As a professional organizer I am always telling people it is simple to organize clutter when they have a home for everything and when that item is not being used to put it back in its home. This is great advice and will help organizing clutter much simpler as there won’t be as much clutter to organize. It is advice I am still trying to master myself and teach my own family.
But I tell you no matter how great the advice is some people just don’t get it. I am talking about anonymous members of my own family. I was getting some cereal out of the cupboard and there were two flashlights in front of one of the boxes. We do keep one flashlight there in case of emergency, but not two. I recognized the one as belonging in the hall cupboard. It took only a few seconds to put it in its place but if it would have been put back in the first place it would have saved me time and energy. I’m glad there wasn’t an emergency where we needed it quickly.
I suspect we are all in the habit of “putting it here for now”. I am guilty of doing this too. I was putting some embroidery floss away in the room where it belongs. But I stopped short of putting it where it actually belonged by about 5 little feet. Instead I laid it on a flat surface to be put away later. (Shame on me)
This happens all the time because we have the misguided notion that it takes too long to put the item where it belongs. Or we feel we are rushed or want to get on to the next thing we are planning on doing.
There is a simple and really easy way to organize clutter:
· Break the habit of “just putting it here for now”. Often when we get back to the item we can’t even find it because of all the clutter that has been piled on top of it by the time we get back to it. The couple of seconds it takes to put items where they belong saves a lot of time and frustration later.
· When you come home from the store take the few minutes to put the purchases away so other “stuff” doesn’t start piling up with your new things. This happened to me the other day. We bought 10 cake mixes (they were having a screaming deal) and we left them in the sack they came in and put them on the floor right inside the front door. Before I knew it there were shoes keeping the mixes company, a sack full of stuff needing to go to the shed and some cans of corn. All of this had become a clutter magnet. Just putting them away where they belonged would have been the wise choice to organize clutter.
· Designating a place to store items we bring into our homes is one key to organizing clutter. If they don’t have a place to go they pile up, decisions are postponed—and the decisions have to be made sometime so it might as well be made before the items become a clutter magnet. Designate a place for everything. This saves us the time of having to figure out where to put (or store) the item later.
·When you see something out of place in your home put it away then rather than letting it start a pile, and letting it take your time later as you are searching for the item.
· When shopping think ahead to where you will put the item when you get home. If you don’t have a place for it or can’t think where you will put it then maybe you’ll decide not to buy it.
· Catch yourself setting something down instead of putting it away. When you do this you can change your action right then.
When we break the habit of just “putting it here for now” and instead put it away we will create new and better habits which makes organizing clutter simple and easy.
Marilyn is a professional organizer who works with women and seniors in clearing clutter and providing organizing tips. Visit her website www.marilynbohn.com for free organizing tips on her blogs, articles and videos.
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