The best way to make the most of the space you have is to get rid of the things you no longer need. There are psychological benefits to streamlining your living and practical ones too. If you think of your excess stuff as emotional baggage, it can help to reframe your mind and help you see whether things are important to you, or not.
We think the comedian George Carlin put it best when he said “a house is just a place to keep your stuff while you go out and get more stuff”.
So here are our tips for making your purge effective and making sure your house is more enjoyable to live in.
Act like you’re moving
If you were actually moving home, what would you have to take with you? Perhaps even think of it as moving to a smaller house, to force yourself to focus on what’s really important.
Plan ahead
Walk round your house with a pen and a pad (or your iPad). Make a note of what strikes you as your first enter the room. (If something literally strikes you, then you’ve got a major job on your hands.) By doing this you can rearrange your living spaces, rather than just tidying them up.
Help others as you help yourself
If you know that the things you no longer need will go to benefit someone else, it can make getting rid of things easier. So pick a charity, or charities, you want to support. And then give them all the things that you no longer need. You can even sign up for Gift Aid with your chosen charity, so they benefit even more.
Enlist some help
Get your family or friends involved. This might involve some light bribery, like food and drinks as a reward. But it’ll be worth it. Many hands make light work, as someone smart once said. And if you’re talking and joking as you work through your home it won’t even feel like work.
Focus on one room at a time
Don’t get distracted. It’s really easy to end up wandering from room to room and achieving very little. All you’ll achieve if you work this way is a huge sense of frustration – as you’ll probably still have a cluttered home. We’d advise you keep a box or a large bag that you put items in that belong elsewhere and relocate them when you finish in the room you’re focused on.
Bring less into your home
We consume. Every single day. So the habit is reinforced. But we can slow the accumulation by thinking a little differently. Ask yourself if you really need the item. Do you have space for it? Can you replace something you already have in your home with this new item? Asking the right questions will help you maintain your clutter-free home and enjoy living there more.
Be decisive
Don’t have a maybe pile. That way madness lies. If you can’t decide whether to keep something or not, store it with us for a while. Then you can see if you really would miss it. Or whether your life would be just as fulfilled without it. If you’re thinking that short-term storage could be for you, get in touch. We’ll make sure anything you want to store is kept safe and secure. And we’ll look after your things as if they were our own. Find out more about our storage options, including how much space you’ll need and prices, here.
And give us a call if you have any questions about how we can help.
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