Declutter your home when you don’t have time
When you need time to declutter… so you have more time.
It’s the classic chicken or the egg dilemma. You want to declutter the house so that you have less stuff to manage. But you are spending so much time dealing with said stuff that you can’t make time to declutter it. How on earth are you supposed to declutter your home when you don’t have the time (or energy) to do so?
Far too many times I’ve seen people get themselves worked up and motivated, and decide to tackle the whole thing at once. It’s almost like they are preparing for battle, black garbage bags in hand. “I’m coming for you, mess!”
Unfortunately, decluttering your entire home in one weekend with one trash bag and good intentions never works. I mean, we’re Moms! Something will come up, we get distracted, we procrastinate, get overwhelmed with decision fatigue. Thus, the task keeps getting put off because it’s just so daunting.
So if you can’t find time to declutter on a good day, and doing it all at once is doomed to fail… What are we to do? I come with solutions! And believe me:
It’s possible to create a simpler, more joyful home when you have minimal time and energy.
Start by thinking as if you already are clutter-free
The whole point of decluttering is to simplify your life by having fewer choices to make day in and day out. And once you have that simplified, beautiful home that is easy to maintain, it will stay that way - thanks to the rhythms and routines you create to take care of things quickly and easily.
So why not tackle the mess with the same point of view? Make the process simpler, give it less of your time and brainspace, and embrace the power of routine.
Learning to embrace the mindset of a clutter-free life really will help you gain momentum in your decluttering habit. Imagine that you are trying to lose weight; you don’t expect to go to the gym once and suddenly lose 5lbs! Decluttering is exactly that. You can’t show up with a garbage bag on the weekend and wake up Monday with an ordered, simpler home.
Just like losing weight is a journey of creating new, good habits and seeing change over the course of time, losing the weight of stuff is a process. Lucky for you, creating a decluttering habit is a lot easier than losing weight - but so much depends on our daily habits.
2 ways to build your decluttering muscles
What we do every day adds up, even if (at first) you aren’t seeing results. So when you try one of the tips below, don’t be discouraged if nothing feels different the first week! Your momentum will build on itself, and by the end of these month-long challenges, your home (and heart) will feel a whole lot lighter.
1. Daily Declutter. I love this method because it truly embodies starting small and builds serious momentum over the course of a month. Start on the first day of the month, and get rid of one thing. Easy peasy, right? Day two, get rid of two things. You see the pattern here. Keep going every day until the last day of the month, when you get rid of thirty things. I did the math, and by the end of this challenge you will have cleared your space of 443 things! (474 if you choose a month with 31 days.)
If the idea of getting rid of 443 things in one month is impossible, first know that you are starting the month small. The idea is to build your momentum slowly, while strengthening your decluttering habit and skills. But if this method stresses you out, I have a second version of the challenge for you to consider, because I want decluttering to be simple, not scary!
2. 5 Minutes, 5 Things. For the person who doesn't even have enough time to check the calendar to know what day it is, this challenge is for you! Every day, carve out five minutes and get rid of five things. You can even do this while talking to your grandma on the phone! This method is pretty pain free for those of you who have a hard time decluttering, because five things isn’t too much to take on at once, yet you will still see a gradual change to your space over time.
Trying a monthly decluttering challenge is a great place to start when you are looking to create a simpler and easier home to live in. By practicing decluttering, you will become more aware of your “stuff” and learn to detach from it. You probably will even develop an aversion to bringing more things into your home.
Soon, you’ll start to experience the joy and ease that clear surfaces bring, and how much easier it is to tidy up when there’s fewer items to deal with. And as your confidence grows, you’ll be more likely to keep the momentum beyond the one-month challenge.