A Tip For Staying Positive About Your Organizing Projects

I stay positive and focused on my daily organizing goals even if I have a day with many unexpected interruptions.  

Make Room in Your Home for the Important Things

The key to all of this is to have a serious plan about what it is you want from your home and your life and how you can best design your décor and your set-up to make that possible. Too often, our homes get in the way of what we want to do and make it harder for us to be effective and productive.

In fact, our homes should be enablers and facilitators that make what we want to achieve that much easier. So where does this discrepancy come from? Why do so many of us fail to have congruence between what we want to achieve and the layout of our homes? The answer is simple: too many of us just don’t know what we want; not just from our décor but also from life in general.

And again, marketing and media in general are largely influential, as we are constantly being shown different ideals and different ways of living – and hinting that they are the very best way for us to enjoy our own lives. We can end up being pulled in absolutely every direction by a hundred different marketing messages and a hundred different desires. We never feel quite satisfied with anything meanwhile, because we’re constantly being told that something else is the key to happiness.

As they say: if you don’t stand for something, you may fall for anything! Instead, have a motive about what it is you really want to achieve in life and how you want to get there. If you can do this, then you may come away with a simple mission statement and you can then go about designing a house to help you accomplish that mission statement. Of course, this might turn out to be more than one thing. But the idea is to know who you are, what’s important to you and how you’re going to serve that goal.

Turning Your Home Into a Means to an End 

For example, let’s say that after a lot of reflection, you realize that the things that really matter to you are your family and your love of music. This makes for a very simple and straightforward décor. You will probably want to create a space where you and your family can spend time together – perhaps a media room where you can all relax on a big sofa and watch TV or perhaps a big dining room where you can enjoy big meals together. And you might also make a music room. Or just decorate your room with things that speak to your love of music.

Now, when making buying decisions or thinking about how to design your room, you should always stop and ask yourself if it will really help you to enjoy those things more, or if it will just get in the way of them. Will it really bring you happiness? Will it make more work for you, so you actually spend less time doing the things you love? Will it distract from what you already have, or diminish from it? With this mentality, you’ll no longer be swayed by marketing because no marketing will be directed at you precisely. You have your own vision of what your home should be and now nothing should be able to move you away from that.

How to Fight the Urge to Buy Unnecessary Clutter

Run through these mental questions whenever you’re considering a new purchase and think about how it is going to fit into your lifestyle on a daily basis. Where will it go? How will it look next to the last thing you purchased? At the same time, try to be savvy to the tricks that advertisers may use to try and get us to buy things we don’t need. In particular, always make sure that you take some time out before choosing to buy something.

The vast majority of purchases are made based on an emotional impulse and this is what can cause us to become impulsive. If you go away and think logically about what you need and what you don’t, you’ll often find you are a lot smarter with your purchases as a result. 

A List of Things to Do 

A helpful habit in the fight against needing to keep buying new things and a good way to practice the concepts discussed in this chapter, is to make a list of things that you want to do – using items you already have, or without needing to buy anything new. This might sound like something you shouldn’t need… Surely you already know the things you want to do! But the reality is that we often forget.

Most of us have lots of books on our bookshelf that we have yet to read, games we never finished playing and even films that we haven’t watched! And these days, you can download books for free, play games for free and more.

Then there are the activities we never seem to have time for that might be to do with our hobbies or just getting our lives straight. Maybe you’ve been meaning to go for a drive, maybe you’ve been meaning to build some furniture, or maybe you like the idea of trying to learn another language.

And yet, when you get a free hour you forget all these things and end up just lying in front of the TV. And when you see something else advertised, you suddenly want to buy it. Why are you buying a new book, game or DVD when there is so much that you already own that you have yet to use? Why are you saving money to buy a big swimming pool when you’ve never been out to your local park? Or checked out the free museum down the road?

Having a list of ideas for your evening’s entertainment can really change this. The next time you’re bored, you can simply check your list for ideas of things to do. The next time you are tempted to buy something new, check the list and realize that you have plenty to be excited about without spending more money or cluttering your home. Stay focused and make a home that helps you achieve your mission!

Tips for Differing Standards of Tidiness within a Household

Family life and having roommates are both rewarding, but each can also be a challenge at times. One of these times is when you are trying to find a balance between keeping everyone happy in areas where they differ.

When some members of your household are neat freaks, and others are more suited to audition for a hoarding television show, it is not an easy task for everyone to live together. Here are some tips on how your household members of various levels of organization can dwell peacefully together.

Have a Group Meeting

The most important tip on how to negotiate this dilemma is to keep your lines of communication open. Hold regular meetings to discuss the issue. Make it a time where everyone can input and try to keep it light-hearted and as fun as possible.

Decide on Common Goals

Although some family members or roommates may be drastically more or less comfortable with disorganization than others, there are sure to be some common goals you can all agree on. Some of these might be to have a regular group clean-up time, or to keep the living room clean since this is where your visitors spend most of their time when they are over. Choose deadlines that everyone can agree on, and talk about a minimum level of cleanliness that everyone agrees is important.

Decide on a Reasonable Compromise

Perhaps the messiest individual of the group simply may not be able to stay consistently organized, nor leave things spotless all the time. Maybe as a group you could choose certain rooms that need to be tidy, and others that are not so important.

Bedrooms are generally an area where organization can be left to one’s personal choice. This way, if someone has items that need to be put away but they don’t have time to do so immediately when they return home, they know that they can put the bags in their own room or another appointed "messy zone" until they have the time for it.

Make other compromises such as letting family members or roommates switch their cleaning duties with someone else if they are running late from work or have an especially busy day ahead of them.

