The question I asked myself over and over again this morning was: What shall I do with all this clutter?  I was faced with the task of sorting out the spare room in my house, otherwise known as the study or guest bedroom, which has been a mess for a while. 

Clutter filled every corner, surface and most of the floor.  Having been on ‘holiday at home’ this week, my plan was to tackle just one room a day so that I could spend the rest of each day relaxing and being with the family.  I started the week with the ‘easier to tidy’ rooms, but today this particular room finally got to me!

Putting off tackling the clutter

Whenever I take time off I’m faced with this scenario – same clutter, different room.  I knew that this time I wanted to tackle it differently, not shuffle things around putting them in a neater pile or different box AND I wanted to do it quickly. 

Yesterday, I sat in the room and had a look around, remembering a conversation that I had with my parents that morning.  We were talking about how long it takes to sort through belongings that have ended up in the spare room (or junk room) and how each item needs a decision.

It suddenly hit me (I love ‘ah ha’ moments) – I was putting off this onerous task because I didn’t know what to do with the stuff (which is mostly mine I might add – I’m a bit of a hoarder).  I also find it hard to make decisions about whether I want to keep something or not.  I decided that I had two choices: do it the short way to get the stuff out of my space, or do it the long way which I knew I didn’t want to face right now.

The short way – I would pick up each item and ask myself one just question:  Do I want this item to stay in the house? If the answer was no, it would go in a box marked ‘garage’ (unless I had the confidence to throw it straight in a rubbish sack).  I would also put a date on the box(es) one year from now and if I end up not looking in them in that time, I would get rid of the items somehow (that scares me just writing it!).

The long way – I would pick up each item and ask myself four questions.  Do I want this item in the house? Do I want to sell this item?  Do I want to give this item to charity? Does this item need fixing?  (Obviously the rubbish bag is present for things I know I don’t want).  I’d then deal with each category accordingly.

My goal

To have a tidy and uncluttered room by the time I picked the kids up from school. Scenario one seemed achievable in the two to three hours that I had allocated.  To go with scenario two was a much bigger beast.

I went with scenario one.

The result

Within one hour I had boxed and bagged up so much stuff and before I even had time to think about it, I took it all to the garage.  This motivated me to do the next step – to reorganise the remaining items.

Making the decision to go with scenario one helped me get started and allowed me to achieve what I wanted to do in just 3 hours (before and after pictures to be added at a later date if I’m brave enough!).  I now have a clear space and a clear mind.

What clutter challenges do you face?

Until next time…

Sandra

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