Our living space can have a significant effect on our lives, from mental and physical health to motivation and productivity levels. The start of a new year is a good symbolic time to get organized and declutter your space to get it ready for what’s ahead. However, decluttering is a big undertaking, and it can feel overwhelming. To ensure it doesn’t become an impossible task, we’ve gathered some fool-proof ways to prepare your home for a full-on decluttering. Decluttering your living space will help get you in a proper headspace to start the new year off right.
Go Room by Room
When your apartment is messy, where do you start? You may feel pulled in multiple directions if your home is full of clutter, which can lead you to try and tackle all of your rooms at once. We don’t recommend going about it this way, as you can easily get sidetracked and end up disserting your decluttering project altogether. Instead, make a plan to declutter each room one at a time. Set a goal, like decluttering one room each day of the week, or each weekend for the next month. Sticking with one room at a time will help you stay on track.
Label Your Boxes
When decluttering, it’s helpful to sort your belongings into a few piles: donation, recycle, and trash. Get prepared ahead of time by labeling your boxes accordingly, so you know which to throw your items into while you’re in the thick of cleaning. You may want a third option for selling gently used items as well. Check out websites like Poshmark if you’re interested in making some cash from your unused or slightly worn clothes.
Turn Hangers Backwards
This one is a bit of a longterm experiment, but it’s one we swear by. Feel free to test it out for any amount of time, from one week to a few months. Our closets are often filled to the brim with clothes, yet we never have anything to wear (sound familiar?). To streamline the closet clean-out process, use this trick: turn all of your clothes hangers backward. When you pull a piece out and wear it, set the hook back to the right side when putting it back. Over time, you’ll see which items you actually wear, and which ones should be placed in your donation box. Bonus tip: If you want to do the same kind of thing with your folded clothing, put safety pins on the tags and remove them before wearing. You’ll soon be able to see which items you should part with.
