How to Tackle Clean Out Projects
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How To Organize
My 9 year old niece slept over a few weeks ago, and several times throughout the weekend, she asked the definition to words my husband and I used which she didn’t know the meaning. It made me think of the definition of the word ORGANIZE. The Merriam-Webster dictionary definition is, “to arrange or order things so that they can be found or used easily and quickly : to put things into a particular arrangement or order”. I have found in working as a Certified Professional Organizer® that each individual I work with, has a clear idea of the definition of the word organize, but they struggle with how to achieve it. I think much of the struggle lies in the misconceptions of what it takes to become organized.
The first misconception is that we are either born an organized person or we are not. This is incorrect. There is no organizing gene. Organizing is a skill, like playing a musical instrument, typing, golf, knitting. To learn and improve skills, we sign up for classes. We work with an instructor one-on-one. We most certainly expect to practice our new skill. This is what’s most required with the skill of organizing. What will happen if we spend 20 minutes a day practicing organizing? Would we improve our organizing skill? I challenge you to do it, and let me know what happens.
The second misconception is that we can become organized by buying the “right” containers. Organizing is not product. It is action. Although organizing products and tools can facilitate the organizing process, the act of doing makes it work. The three most important actions that are required in organizing are:
- deciding whether to keep something,
- deciding where to put it,
- putting it in the same spot again, and again, and again.
These three action steps are what we do to practice organizing. Again, I challenge you to do it, and let me know what happens.
The third misconception is that we can organize just once and be done with it. Unfortunately, organizing is like dishes and laundry. It doesn’t go away, and it needs to be maintained or the disorder grows. It is important to reclaim order before clutter piles up and things get out of control. I recommend spending at least 15 minutes a day reclaiming order. Again, I challenge you to do it, and let me know what happens.
If you struggle with how to organize, take a closer look at these misconceptions. Do you practice organizing? Do you take action through decision making and putting things in the same spot? Do you give yourself time to reclaim order? What would change if you took steps to disprove these misconceptions? Want to find out?
© April 2016 Janine Cavanaugh, Certified Professional Organizer® All rights reserved
Lost & Found Box
Establish a lost and found box for small items that you come across while organizing and cleaning up. This way you’ll have a home for found parts to a game, pieces to a toy, buttons, screws, pens, lose change, etc. Once a month empty out the lost and found box and put items where they belong or toss them.
10 Points on Which I Agree With Marie Kondo
The popular book by Marie Kondo, “The Life-Changing Magic of Tiding Up” has been a topic of many discussions between my Professional Organizer colleagues and myself. I found that I agree with many of Marie Kondo’s points, as long as you substitute the word organizing in place of the word tidying. Here is a list of 10 points on which I agree:
- In most societies tidying (i.e. organizing) is the job that keeps the home livable, but is not taught because of the misconception that the ability to tidy (i.e. organizing) is acquired through experience and doesn’t require training. I agree with this point, because organizing is a skill that needs to be taught, learned, and, most of all, practiced.
- Effective tidying (i.e. organizing) is discarding and deciding where to store things. I agree with this point, because organizing is action. It’s discarding, in a timely manner, what is no longer wanted, needed, or used. It’s also deciding where to put things, and returning those things to the same spot every time they are used.
- Tidying (i.e. organizing) is a dialogue with one’s self. I agree with this point, because when we perform the actions of organizing, discarding and deciding, we have internal dialogues with ourselves.
- Focus more on what you want to keep in your life and space than on what you want to get rid of. I agree with this point, because it’s easier to make decisions when we focus on what’s important to us and worth keeping in our lives and spaces.
- It’s easy to part with things where there is an obvious reason for doing so, but it’s much more difficult when there is no compelling reason. I agree with this point, because we often hold onto things out of indecision or obligation.
- Sometimes never comes. I agree with this point, because when we use the word “sometimes” it is most likely an excuse. The phrases, “I might need that sometime.” or “I might use that sometime.”, are excuses to keep an item, instead of accepting that we don’t need it, and that it is time to let it go.
- If you have lived in Japan or USA all your life, you have almost certainly been surrounded by more than you need. I agree with this point, because it’s estimated that the amount of unopened merchandise in an average American home is $7,00.00.
- Clutter is cause by a failure to return things to where they belong. Therefore storage should reduce the effort needed to put things away, not the effort to get them out. I agree with this point, because more people have trouble putting things away than they do in getting them out.
- Discarding hones one’s decision-making skills. I agree with this point, because practice improves the skill of organizing.
- Tidying (i.e. organizing) ought to be the act of restoring balance among people, their possessions, and the house they live in. I agree with this point, because it has been proven that organized people are less stressed.
©March 2016 Janine Cavanaugh, Certified Professional Organizer® All Rights Reserved
Attack Clutter
Organizing is action and clutter is unfinished action. To prompt yourself to take action and attack clutter, use bright colored sticky notes to tag the clutter with the action that is needed to make it go away. Then give yourself time to follow through with the action step that’s written on the sticky note.
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