Home is a place where we should feel good, cozy, comfortable and relaxed. But do you recall the last time you felt annoyed by scattered things or inability to find something exactly the moment when you are in a hurry? If that memory is fresh or that happens to you quite occasionally, you might need to reorganize the space in your home. Although organizing is not the most exciting activity, by optimizing your home space you may save an enormous amount of time on cleaning and looking for things.In this post you will find several principles which can be taken as a guidance for optimizing your home space.
1. Declutter your home
Get rid of the things you do not wear or do not like - if you do not use something or do not like it, why to have it at all? Allow yourself to be picky about the items in your home - you really want to be careful about what you allow into your home. By doing this, you may get much more space in your home. If the things are still in a very good condition, think of giving them to a charity organization or putting them into a donation box - in this way you can help other people as well as serve the environmental protection goal.
Still not sure what should be given away? Any good professional organizer will suggest you to get rid of any garment or home appliance which you have not been using at least once over the last 12 months or longer. If there is an item you have not used even once over the last 12 months but you are still hesitant to give it away, put in the box “Donate later”, seal it, and mark the date an come back in a year - if you have not opened that box by that time, you can safely give that box away without peeking inside.
Another useful advice you can get from professional organizers is taking inventory of your possessions - that may help you track what you have and what you actually do not need. The other tip could be also placing a donation or recycling bin somewhere around - it will remind you to give away the things you do not want to have rather than to cluster them around.
While talking about decluttering it is impossible to skip the topic of shopping. Shopping can be a fun and relaxing activity, but you can still make sure you do not overfill your closet by applying the rule “One in - one out”. This rule means if you buy a new T-shirt or a new pair of jeans, then you have to donate one item from your wardrobe to make space for a new purchase.
2. Make it comfortable
Comfort should be your first priority. Just to give you a couple of examples. Firstly, put the things where you use them. It does not make sense to put a hairdryer in the bedroom if you use it in the bathroom the most. Secondly, it is better to place those things which are used very often to the same or designated spots for them. For example, it makes sense to have a hook for door keys close to the door - when you are leaving your house you just need to stretch your hand and close the door rather than run around the flat in a search for keys.
Those things you use the most should be in plain sight and easiest to reach, while things you use once in a while can be put in the lower or upper shelves and it is okey if reaching them will require a ladder. If we move to the kitchen, those boxes you use the most should be placed in the first row as in such a case the probability of making a mess or not putting the box back to their places is much lower. Here it is important to take into account not only your habits, but also the habits of your partner or other family members. Suppose you are a coffee lover, but your partner is a tea lover, then in this case it makes sense to put in the first row not only coffee, but rather both: coffee and tea.
You can also achieve comfortability by making it easier to put things away. For example, it will be counterproductive to hide your laundry basket in the back of the closet. Open containers for such things as toiletries and cooking supplies are the best choice in making it easier to put them away. The rule here is simple: “The fewer steps, the better is your organisation system”.
3.Place like things with like things
If the things are ordered by category, alikeness or designation, you will know where the things are and will not spend time looking for them. Among the thematics the following could be mentioned: sport equipment or clothes, bed and bathroom textile, home appliances, Christmas decorations, etc. You can also put further away the seasonal clothes you are currently not wearing - your wardrobe will look neater although the number of items will not change. Even sorting the current seasonal clothes by category (think of such categories as the trousers, shirts, dresses, suites, T-shirts or sweaters) will make a huge difference.
4. Use organizers
In many home goods stores, you can find a variety of organizers or containers for shoes, cosmetics, underwear, bathroom and kitchen accessories, stationery, toys and other small things. These can be plastic or wooden organizers, boxes, wicker baskets, textile bags and sacks. It might also be a good idea to label such organizers as boxes and sacks - if you look for something later on, you will not need to open every single box while looking for something specific.
Deep drawers are not your friends — not now, not ever — unless you're storying hoodies and sweaters. The smaller the drawers, the easier they are to organize and categorize. But organizers again can help you here - a deep drawer can be separated in several sections or categories by organizers. If you are still in search of new furniture, pay more attention to shallower drawers.
5. Tackle one space at a time
As organizing can be time consuming, exhausting and frankly speaking boring or even stressful exercise, experts suggest to start small and tackle one space of your home at a time. Start with making a prioritized to-do list. It will make a huge impact on your day-to-day life if you start with the place you use the most. After feeling and experiencing all the benefits of having this place well organized, you will get more motivation to move to other areas on your list.
You might also think of blocking time if organizing a given place will take quite a bit of time - if you do not finish arranging things and will need to run let’s say to pick up your children from school, you will have to come back tomorrow and may feel a bit more stressed or frustrated about this. On the contrary, if you finish everything in one day, you will feel very satisfied and proud of yourself.
6. Pay attention to order every day
Do not get scared right away - you do not need to do that for hours per day. All you need is to do little here and there, and your home will always look organized. Given that we are still in the pandemic, many of us fully or partially work from home. Life coaches advise working from home people to take 5-10 minutes breaks regularly to avoid burnout and stay productive - you can use those breaks to declutter things in your home.
If you used your extra blanket or a coffee tray, or whatever else you are not using anymore, put it back to the place it belongs to. Not putting things back right away is the biggest reason for cluttering - simply because you will have a million things to do “later”. Remember that postponing tasks can make you feel overloaded, overwhelmed and exhausted. You will get a lot of mental benefits by finishing tasks, which will not take you more than 5-10 minutes - and it does not matter whether it is putting things to their spots or something else.
The psychologists also advise to consider where the cluttering is coming from. The truth is that sometimes the clutter might be happening in our heads when we are not focusing on the tasks at hand. For example, when there is a lot going on with work or school, we might not be giving ourselves enough mental space to process it all. In such a situation, you should start giving yourself little breaks - both mental and physical.
7. Check your system
After finishing your organization, it is also worth checking whether the system you created is easy to sustain: is it logical to look for a thing in a spot you placed it? can you find and reach the things you use the most often fast and easily? are the things you use the least often taken further away (like on the top shelves)?
If you notice that your home still gets messy very fast, you might think on how to improve your organization system or maybe start paying more attention to putting things to places they belong to right after you used them. You may also need to give a second thought of whether you do not need to get rid of some of the things.
8. Make it beautiful
This is the last, but not least item - you want your home to look neat, comfortable, beautiful and cosy. For example, you can use colorful folders to sort your papers or put a pot with a plant on that coffee table in order to avoid cluttering it with papers. And remember, your beautiful and well organized home will not only save your time, but will also make you feel happier and improve your wellbeing.
Photo by Farah
