Tips and Tricks to Get (and Stay) Organized
Looking to start fresh this year and truly get organized? Many of us want to have a more balanced, orderly system but it can be hard to maintain throughout the year. We know everyone has to find what works for them, so here are four tips and tricks that we hope will help you.
Tip 1: Declutter
2020 impacted us in a variety of ways. Some of us picked up new hobbies, some of us left terrible habits behind, and some of us might have reinvented ourselves entirely. Start 2021 by decluttering your home to create space for a more organized environment, and to leave room for all the hope and possibilities that come with a new year. Marie Kondo, the author of the best-selling book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, employs a decluttering method that has gained mass popularity worldwide.
In the “KonMari Method,” you start decluttering by category rather than location. She recommends starting with clothing then moving onto books, papers, miscellaneous items, and finally, sentimental items. The next step is to identify items that are no longer needed. Marie Kondo advises that you only keep the things that spark joy and discard the ones that don’t. You then end the decluttering session by thanking those items for their service and letting them go. Not only does
Kondo have philosophies for decluttering, but she also has dozens of tips on how to
optimize spaces for efficiency while preserving the aesthetic of your household.
Tip 2: Buy or Create Excellent Containers
We know there isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution when it comes to getting your home organized. Everyone is different. However, one stand-alone tip that can be implemented by anyone wanting to organize their space is to use practical, durable containers. You can even turn this into a crafting session with your kids where you decorate or create new containers to hold small miscellaneous items in your house. We recommend translucent containers if you’re the type to store often-used items in bins and then forget which one you put them in. Mason jars are an excellent way to organize everything from pens to Q-tips to beads. Another translucent storage solution: a hanging shoe organizer. They’re great for shoes but if you’re tight on space, the pockets can also be used for toiletries, gardening tools, cleaning products, or toys.
Tip 3: Build New Habits
Give you and your family their best chance of manifesting a better and brighter year by building new habits! The extra time we've spent at home has left many of us sluggish and uninspired. January is the best time to begin building behaviors that will help you achieve your personal goals and stay organized all year long.
James Clear has dozens of tips and tricks on forming healthy habits. One, in particular, is called the 3 R’s: reminder, routine, and reward. The reminder is the cue that initiates the behavior, such as an alarm or a notification. The routine is the act of doing the action. The reward is the benefit you get from practicing the behavior. Whether it’s meal prepping or getting your kids to do their chores, the 3 R’s is a framework that applies to any action you want to integrate into your daily life.
Tip 4: Use MIT to Master Time Management
Do you ever look at all the things you have to do and get so overwhelmed that sometimes you don’t even get any of them done? Looking at lists of to-dos can drive you crazy. One of the most helpful tips for this is to isolate the 3 most important tasks for the day. This method is called MIT (Most Important Task). On your to-do list, some tasks are a high priority, and others are lower priorities. The MIT method suggests that you identify two to three of the highest priority tasks and focus on the first, finishing lower ones afterward. Implementing this method can be challenging, especially when it feels like all of your tasks are urgent. The MIT is usually the task you write down the night before. So if you’re thinking about all of the laundry that needs to be done when it’s time to head to bed, that should be the first thing on your list of to-dos the next day.
We wish you all a healthy, happy, organized start to 2021!
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