There is nothing more frustrating than putting in hours to clean the house, only to find yourself tripping over toys, shoes, random bags and items on the floor. Well, perhaps never being able to find the car keys among the “stuff” all over the tables could be a little worse, but either way, clutter is the worst thing to have to cope with at any point. You feel like you’re continually clearing up, even after you have JUST cleared up. What you need isn’t a cleaner, though. What you need, is the right way to declutter your house.
Your house is supposed to feel like somewhere you want to be. There’s nothing good about being in a house that feels overcrowded, and it’s not always to do with tripping over. Being in a home that has constant clutter is bad for your mental health, and you may not even realise it. The continual mess can put you in a perpetual state of worry and stress, and because life is so busy, you just don’t get the chance to get around to it all to clear it up.
You could spend a lot of time joking about never finding your other shoe, or your scarf in the winter months when it’s cold. It’s not a joke, though, is it? You could achieve so much more if you stopped wasting half your day searching for things and actually were able to get out of the house on time. Think about it: how much time are you spending clearing up and never really getting anywhere? Exactly.
So, you need solutions. You need to be able to declutter and live your life without being a total hoarder all the time. Let’s take a look at some of the tips that could see you decluttered and healthier in no time at all.
Tools For The Job
Before we jump into the decluttering and storage tips, you need to have some tools to get you started. You don’t need anything fancy, but you do need five baskets – or bins if you don’t have baskets – to help you to declutter everything in an organised manner. These are:
- Put Away. These are the things that you need to put away, such as a coffee cup on the table that hasn’t gone back to the kitchen. They have a place to live; they just need to find their way back to their designated spots.
- Recycle. A basket for papers, glass or plastic rubbish to be taken outside to the bins.
- Fix. How many broken toys are laying around? Yeah, these need to be put to one side to be mended.
- Bin. You need to have one basket around the house with you for things that can be binned right away.
- Donations. Old toys, too-small clothes, and any items you don’t want to keep can go in the donations basket.
Five tips for decluttering your home
One Room At A Time
Trying to declutter a house is overwhelming to think about – so don’t think about it. All you’re going to do is freak yourself out and end up on the sofa watching Netflix. The best thing that you could do is take it back a bit and go from one room to the next instead. Starting small can make decluttering so much simpler.
Look at your bathroom and break it down into pieces; medicine cupboards first, then storage cupboards, then towel cupboards. Doing it this way can help you to clear and clean everything thoroughly. The best rule you could stick to? If you haven’t used it in six months, and it doesn’t have sentimental value, it’s time to donate or ditch!
Daily Declutter
Sometimes, even a room at a time can be a little too much of a commitment. Instead, you could go to micro-declutter mode and ditch one item a day. As you come across the toys on the floor, look at them closely: are they broken? Are they old? Are they forgotten about? Decide there and then whether you want to keep hold of the item and dispose of it accordingly.
It’s a challenge to see whether you can stop hiding away things that you don’t even want; stop hiding it all and make some harsh decisions!
Clothing Storage
You need to give yourself a fashion show in the bedroom. Your clothing is going to be harder to store when you fold it because you cannot actually see the items in the drawers and in the wardrobe. So, get some hangers and hang everything up so you can see it properly.
Coats, thick jumpers and even the smaller items all take up a lot of space, and you need to make room rather than take it up. The aim of the game is to free up as much storage space as you can, so hang as many of your things up as possible and watch how much space you afford.
Suck It Up
No, really. Vacuum storage bags are something of a storage tips miracle these days. You need to store large blankets and duvets, but your cupboards are small. Instead of buying smaller items, just make what you have filled a different space. You can switch out seasonal items and blankets and use vacuum bags to reduce the volume of the things that you have in closets.
Use A Self-Storage Unit
Sometimes, you cannot get rid of your own clutter. Boxing up your sentimental items, photo albums, and old toys often mean you’re not decluttering, you’re shifting your stuff elsewhere. Instead, you can rent out a storage unit to store your stuff and keep it, without it being in your face anymore.
Henfield Storage offers flexible storage facilities across Brighton and London, including locations in Chiswick, Wimbledon, Southwark, and Staples Corner, to help you create a clutter-free environment at home.
Whether you need space for seasonal items, sentimental keepsakes, or simply want to organise your living space, our storage solutions make it easy. Call us at 020 3613 4880 to get a quote and let Henfield Storage take the stress out of decluttering in London.
Tips For Decluttering Your Workspace
As you operate your way through your typical business day, your desk is your operating table. If the surgical tools are all over the place, or you can’t find clamps or reach the scalpel quickly and efficiently, things get messy. So, is your home or workplace desk working for you? When you are working on projects, do you feel comfortable and ready to shine? Does your desk make the atmosphere pleasant?
