Maybe you already know the benefits of being organized and you want to be organized, it’s just tough because you feel like you are disorganized. Well here’s the thing, any person can change at any time. In other words, if you are disorganized but truly want to be organized, all hope is not lost. You just need the right tips and tools to put you on the path to organization.
The Benefits of Being Organized
Being organized can make life easier in a number of ways.
- It can reduce stress when you know where things are at every time you go looking for them.
- With the reduction of stress comes a greater benefit to your overall health.
- When you know where things are at you can get more done in less time.
- You can also reduce the feeling of being overwhelmed.
- Your space reflects your mind and vice versa. Being in an organized space helps promote calm and peace of mind.
- When you get into a routine of organization you can save time and have more time to spend on what is important to you.
- You can also achieve more in less time.
How to Get Organized Even When You’re Not
The good news is that with some easy home organization tips, you can have your home whipped into shape in no time. It may seem like an impossible task right now, but when broken down into smaller projects, organization is inevitable.
Try these simple organization tips:
1. Get rid of your clutter
If you read our post How to Declutter Your Messy Home Office, you may already know how powerful this first step can be. There’s no use in organizing items that you’re not going to keep, so getting rid of them first is a good initial step. It’s best to live by the rule that if you haven’t used an item in over a year and it doesn’t hold sentimental value, you should probably consider letting go of it. You may have read this in the book The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo. Which, PS by the way is a great book to get if you are serious about getting your house under control.
Make piles for trash, donations, and things to sell. You can use websites like eBay or Craigslist to sell unwanted items for extra cash.
2. Start small
It’s important to set small goals for yourself, room-by-room, throughout your house. When you focus on everything as a whole it can get so crazy that it might just seem like a lost cause.
For example, try starting in your bathroom, or better yet, just start by going through the cabinet underneath your bathroom sink. Throw out old items and organize the rest. Afterward, you can call it a day and then work on another small project tomorrow or the next day. Little by little you will clear the clutter and get organized.
As you move to new rooms, maintain the organization of the rooms you’ve already done. You don’t want to complete a few rooms only to find out that your bathroom cabinets are disorganized again.
3. Learn how to store things
Just because you’ve gotten your things out of sight, it doesn’t mean that you’ve got an organizational method. Plan a strategy to store similar things together in marked storage bins. These clear bins from Sterilite are our favorite for under the sink. They are stackable and you can easily see what is inside, or put a label on the plastic container.
You can also benefit from learning how to store things in sight. Make good use of shelves, baskets, or furniture with built-in storage space to keep things neat and where you’re likely to need them.
4. Create a cleaning schedule
Once you have your home in order, it’s all about maintenance. You’ll need to find a way to keep things in order. Make a schedule to keep track of what chores are done and when. You can even schedule in a time to deal with clutter to get everything back into its proper place.
Dividing up the cleaning tasks throughout the week will make it easier to maintain the order you worked so hard to attain. This limits “chore time” to short increments of time. Instead of spending an entire Saturday cleaning, clean a room each day, and then you can have fun on the weekend while your home is still neat and tidy.
Establish the habit of picking up as you go. When you take something out of its place to use it, put it back when you’re done. This is something that is not always easy to teach kids but once the whole family is on board with this notion, it greatly reduces weekly clean-up time.
