7 Steps to Declutter for the New Year

Here are 7 quick steps to get you started to a new organised year for 2012

1. When organising, it’s best to unclutter first. Pull everything out of a space and sort it into piles: keep, purge and other.

o “Keep” obviously means that you plan to continue to store and/or use the item.
o “Purge” can mean that you intend to throw, shred, recycle, or donate the item to charity.
o “Other” is for objects that need to be repaired, relocated, returned to a friend or family member, or some other special action needs to be taken.

2. Once all of the objects from the space have been sorted, the garbage and recycling items need to go, donate the objects that can be donated, return items to friends, and drop off objects that need to be repaired at the repair shop.

So – what is left in your keep pile?

3. Do you need to do another round of uncluttering? If you’re feeling more courageous about purging items, now is the time to do it. When you are satisfied with your keep pile, sort the objects into new piles of like items — pencils with pencils, envelopes with envelopes, jeans with jeans etc.

4. When everything is in piles by type, examine what you have and compare it to your storage systems. It is only at that this point that you should consider buying storage. But before you do, look through your house or office to see if you already own something that could hold and organise your objects. Take into consideration your style of organisation:

• Do you like to see things on display, or would your rather items are out of sight behind closed doors?
• Do you like the eclectic look or the minimalist?
• Do you like labels, or need opaque containers so you can see what’s inside?