If not, then you should think of how you want to use your desk. While the modern working space continues to evolve depending on current trends and the firm’s culture, you can always declutter your desk to create an optimal working environment.
Know You
When thinking of how to effectively use your desk, you need to understand who you are as well as your workspace.
Why is it so difficult for people to throw stuff out? It’s straightforward, people tend to keep things for sentimental value – like an old clipboard or a coffee mug they got from their first love. To declutter, you need to take a moment and figure out what you want for yourself. Create a mental image of what used to work for you and what currently works for you. If you have anything on your desk that no longer serves any purpose or doesn’t contribute in any way to get you where you want to go, get rid of it. Because if you don’t, it is automatically classified as clutter. So feel free to express yourself.
Clean, Sort & Move
Once you’ve figured out what works for you, get to separating things that you want to keep from those you want to move, toss or donate. When cleaning and sorting things in your office, forget the guilt and be ruthless. If you start beating yourself up about the items you are getting rid of, you will never declutter your working space. If you feel that you can’t help yourself, you can always move them from the office and put them in storage.
But why keep what doesn’t make you genuinely joyful at work, or support your work in any way? To take care of the guilt, jot down a list of items on your desk at the office or in your home office as well as the purpose for each item then move or donate those without a real purpose of benefit.
Keep Things That Make You Feel Energised
Whether it’s at the office or at home, a workspace is more than your office equipment. Ideally, it should be a place that not only cultivates a conducive working atmosphere but also brings you joy, happiness, comfort and motivates you to work.
You’ve probably heard about it, and yes it’s true, a cluttered workspace undermines people’s working morale and negatively affects productivity. As US and UK best selling author Marie Kondo, a tidying and decluttering guru, puts it on the KonMari method: Only keep things on the desk that “spark joy.” Note that “joy” is being used not to refer to actual joy, but rather office items that have a purpose in your perspective or those that motivate you and make you feel energised.
Trust Your Instincts & Check Out Rearranging Options
When it comes to decluttering your office, it all comes down to your first instincts. There must be some items that you already have in mind for moving or tossing out. Once you take care of these items, your mind with automatically refresh and help you spot other items that previously might have been hard to get rid of or donate.
Therefore, always try to follow and trust your instincts when decluttering. After you’ve tossed out all the unnecessary things from your office, revisit your layout. Maybe there’s a smarter way to configure your office space; this is the time to designate particular spaces on your desk or in the office for particular items.
Make Decluttering A Habit
How do you make your workspace clutter-free? Often, people think that decluttering an office is a one-time thing. However, it’s not. Therefore, it is imperative that you put cleaning and decluttering on your calendar. Because when you do, it becomes a habit and can be considered a long-term commitment. Even after a major purge, don’t forget about regular decluttering.
Decluttering should be a weekly, monthly or at the very least an annual task to keep your office neat and inspiring. After all, you want your desk and office space to keep working for you all year-round.
Don’t Bring Clutter Into the Office
So, your children make you a bracelet every weekend. Of course, you love your children, and while a bracelet made by your little princess on the desk will always bring a smile on your face and keep you energised, don’t overdo it.
In other words, you don’t necessarily have to bring everything your child gives you to the office. Do you bring things that serve no purpose in your office? If so, it’s time to stop. Be selective and cognizant of the things you bring to your workspace at home or at the office to make your desk more conducive for increased productivity.
Label! Label! Label!
Never underestimate the power of the label. If you opt to label, not only will it be easy for you to distinguish useful items from useless items on your desk, but you will also find things faster. Whether it’s a pen holder, a paper punch or a file, you’ll want to label them to save time that would have otherwise been wasted looking for misplaced items. Moreover, it’s easier to declutter when you have everything on your desk labelled.
Preventing clutter
Once you’ve been through the arduous, but extremely cathartic process of decluttering, it’s wise to make an effort to stay on top of tidying and putting things away to prevent another clutter volcano from erupting. A tidy home makes for a tidy mind, they say, so try and get into a habit of tidying up at the end of each day, and making use of the storage you have available. Don’t be a hoarder, and learn to let go of anything you know you’re not going to need or use. Make regular trips to the tip, and think about paying for extra storage if you’ve downsized or moved house and changed the style of your decor.
If you’re planning to redecorate, and you find that storage is still a problem even after intensive decluttering, look into furniture that offers additional storage and search for innovative ideas online. It is possible to prevent clutter even in the most compact and bijou spaces.
