The Secret to Decluttering Your Home
There are plenty of reasons to divest yourself of some of your belongings. You may be downsizing, moving, or simply have too many items to live comfortably. Regardless, you are now faced with a huge project: you have stacks- maybe even rooms- full of items. They are all over the place in no particular order or grouping. Once you start actively looking, you’ll find things everywhere- behind the bookcase, under the bed, and shoved in the space between the dresser and the wall. As you look out over your vast collection of possessions, you realize that a) this is a much larger project than you initially assumed, and b) you have no idea where to start. Now what?
Here it is, the secret to dealing with this huge, unruly project. The key is to remember the old joke about the elephant.
Yup, that’s it.
The only way you’re going to get through a huge task like this is to break it down into manageable chunks, then do one chunk at a time. The size of the chunks and what the chunks look like vary from project to project and depend on the person. but the basics are always the same.
For exampled, don’t think about clearing out the whole house, just think about the kitchen. And don’t think about the kitchen as a whole, just the fridge. Break it down even further: work on one shelf in the fridge. If that’s still too much, do the first four inches of a self. Do the first shelf, second shelf, third shelf, vegetable bin, inside door, freezer, top of the fridge, and the outside fridge door. When you’re finished, the whole fridge is done. All the little bites will eventually add up to one big elephant.
Another example of this is in the posts: Clearing Out a Parent’s or Other Loved One’s Home After Their Death, particularly parts two and three.
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