If “cleanliness is next to godliness” as the ancient proverb goes, what is messiness next to? I can come up with a few options, none of which are appealing. As we start a new year, it’s natural to think about cleaning and reorganizing your space—work, home, or otherwise. I have been thinking about (and avoiding) cleaning out my apartment for months—I just always found a reason not to. We’re too busy Christmas shopping, we have to pack for our trip to New York, the celestial bodies are not perfectly aligned and I woke up with a crick in my neck—you get the idea—pretty much anything was an excuse for me NOT to clean.
Until recently when I woke up one morning, I looked myself in the mirror, and I decided enough is enough. So when I went downstairs and was confronted face-to-face with the detritus of our daily lives (multiplied by the six months since I had actually gone through bills, thrown away junk mail, and organized our receipts, etc.) saying that I was overwhelmed would be a mild prognosis. I stared at the mess and I thought, what can I do to make this easier and how can I help other poor, overwhelmed women avoid the same mistakes?
Mistake #1: Going to the store to blindly buy organization and storage materials.
I think it’s in our nature, as women, to want to go immediately to the store and stock up on everything we’re going to need for our “organization project du jour”. That motivation is great, but the problem lies in the fact that we tend NOT to do our homework before we go out. We go to the store, we buy the pretty colorful boxes in an arrangement of sizes, and we come home essentially hoping and praying that it will all work out.
Bad idea.
Solution: Do the grunt work BEFORE you go shopping.
Although it’s quite annoying to go through all of your mess before you go buy the cute storage pieces, if you do take the time to organize everything first, you (and your wallet) will thank me.
Start with clearing a big space on the floor. Go through everything and break it into piles on the floor. Gift cards go in a pile, receipts go in a pile, bills you need to file go in a pile–you get it, right? Keep a large bag for recycle and trash by your side and keep piling until you’ve gone through the entire mess.
Once this is done, you should have a very clear visual of what you’re dealing with. Visuals are good–they help you decide what you need to HIDE this mess. Now look at each pile and imagine what storage item would work best to put this mess away and add that item to the list. (I would also put in parenthese what will go in that box, folder, divider, etc. because when you get to the store, you might see something that would work better for those items and this way you’ll be able to edit your list…which get me to my next point…)
Mistake #2: Looking at storage and organization as having a static set of rules.
There are no rules for organization. If you find a pretty aluminum coffee can in your kitchen that you want to use to organize the pens on your desk—go with it.
Solution: Remain dynamic.
You should manipulate your list, change it up, and delete items as you see fit. Go to the store for inspiration, search online to see what other people are doing, and make it your own. Just because you’re trying to “organize” does not mean you have to be boring and buy 15 matching gray plastic boxes from the office supply store. Your solutions should be pretty, functional, and fit your lifestyle.
I find myself, when unearthing the mess that we harbor in our home, suddenly attached to these items that I haven’t even seen in months. I am really good at finding a justification to keep something. Oh, we should keep all of these random screws and washers because who knows when something might break and we’ll be dying to have a screw on hand. No. No. No.
Solution: Stop these thoughts before they start.
Here’s what I’ve learned, The screw you actually need when something breaks is rarely one of the screws you actually have on hand. It is very hard for me to part with anything that could eventually be of value or service to me, so the trick I’ve learned is that if it doesn’t have an immediate function in your home, get rid of it. (Example, the extra cord for your camera is something you should keep. The four cords you have rat-holed away that were for cameras you barely remember ever having owned should not be kept.)
Mistake #4: “I’ll come back to it later.”
This is a big no. If you box up all your bills, paperwork, etc. and promise yourself you’ll come back to it later to really go through everything and throw out the unnecessary, you’re kidding yourself. You won’t come back to it. (At least not anytime soon…)
Solution: Commit to cleaning and all its intricacies.
When you decide you’re going to do a big cleaning—commit yourself to it fully. That means going through the piles of bills and throwing away the envelopes, saving the part that matters, and filing it all away by date and year. Yes, it’s annoying. No, it’s not something you can avoid. Embrace it and you’ll find that it gets done much faster than if you fight against it. (Plus, who really wants to come back to old bills from 6, 9, 12 months earlier and try to sift through them?)
Mistake #5: Giving up.
Solution: Don’t!
Once you’ve pushed through and finished your clean up, you will be able to enjoy your home without the clutter that blocks creativity, happiness, and good health. It’s like yoga for your home.
Happy organizing!
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