Tired of your home feeling more like a storage unit than a sanctuary? You're not alone! In this episode of Talk Clutter to Me, join Amanda, our resident "clutter master", as she reveals the transformative power of conquering clutter without the stress. Discover how decluttering goes beyond just tidying up; it can enhance mental clarity, productivity, and even sleep quality! Dive into practical steps and strategies to declutter any space in your home, all without feeling overwhelmed. Get ready to reclaim your peace of mind and create an organized, serene environment you'll love to live in!
What is Decluttering?
Decluttering is getting rid of all the crap that has taken over our lives, doesn't have a home, or doesn't serve a purpose for anything. It's just laying around, not serving a purpose. And that's the key part: It's not serving a purpose.
Examples of Clutter:
Random screw in the junk drawer
Power cable you're not sure what it goes to
Email in your spam folder
Thousands of unread emails
There is clutter everywhere in our lives. Everybody has it, and the decluttering process is the process of removing it from our lives in one way, shape, or another, or repurposing it in another way.
Why is it so Important to Declutter?
Decluttering will save you time and money. If you are actively looking to get organized, it is going to save you time and money in the long term if you hire a professional organizer. When we are organizing a space, The sorting and decluttering process takes up the majority of the entire organizing process. That last 20 percent there at the end is all the fun stuff. The product, the labeling, it's all the fun stuff.
What not to do before decluttering:
Trying to Organize
Buying Product
So decluttering not only is going to save you time and money, but it's also going to allow you to create a very functional system. It's setting you up for success. Decluttering also allows room for the other things that are coming into our lives.
How Often Do We Need to Declutter?
We're constantly getting new things in our life. You're constantly bringing in new things between holidays and birthdays and employee appreciation gifts, and there's constantly things coming in not to add your Amazon cart to the list. If we do not get rid of stuff, it starts to become claustrophobic in our lives. Having a lot of clutter can cause a lot of strain on our mental health.
So how often and when? When should you declutter? When it starts to feel full, when you start to feel claustrophobic and anxious, and your brain can literally look around the room and say, oh my god, I need to do A, but I also need to do B, and I need to do C in order to do project one.
So how often and when? When should you declutter? When it starts to feel full, when you start to feel claustrophobic and anxious, and your brain can literally look around the room and say, oh my god, I need to do A, but I also need to do B, and I need to do C in order to do project one.
And so when there's a lot of these steps that our brain needs to do or wants to do, it becomes very difficult to get on board with it. So, we want to do it often, which is why I'm going to tell you every other month, at least. Every other month. Why? Again, holidays, birthdays, crap that we get from our employers, all of that stuff.
Who Should Be Involved?
Who should be involved with the decluttering process? The real quick is the entire family! Involve everybody who has a remote say in that space. Kitchens might be just the wife, but it could be the entire family because if there's teenagers that are using the kitchen or husbands, that's really important.
Children's bedrooms, if the parent is never going in there. It doesn't matter to them. It matters to the kid. I can tell you that right now. It matters to the kid. So that kid needs to be involved
Where Do You Start?
So where should you start? My recommended spot, if you are doing it on your own, is going to be the area that you think is going to be the easiest and quickest to decide on. The sentimental stuff, storage areas, should be one of the last things you really consider. Start flexing your decluttering muscle before you tackle the harder stuff by working on smaller projects first. The smaller the space, the easier/quicker the job.
Great Beginner Decluttering Projects
Bathroom Cabinet
Medicine Cabinet
Linen Closet
Entry Way Closet
Four Steps to Decluttering
Before You Start Decluttering
Plan it - You need to put it in your calendar - google calendar, planner, whiteboard - whatever you use to plan your daily life. If you put it on the calendar, you're more likely to do it!
Have a family conversation about it - It is so important to involve everybody who needs to be involved in this family conversation. Talk about why you're doing it, what are the current problems you have in that certain space, and what your goals are.
Make a goal and write it down - Write your goals down and put it on a paper, put it on the wall where you're going to be organizing.
45 Minute Rule - Work for 45 minutes when you're decluttering and organizing, and then take a 15 minute break. 45 minutes! 15 minute break. That way you're not gonna hit decision fatigue too quickly.
Bonus: Supply List
sticky notes
markers
trash bags
Decluttering Steps
1. Major Sort
Take all of the items, empty everything out sort it into major categories. For example in a kitchen: put all of the utensils together, all of the snacks together, all of the drinks together. We're going to make big, broad categories. This is where the sticky notes and markers come in handy, is writing out what each of these piles are. Do not make any decisions at this point.
2. Minor Sort
Take each of these categories and make them into smaller categories. For example in the kitchen, utensils can be sorted into spatulas, spoons, tongs, snacks can be kid snacks, salty snacks, sweet snacks, fruit snacks, candy, and so on and so forth. Do not make any decisions at this point.
3. Make Decisions
The decision making process is where the trash bags come in. So as you're making decisions, you're going through all these minor categories and you're looking at them and saying, okay, I don't want this. This is either has to be trash, donate, recycle, what have you. And then keep is the stuff that can be kept into the kitchen and organized.
Recap
We've talked about the who (everyone who makes decisions the the space), what (clutter), where (the smallest spaces), when (every other month), and why (saves you money, time, and stress) of decluttering. We also dove into the steps to prepare for decluttering actual steps to decluttering. The two main things I hope you take away from this is do not purchase product until you've decluttered and do not make decisions on anything until after you've completed the second stage of sorting out things. Let me know if you have any questions in the comments!
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