Decluttering certainly doesn’t sound like the most exotic or exciting of household tasks but it’s one of the most satisfying to complete. You’ll love looking around at your newly-cleaned home that’s been rid of large gatherings of disused items, while you’ll get a strong sense of accomplishment when you’ve finished decluttering, as it’s one of those tasks which usually takes a lot of time to complete.
The hardest part can often be finding the motivation to begin decluttering and identifying a strategy for where and how to start. It’s a task that’s best managed one room at a time, going all-out on the kitchen, for example, before you even begin taking on the living room or bathroom. In terms of how to approach it, emphasize a certain task which you believe will make a quick impact, whether that’s filling a garbage bag with items to be thrown away, sorting items into boxes based on their proposed fate, or a longer-term approach of binning one item each day until you’re left with a much tidier home.
If you want to turn decluttering into a game, try your hand at the ’12-12-12 challenge’. This involves taking on 36 items at a time and sorting them evenly into three categories: throwaway items, charity donations and items to be returned to their rightful place. It’s one way to add a bit of excitement to decluttering!
Each room in your home will have differing levels of clutter and different structures, but most (if not all) will have some form of storage, such as drawers and cabinets. These are a good place to start; go through each of these thoroughly and bin anything you’re not using or not expecting to use. This is not a time for sentiment – if there’s an item that you haven’t used in at least a year and you can’t reasonably foresee any scenario where you will use it, time to toss it out or give it to charity.
For further decluttering advice, check out this infographic from EZ Living Interiors, which goes from room to room with pointers on where to start decluttering.
Helen O’Keeffe writes content for EZ Living Interiors, a home furnishings retailer based in Ireland and the UK. She is very experienced in this industry and frequently contributes informative content on home interiors.