What is clutter and how can you tell if you have it? According to productivity expert Lorie Marrero, clutter is simply postponed decisions that accumulate in a home and cause stress to its occupants. Knowing...
Knowing exactly what clutter is and how to tell if you have it is an important first step in home organization. Lorie Marrero, who is the owner of "LivingOrder", a professional organization company that creates organizing solutions for homes and businesses, offers this definition: "'Clutter' is postponed decisions. That is exactly what clutter is. Every piece of clutter that is lying around your home is something you haven't made a decision about as to where it belongs or what to do with it. You can tell that you have it if you are stressed or bothered about your surroundings."
We've all heard the saying, "A place for everything and everything in its place." Home organization isn't necessarily about having to down-size, though that may be the case sometimes. It's about finding a home, within your home, for all your things. Some have a tendency to purchase items that would be perfect for the décor in a certain room without taking into consideration the size itself of the space and then arrive home to find that they have no where to place the item. Others will purchase an item that, even though it doesn't fit into any decorating scheme in any room of their home, has "something about it". Both of these scenarios leave you with two choices: put the item away until you find a use for it or try to squeeze it in somewhere and make everything around it less attractive. Another form of clutter comes in the all too common paper form. This includes unsorted mail, un-filed files, homework, books...the list goes on and on. As Lorie says, clutter is any object in your home that has been placed somewhere, with the mentality of "getting to it later".
Clutter can creep up on someone, even the most organized person, without them realizing it until they are overwhelmed with everything around them. This frequently happens when a big change in one's lifestyle takes place. Lorie explains, "One of the most common reasons people call Living Order is because they are in a big transition or crisis in their lives. For example, they're remodeling, moving, they have a new baby, they've gotten married or gotten divorced, lost a job or have had a death in the family. On the business side, a company may be growing or laying people off and have to distribute more work to fewer employees. When people decide to call us, a common element their lives have is some kind of transition or change. The reason people are hassled with what they are trying to do is that they are in this transition period and things aren't where they belong."
The whole process of de-cluttering can seem overwhelming but it doesn't have to be. It is just one of the small steps on the path to home organization. While you are progressing towards this ideal, just keep the image of your goal in front of you along the way. Home organization is all about removing some of the stress from your life, not adding to it.
