10 Minute Organizing Clutter Session
Clutter, Clutter, Clutter. Its like it just sneaks into the home when you are not looking. It might be a paper that you think you’ll need and it ends up sitting on the counter, unneeded for a month or more.
It’s that shopping list you used when you shopped last week but never got around to taking it out of the purse. It’s those great magazines that come for free each month, that you know you’ll get around to reading. So you just can’t part with them.
It the pieces of toys that kids just can’t let go of, because someday, they know they will find the rest to go with it. But someday just never comes.
My Confession, I’m a Paper Clutter Magnet
All of these little items, these little seemingly small things, are the things that can become a big clutter problem if left uncheck from week to week or month to month.
I know. A couple of years ago, I went on a quest to get my home clutter free. A year long one, where each month I combed through a part of my home to search out each and every bit of suffocating clutter that was lurking. But after the first month or two I realized, I had a problem. One that I hadn’t really considered, the clutter was coming back.
The areas I had decluttered, were trying to clutter up again. I didn’t want to have to start over. I had to get a few systems in place to keep the clutter out of the decluttered areas of my home as well make progress in new areas of the home. That is how my organizing clutter session started.
Start Using 10 Minute Clutter Sessions
I guess I really shouldn’t call it organizing clutter. It’s more like banishing clutter or clutter control. As I was working to declutter my home, a theme kept coming up. I’m evidently a paper clutter magnet or at least my house is. In every room of our home we had some kind of paper clutter. Paper clutter was the biggest problem.
To keep my clutter under control, I started a 10 minute clutter session each week. For 10 minutes I would go through my home and get any and all paper clutter that has accumulated for that week.
If the coupons were on the piano, they were put in the coupon bin. If the newspaper was piling up on the hearth, they would be dropped into our recycling bin. The kitchen counter would be cleared of all unnecessary paper clutter and any odds and ends.
10 Minutes Can Make a Difference
Now you might think, 10 minutes, I can’t make any progress in 10 minutes. It’s true when I started using my 10 minute clutter sessions, my home had already had a big purge. But you could use the 10 minutes each week to purge a small area in your home. Or do two sessions a week. One to purge and one to do a clutter clean up in the areas you have already decluttered.
Before long, your house will be looking so much better and you did it all in just 10 minutes here and 10 minutes there. So what do you have to lose but that clutter that has been clogging up your house and your mind.
What can you get accomplished in just 10 minutes today? If you take the challenge and declutter for 10 minutes I would love to have you share with me what you were able to accomplish. Just scroll down and leave me a comment below.
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I love this idea of taking 10 minutes here and there to de-clutter my home. It seems a lot less daunting that way. 🙂
This is such a good idea! Taking just a small amount of time can really add up to a much more organized house 🙂
It really does add up, Erin. It amazing what a change can be made in just a few minutes.
Great tips, Shelly! 10 minutes is doable – and paper does accumulate so quickly!
Thanks, Kristen.
It really is a good idea, and I really need to start doing it. This idea would work in the garage and outside places too.
Thanks Audra! I know if I tackle the clutter a little at a time, it goes so much better. I know I practice this method when I’m working on weeding the garden. It makes the job go so much easier. 🙂
if I know ahead of time what I’m going to declutter I can spend a few minutes at a time throughout the day working on that spot. 5 minutes before I leave for work, 5 minutes when I come home, 5 minutes in the evening, and so on. Breaking up the job also fights the feeling of overwhelm.