“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving.”

— Albert Einstein

We’re all at different stages with our families. Some of us have kids and others have none. Some have young and some have adult children. Some live close by while others live far away from our families. All families go through transitions and changes of varying magnitudes. There are marriages, births, divorces, moves and deaths. There are joyful times and challenging ones.

We don’t always notice the changes because we’re living them. Sometimes we feel the tumult and haven’t assimilated the movement these shifts create.

With the many changes our family has experienced in the last bunch of years including becoming empty nesters, family moving away, and loss of loved ones, my family has become even more essential for me.

I’m not only grateful for my family, but also realize how much they ground me. They play a significant role in helping me feel balanced. Whether my family is near or far, whether they are living or have passed on, they are part of me. They are with me wherever I go.

What brings balance to your life? Come join the conversation and share your thoughts.

A few weeks ago, I wrote about preparing for our tag sale. Having a specific deadline motivated my family and me to declutter and get rid of a lot of things. The event was a success, and we felt great! While scheduling the tag sale was a terrific motivator, there are other types of events that can make us evaluate our “stuff,” declutter, and let go. What has your experience been like with event-inspired decluttering?

5 Events To Motivate Decluttering

1. Entertaining—Throwing a party of any size (from an intimate dinner to a large BBQ) can motivate us to declutter and organize. Spending time with the people we love rather than accumulating more “stuff” brings positive energy into our lives. Use happiness-producing events to keep clutter in check.

2. Life Event—Marriage, birth, job change, medical emergency, empty nest, divorce, or death are times of transition. These life events make us rethink our possessions and spaces to accommodate major changes. Things that were once relevant aren’t anymore. In our search for clarity and the new normal, letting go and decluttering become crucial.

3. Moving—Whether we are increasing or decreasing our living space in a move, there will be things that won’t be needed. Moving motivates us to evaluate the “stuff” and release the extraneous. The more decluttering you do before a move, the easier it will be to set up your new home. In a recent post, one of our readers (Rosemary) shared that as she was preparing for her move, she posted a sign in her triage area that helped her evaluate what to keep. It read, “All you need is less.”

4. Renovating—A renovation is stressful. However, it’s also a fabulous opportunity to ask lots of questions, release clutter, and create room for the things you treasure most. Rooms are emptied to prepare for construction and then reorganized when the building is done. This is a natural opportunity to be ruthless and only restore what you really want.

5. Tag Sale—Bringing us full circle to the beginning of this post, having a tag sale gives you a specific deadline to work towards, increases your motivation for letting go, is an enjoyable social event, and lets you make a few bucks. It’s also fun to meet the buyers of your “stuff” and know that your possessions will be useful and enjoyed by others.

What events have motivated you to declutter? I’d love to hear your thoughts. Come join the conversation. 

9 Clutter Management TipsWhat is your favorite clutter management strategy? I asked several of my wonderful colleagues (Ellen Delap, Janice Simon, Jackie Hollywood Brown, Aby Garvey, Peggy Pardo, Ramona Creel, Janine Sarna-Jones, Sue West, Helena Alkhas ), many of which I recently had the pleasure of hanging out with at the NAPO conference in New Orleans, to share their best ideas with us. Their responses are creative, practical, and doable. My gratitude goes to each of them for taking the time to reflect, and give us their proven clutter management strategies. If you’re feeling overwhelmed by clutter, I encourage you to keep reading and try one of their fabulous ideas.

What is your favorite clutter management strategy? . . .

1. Shift Perspective

“My favorite clutter management strategy is to view decluttering work as a treasure hunt. Rather than sifting through, I help my clients prioritize and find what is most valuable first in their clutter. This focus helps them move forward and look toward what will be most useful, functional and beautiful to them as they create their vision of organization. ”

Ellen Delap, CPO^® – Certified Professional Organizer & Family Manager Coach

2. Decide Now

“Make a decision. Whether it's paper, emails or anything else, it's important to make a decision about what you want to keep in your office and life and what you need to let go. When you put off making a decision, things pile up, and it takes more of your time to clear the decks to move forward.”

Janice Marie Simon, MA, CPO^® – Professional Organizer

3. Evaluate Costs

“Although moving from one city to another isn't my favourite clutter management strategy, it is certainly effective. When the price to pack/load/move/unload/unpack an item costs somewhere between $3-$8 per pound, it is a little easier to make decisions about what to keep and what to toss! Anything that costs less to re-purchase than it does to move, doesn't get moved. Often when you get to your new home, you find out you really didn't need all the stuff you left behind after all.”

Jackie Hollywood Brown, M.Sc.  – Organizing & Productivity Consultant

4. Organize Thoughts

“We often associate clutter with the visible and tangible, however the most paralyzing form of clutter is the mental one. When we feel stuck and overwhelmed mentally, we allow clutter to accumulate in our spaces. To find relief, I practice both for myself and with my clients, what I call ‘mental dump’ time. I use a notepad to write down everything that's on my mind. After writing everything from the multiple ‘mental to-do lists,’ I categorize them into personal, professional, and family. My clients and I love clearing the ‘floor’ with this process. We feel great and are able to re-focus on getting organized.”

