Unsure of what you need in different areas? These distinctions can help!

First, what is “Clutter?”

Clutter is anything in your home that isn’t serving a purpose, isn’t used, or isn’t loved. It’s the extra stuff that sits around with no place to be put away or maybe shoved into a cabinet or storage room for years at a time.

What counts as clutter varies for different people. It depends on what you need in your home to live a life you love. I will never tell you something is clutter. Instead, we will reflect on the purpose, use, and feelings your items bring to your home.

Decluttering vs. Organizing vs. Cleaning

These are the three layers to maintaining your home.

Decluttering is a process to identify the things in your home that you need, and to let go of the rest.

What you need in your home is unique to each person and their life. If my favorite thing to do is paint, I will have a completely different list of needs than someone whose favorite thing to do is bake.

Decluttering will identify what “stuff” you need to do the activities you love and create a space that allows you to do them. Keeping things you enjoy is just as important as keeping things required to function.

You may need to revisit a space more than once to get it functioning, and that’s okay! Each pass is better than the last and gets you closer to your goal.

Once you have the inventory that meets your wants and needs and fits into your space, it’s time to organize.

Organization is the process of creating systems where your items are easily accessed and put away.

The systems should be simple enough that everyone in your household can use them (at least to some degree if you have little ones). Labels and bins can help here, but are not always necessary. After decluttering, you can often free up enough space in cabinets, bins, or closet space that additional purchases aren’t necessary…but they can be fun and elevate function 😉

This might not be perfect on the first try either. Being flexible with an organization system and tweaking it until it works will get you where you want to go!

Once you have decluttered and organized, your space is now easy to tidy and ready to clean.

“You can’t clean clutter.” -somebody on the internets

I don’t know where I heard this the first time, but it completely changed my perspective on why I felt like my house was never “clean.” My “cleaning” was actually just tidying because I spent all my time trying to figure out where to put everything.

Once your house is tidy, then you can actually clean! When the counters are clear, you can wipe them down. When belongings are off of the floor, you can run the vacuum. If your room can be tidied in 10 minutes or less, you might even have time to…..DUST!

Just kidding, if you have little kids, dusting might just be a pipe dream 😉 and that’s okay too!

So if you find yourself shuffling things around the floor, shelves, or countertops to clean, decluttering is probably where you need to begin.

Interested in a guided decluttering experience? Fill out my Questionnaire for a free consultation!