Let Each Person’s Strength Be Highlighted

No two people are alike, even in the same family. Everyone has different strengths, and this can be capitalized on when you are creating your cleaning schedule. Perhaps one of the household members loves cleaning the kitchen after supper, while another prefers more time-consuming but less frequent tasks such as vacuuming. Create the schedule to cater to everyone’s likes, dislikes and natural abilities.

It can be a challenge to live with someone who is at the opposite end of the spectrum when it comes to household organization, but there is no need to let it destroy your relationships or living arrangements. Stay focused on what you love about each of your roommates, whether it be family or friends. Appreciation for each other and a commitment to working together will help you to live in harmony while taking responsibility together for the home you live in.

 

Planning Baby Steps For Getting Your Home Organized

You can increase your productivity dramatically by simply organizing your belongings in your home. I will describe important tools to help you when deciding on your goals to organize your life. 

The first major step is to create a plan. There is nothing that is more essential to achieving your goals than having a good plan. Often times, people set nonrealistic goals when first embarking on changing any area of their life.   

In order for your organizing plan to work successfully you need to have understandable, realistic goals that are individualized and written out. It is a good idea to set long and short-term goals. For example, your long-term goal could be getting your total home organized in one year's time. Your short-term goal could be getting one room in order within a month. 

After you have your goals defined, write them down on paper and put that paper in a place where you can view it often throughout the week. This should easily motivate you to achieve your goals.

Lastly, you need to determine why you want your house to be organized. It is helpful for you to know why you have this desire. 

While the above ideas may seem simplistic, it is amazing how many people set out to achieve positive changes in life without knowing what they specifically want to get done. The simplest and strongest force to achieving your goals is knowing where you are going and the reasons why you are going in that direction. Hopefully, if you follow these tips you will organize your life better than you ever thought possible.

Positive Benefits of Home Organization and Decluttering Your House

I would like to begin by telling you a little information about myself. I am a Registered Nurse and I also earned by diploma in medical transcription.

I have several years of nursing experience and I even had the wonderful opportunity to write and teach a few online medical assisting courses on the junior college academic level.

However, I have always had a great passion for organizing my house. I studied many resources about home organization. There is so much helpful information to learn. I decided to continue to pursue my interest in this field. I studied online and now I am a trained Professional Organizer. I successfully completed a Professional Organizing program and I enjoyed my training very much. 

Now that you are a little more familiar with my training, we will get onto our topic of decluttering the house. I would like to emphasize that I do not believe there is just "one" successful method to organize and declutter your home. 

I think it is extremely important for you to educate yourself about home organization and decluttering the house and decide on specific "organizing systems" that will work well for your individual lifestyle and family. Always remember that good organizational habits can be learned.

I have a question for everyone reading my blog today. What is clutter?

• Clutter is anything in your home or office that does not serve a purpose or function in your life anymore.
• Clutter may include items in your home that are broken or nonfunctional.
• Clutter may be material items in your home that you do not need or love.
• Clutter could also include unnecessary duplicate items in your home.
• You may be surprised to realize that having too many storage containers that aren't actually being used in your home may add to your existing clutter problem. That is the main reason it may be suggested that you declutter your home "first." Then it should be easy to figure out exactly how many storage boxes to buy and specific sizes you may need.
• Clutter could also consist of accumulated items of trash to be thrown away or removed in an appropriate manner. 

Now that we know what clutter is, why do you think our homes accumulate clutter?

• Clutter may be caused be delayed decisions.
• You haven't taken the time to decide on appropriate areas to keep your specific items in your home.
• Procrastination: maybe you feel overwhelmed about organizing or decluttering your house.
• You may be experiencing that frustrating "all or nothing" feeling about home organization. For example: you may think to yourself, "I will never have enough time to get my organizing projects done. There is just too much to do. So, why should I even start?"
• Maybe you have a very busy family schedule and you haven't been using a good weekly/monthly planner for routine chores/tasks in the home.
• Possibly the family doesn't realize your home organization goals and you may get easily distracted with many interruptions throughout the day. It may be very helpful for you to communicate your short-term and long-term organizing goals with your family. You may decide to have family members participate in your plan. This may be especially important in helping to keep your home maintained after you have everything set up the way you like it.
• You may have felt the lack of energy or motivation to complete organizing projects in the past.
• Often times, a major lifestyle change may cause a change in the normal flow of organization in your home. Here are a few examples: a birth or a death in the family, new marriage or a divorce, job relocation or health problems.

How can clutter affect your life in a negative way?

• Clutter can take up lots of extra space in a home. Think of how much more additional space you may have available after you get rid of any unnecessary clutter.
• You may be using a lot of your valuable time to take care of all the material things in your house.
• You could be spending extra money for duplicate items that you have been purchasing because you haven't been able to find the things that you were looking for in your house.
• Many people say they lack energy because they are tired of maintaining all the material things they have accumulated over the years.
• They don't have enough time to take good care of themselves or to enjoy their favorite hobbies and outlets.

What are the positive benefits of home organization and decluttering your house?

• You will be able to focus on things that you enjoy such as: exercise, hobbies, good nutrition, etc.
• You may find that you have more time to spend with family and friends.
• Hopefully, you won't have the need to purchase unnecessary items because you will have easy access to your items and be able to find everything when you need it. You will learn how to find "the right place for everything in your home."
• You may really enjoy the big bonus of having more space in your home once you get rid of your clutter.
• An organized house, free of clutter, may help you save time when you need to do your routine daily/weekly household chores.
• I find that I focus and concentrate better and feel more productive and less stress with work when my house and office are organized.
• You may increase your confidence to invite your friends over to your home again.

This is a wonderful video titled:

"How to Organize Your Home: Organizational Expert Alejandra Costello's House Tour"