Helena Alkhas – Professional Organizer & Virtual Assistant

5. Be Proactive

“To help manage clutter, I like to attack it before it gets out of hand. For example, stacks of incoming mail could easily take over our house. When I bring the mail in, I sort through it right away. That which isn't shredded or recycled goes into the appropriate family member’s ‘in-box’. Taking a few minutes each day to handle small tasks like this helps keep the clutter under control.”

Peggy Pardo  – Interior Decorator, Professional Organizer, Author, & Blogger

6. Clarify Purpose

“What do you stand for? What gives you daily purpose? If we can tie motivation, reasons for managing clutter, and practical strategies to who the person IS, there’s greater chance for continued success. It’s the minister who elects to donate his things because this IS ministering; the mother who values making her mark and so passes along traditions, photos and heirlooms to family; and the business leader who listens to TED talks to improve his skills, while he manages paper and emails.“

Sue West, COC^®, CPO-CD^® – Organizing Coach & ADHD Specialist

7. Delegate Responsibilities

“A strategy that has worked great in my home has been to assign each family member a container called a clutter bin, which is stored in a centrally located area of the home, such as the laundry room, mudroom or family room. When you find small toys or other clutter strewn about, it gets tossed it into the appropriate person’s container. Then, once a week each family member is responsible for emptying their clutter bin by putting items away where they belong.”

Aby Garvey – Professional Organizer, Author, & Online Class Instructor 

8. Activate Plan

“When a client feels like they are drowning in clutter, I encourage them to think of using ‘buckets’ to bale themselves out—essentially, containing items in macro categories to clear some space and avoid getting bogged down in minutiae. When a client is frustrated by clutter, but not overwhelmed, I encourage them to create a set of criteria to manage clutter, e.g. recycle all reading materials ‘x’number of months old.  But my all time favorite clutter management strategy is helping clients identify the dynamics in their relationship with clutter.”

Janine Sarna-Jones, CPO ^® – Certified Professional Organizer, Blogger, & Change Agent

9. Increase Attention

“Clutter creeps up on you and takes over your space when you aren't paying attention to your stuff – so the trick to taming clutter is to pay better (and more frequent) attention! Every time you walk through a room and see something out of place, take a second to put it where it belongs. And if that item no longer seems to serve a purpose in your life, drop it in the ‘to donate,’ ‘to sell,’ ‘to give away’ (or otherwise ‘to get rid of’) bin – rather than sticking it back into storage.”

Ramona Creel – Professional Organizer, Simplicity Coach, Author, & Blogger

Do you have a favorite clutter management strategy? I love the variety in these fabulous responses, which include shifting perspectives, not delaying decisions, evaluating costs, and organizing mind clutter. I’d love to hear from you. Come join the conversation and share your thoughts about your favorite clutter strategies, success stories, or challenges. What are your thoughts?

Motivation is a funny thing. It can be a powerful force in helping us take action. Using its power will bring you great results. Many things motivate us to get organized from imposing deadlines to satisfying someone else’s wishes to preparing for the arrival of houseguests. Being aware of both large and small motivating factors will help you reach your goals.

This is something I encounter not only when working with clients, but also in my own life. Sometimes the goal we are trying to reach is so large, that thinking about that goal and the desired results can actually de-motivate, rather than motivate us into action. While it’s important to keep the big goal or motivating idea in mind, using mini-motivators along the way is essential.

Let’s look at a scenario where you want to sell your home and move? Before that can happen, the cluttered rooms filled with years of accumulation need to be organized and cleared. Even though you have a burning desire to move, it’s not enough yet to bring you to action.

The desired goal seems so large and impossible that it causes inaction. This is often the point when people call for help. They realize that they just can’t accomplish this on their own. If they could have, they would have. The large motivation for moving to a new neighborhood brings them to the next step, which is enlisting help. The help can be from a professional, friend or family member.

Once help arrives, now what? The big picture of moving still exists. Yet, the clutter and things to do are overwhelming you. It’s hard to know where to begin. You feel stuck. Now it’s time to find the mini-motivators. We’re looking for tiny steps that require a less intense level of motivation.

So let’s say we have 30 boxes of papers to sort through. Most of them are old and can probably be recycled, but we still need to look at them to seek out any important ones that might be mixed in. The motivation here becomes emptying a box, not emptying 30 boxes. And when that one box is finished, it propels us forward to begin the next box. The motivation is finding the bottom of the box, all clear, with nothing in it. The small successes will build off one another. They will keep us motivated until we reach the desired goal.

No matter what you are trying to accomplish, don’t underestimate the value of using both large and mini-motivators.

What motivates you to get organized and reach your goals?