Declutter and keep your home free of excess

After a holiday of giving and receiving gifts, your home might be feeling more cluttered than usual. Many of us desire a more organized home but have a hard time purging items. The following tips will help you declutter and simplify your life moving forward.

Identify the benefits of purging before you start

If purging excess items was easy, none of us would have clutter. Before you begin a decluttering, consider the benefits:

• Less time spent cleaning
• Less time searching for lost, disorganized items
• Reduced stress
• Gain mental clarity and focus

If you lose momentum while purging, stay on task by reminding yourself of these benefits.

Begin with simple tasks 

One of the easiest ways to start purging is to eliminate duplicate items. If you’ve lived in your home for a while or have merged households with another person, you may have duplicates of several items. How many bath towels do you really need? Do you need two sets of measuring cups?

Separate sentimental items

One thing that’s halted many decluttering efforts are sentimental items, such as photos and things associated with memories. If you come across items that evoke emotional ties, set them aside in a box and sort through them later.

When you get back to sentimental items, separate them out into your favorites and least favorites. This can make it easier to let some things go. Also, consider taking a picture of an item to keep the memory before letting it go.

Let go of things that aren’t used

Ask these two questions about items in your home: When was the last time I used this? Do I really need it?

If it’s been more than a year since you’ve used something, it’s a good candidate for letting it go. However, documents such as passports and birth certificates may not have been used in the last year, but should be kept.

Be realistic about things in need of repair

Many of us hold on to things we intend to repair or repurpose. The problem is that oftentimes we never get around to it and these items clutter our spaces. If these things were truly meaningful, wouldn’t you have fixed them by now? Let go of things that are in need of repair.

Give some items an expiration date

As you declutter, you may come across things that are difficult to label as “keep” or “toss.”

Designate a box for “undecided” items and mark it with an expiration date. Consider labeling it as follows. “Toss if not used by __(pick a date three, six, or twelve months in the future)____.”  Mark the expiration date on your calendar. If you haven’t needed anything in the box by the time the date arrives, toss or donate the entire box. Do not look inside. Just let it go.

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