floor, turn the washer knob, fill the soap, load the machine, and then notice a clean towel folded on top of the dryer which leads you to walk to the bathroom to hang it up…and there the blow dryer is sitting on the counter, so you put it away under the sink where you see the silver cleaner which would be useful to shine up the bracelet you are wearing tonight, which reminds you to confirm the reservation. Now you are at your desk…EMAIL. Need I say more.

Yup, that is the zig zag. Once you are caught up in it it is really hard to get focused back to the original project. The linen closet is torn up and mess and you are frustrated.

How do you avoid the zig zag? Try this.

* Prepare for your organizing task by bringing supplies to the area where you are going to work. (bags, paper for lists and other notes, markers to write on the bags, etc).
* Bring bags or totes to fill for items that will move to other areas of the house.
* DON’T LEAVE THE AREA OF THE PROJECT.

By physically staying at the place you are cleaning (in this case the linen closet) you are staying clear of all the other distractions that will pull you away.

* Fill a bag with items for other rooms. Don’t go the other room while you are working. Instead, do a sweep of room to room later.

Have bags for donations, recycling, and trash all nearby. That will keep you in one place so you can focus on the task at hand.

What is Visual Clutter?
Stuff that is in plain view that over stimulates your eyes and your brain to the point where you don’t even see it, but it still agitates your brain.

Examples:

Piles of magazines all over the living room.

A refrigerator that is covered with photos, calendars, newsletters and more.

A mantel that has lots of photos in frames, trinkets and candles.
A wall with tons of photos that in a wide variety of frames.

You get the picture. There is so much stuff in plain view that is screaming at you. You generally look past it and don’t see any of the individual items. It over stimulates to the point where you don’t see the loved ones in the photos.

What can you do about Visual Clutter?

If one of your goals is to have space that is more calm and peaceful, be prepared to make some changes to your visual clutter. Reduce is the key word.

First strip the area with the visual clutter totally clean. That means completely clear it. Remove everything off the refrigerator, or clean everything off the mantel. Strip the wall of photos. In this process you will likely find things you didn’t see before, forgot about, or maybe don’t even like and you are not sure how they got there.

Second, decide to put back no more than three things. Just try it….On the refrigerator that might be one calendar, and two photos. On the mantel that might be one candle, one framed photo and one trinket. One the wall re-frame three large photos in a similar frame (all black or gold frames for example).

Three is not the magic number, but it is a great starting place to show that less is more. That you will actually see those few things clearly and enjoy them more. You may settle on five things at the end, but either way it needs to be greatly reduced from where it was when you started.

Third, what do you do with everything else? Put it away. It might be a photo album or box. It might be a place where all the newsletters go together. It might be the trash or recycling (you don’t need the newsletter from 9/10).

Have a look at your space. It is already calmer without all that visual stimulation attacking you. Give it a try.

I like this idea…that you can make an impact on your space quickly. Try some of these ideas this week.

Recycle some third class mail that is lying on your dining room table.
Pick up 5 items and put them away.
Remove all the empty hangers from a clothes closet.
Unpack the non-perishable groceries and put them away (because all the perishable are already in the refrigerator).
Put a “to donate” bag in your closet.
Recycle all the magazines and catalogs from last fall.
Toss out 3 items from your refrigerator.

You get the idea. Little actions that take a little time will add up in the course of a week and give you results. Give it a try this week.

Are you thinking I am nuts? Does this sound like an oxymoron?

Here’s the deal. If you are not a neat and tidy person and this is holding you back from making progress in getting organized, stop and read this.

As I have said before being organized means having the right amount of stuff put away in a manner that you can find it later. (Memorize this and make it your mantra). No one said it has to be neat. Here is an example to make my point clear.

Before there were clean socks all over the bedroom: in three different drawers, under the bed, on the floor of the closet, etc. This is highly disorganized.

After all the socks are in one drawer. Maybe they are just thrown in there, but they are in one place and they fit in that one container (the drawer). This is organized.

The personalization of this for the person who is naturally neat is the socks are all set up in pairs and color coded. The messy person has them all in one drawer, but just dumped in. In both cases the socks are in one place and easier to find than when they were all over the room. Both scenarios work.

Another example is tax receipts and other papers. As long as they are stored all together for one tax year, you are way ahead of the game when it comes time to work on your taxes. The neat person might go to the step of pre-sorting receipts. The messy person is glad to have them all together.

Think of it this way…When you are organized you can find things quickly because they are in a designated place. You can clean up quickly because everything has a designated place. Having like with like and not too much of it is a core point of organizing. Yes, even my desk can be a mess while I am working on projects, but I can clean it up quickly because everything has a place.

I was looking at a Storage magazine last week with its beautiful photos of nearly perfect rooms, drawers and shelves. The “organizing ideas” weren’t terribly brilliant or innovative which is fine. Many of the best ideas are the simplest. But here is what really caught my eye. The photos are so attractive because there is no clutter, no excess. The rooms had the right amount of stuff.

So my tip this week is to focus your goals not so much on “getting organized”, but on CLEARING THE CLUTTER. That is the root of getting organized.

Ask yourself these questions:

* Do you really need so much stuff to live a happy and fulfilling life?
* Do these things really make you happy or do they hold you back?

Prepare yourself to shift your point of view and get ready to clear some clutter.

If this is really difficult (and it can be) consider getting an organizing buddy who can help you see what is going on.