2 Simple Questions to Ask When Decluttering Your Home
When decluttering your home, these 2 simple questions can make your job easier.
The thought of decluttering makes me a little twitchy.
I absolutely hate the effects of clutter in my life and in my home, but decluttering always seems like such a huge undertaking.
Since clutter won’t magically disappear on its own, though, I end up feeling trapped. I don’t want to live with clutter, so I have to take the time and energy to get rid of it.
When I finally do set aside time to tackle a whole house clutter, I always discover that I’ve made my homemaking easier.
How to make YOUR homemaking easier
If your home is full of stuff, all of that stuff is actually adding to your housework. Your belongings get cluttered. They need organized. All of your stuff takes up space. And it demands your time.
It’s tempting to try to tame all of the clutter, in the “I just need to get around to organizing it” mindset. And plenty of businesses have started just to help you become a better organizer.
But all of the organizing and storage in the world will not help the underlying problem.
Your problem is clutter.
You can go ahead and breathe a sigh of relief, because your solution to easier homemaking isn’t found in organizing tricks or storage solutions. It completely revolves around getting rid of the extra stuff in your home.
The gift of decluttering
Call it decluttering or purging or just making your home manageable, one of the biggest secrets to cutting back on your homemaking efforts and time spent cleaning is to get rid of what’s unnecessary.
If and when you know you need to start decluttering your home, it’s important to ask yourself two questions with absolutely everything you own:
- Do I love this?
- Do I need this?
If you can answer yes to either question, then keep your belonging.
If your answer’s no, though, then it’s time to pass it along to someone else.
You’ll find that you may not love every single thing you own – and that’s OK. But if you need something – or know that you will need it – then keep it.
How to start decluttering your home
While these two questions are simple enough to ask and may be simple enough to answer, the big trick is found in taking the time to go through all of your belongings.
Before you get overwhelmed by the thought of this, take a deep breath. Then pick one room to start in. (You may want to choose your messiest room or your cleanest.)
Once you’ve picked the room to begin decluttering, pick one area. Personally, I like to start in a corner, and then eventually work my way around in a circle.
Now that you’ve picked your area, start sorting everything you own. It can be easy to start with one drawer or one tabletop. Start in one small spot and go through absolutely everything asking yourself if you love it or need it.
If you do love or need it, put what you’re keeping where it all belongs. And if you don’t love or need it, put it in a pile to give away. Or, if something is unusable, throw it away.
Once you finish your first decluttering task
Once you finish the small area you’re working on, move on to the next area in your room – and the next and the next.
Work for as long as you can. If you only have 5 minutes available in your day, use those five minutes to work hard and fast. If you have 45 minutes on another day, use that chunk of time.
If you keep working on this room – since clutter won’t magically disappear on its own – you’ll eventually finish decluttering your room. When you do, celebrate … and enjoy your accomplishment!
Then, the next day, move on to the next room and repeat the process.
If, for some miraculous reason, you have days or weeks to set aside and work through this process, then your decluttering will be finished a lot quicker.
By repeating this decluttering process, you’ll methodically work your way around your home.
Before you know it, your home will be decluttered. And your home will be filled with things you know that you need … or love.
The Decision to Declutter
After I got sick enough of clutter, I went on a massive two-month purging spree. Since I’m confident I’m not the only one dealing with a clutter monster, I created the 14 Days to a Cleaner Home program as a result.
Through the 14 Days to a Cleaner Home, I’ll walk you through room by room, project by project, so you can strategically declutter areas of your home over 14 days.
14 Days to a Cleaner Home focuses on a different area each day. Every day I’ll e-mail a decluttering project that will help guide you through the entire process. The time you spend on this each day depends entirely on how much clutter you have – some areas may take longer to declutter than others.
To take control of the clutter in your home and life, click here to join 14 Days to a Cleaner Home!
What tricks help you when you’re decluttering your home?
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All images courtesy of Unsplash and Pixabay.
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