The one thing that will save your sanity (and your wallet) when you start home organization
For many of us, home organizing is a response to some last straw, and we begin it with lots of determination and energy. Then we start to realize just how much stuff there is, and wonder where it all came from. How on earth we are going to make sense of organizing it?
When I moved out on my own 30 years ago, I carried one huge backpack with me. Now, after 1 child, 2 marriages, 3 cats, 4 home businesses, a market garden, and countless hobbies, I have more stuff than I did then. A lot more. Eventually I got to the point – maybe you have too – when I put my foot down and said, “I want an organized home!”
Where will we put it all?
Will we need to…
- buy more storage furniture?
- buy closet organizers?
- move some stuff to a separate storage unit – and pay by the month to keep it there?
- add on to the house – or even buy a bigger one – to have room for it all?
This is starting to sound like a very expensive home organization project!
Then, what happens after we have everything organized and stored away? We still have to keep track of it, keep it clean, maintain it and insure it. And every day, more Stuff keeps on arriving. It’s enough to make you throw up your hands and surrender to chaos.
Don’t give up! There’s one thing you can do which will make organizing the house faster, cheaper and easier:
DECLUTTER FIRST!
Get rid of all the extra stuff – the things you don’t want, don’t like, or don’t need. Then organize the stuff you have left.
Decluttering is simple
But it can have unexpected feelings attached, making it harder to do than it looks. You can get mired in the question of whether to keep or toss little Sally’s grade 2 painting, the wedding gift from Auntie Muriel which you’ve never liked, the pants which almost fit (and would again if you were 5 pounds lighter), the magazines about the hobby-before-last…
Help is available! A good friend to encourage us to toss things is useful “in the moment”, but what’s even more useful in the long run is changing our thinking from the inside, so we can declutter as much as we need to, and then keep our homes - and our lives - clutter free in the long term. Check out these resources and see which would work best for you:
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