Let's Begin Our Decluttering Plan! No better time to start!

“Order is Heaven’s first law.” 

Alexander Pope

I sit here this morning, several days before the beginning of a new year, with great anticipation for 2012! For some reason, deep inside, I have a feeling it is going to be something special. It has been years since I have made " resolutions", for I never seemed to obtain them when I did. This year, though, there are several things that I want to do, so I am making a 2012 "bucket list".  The most exciting things on my list are to grow my organizing business,  raise baby chicks in the spring and to learn how to crochet. These things aren't just going to miraculously happen, so I am beginning to take a few deliberate steps. 

Is becoming more organized and less cluttered one of your goals for the new year like it is for so many others? Studies show, and this is obvious by all of the magazine covers at the grocery store, that most Americans long for a more organized environment in which to live, work and play. Has it been one of yours for many years? What has kept you from obtaining it? There are lots of random reasons that I have heard over time and here are just a few...

There aren't enough hours in the day

I don't have enough space

I don't have enough money

I don't know where to start so I just don't

I could sit and write a rebuttal for all of these but why should I? Sometimes I feel the same way..but at the end of the day, I know what it does to my insides to have things orderly and simple...to have drawers cleaned out, filing cabinets orderly, all things in their places and the excess gone...all you have to do is live that way briefly and it will change your world. I am not kidding. There is something that happens inside when things on the outside are uncluttered. You see, I was not just born with the uncluttered gene. It was forced onto me by downsizing to a small home years ago...and I thank God for that..otherwise, my currently larger home would be busting at the seams with a bunch of stuff that I do not need or want. You do not have to downsize to get there though...you just need to make the choice to make the change...little by little, with no excuses. And if the queen of "I can keep that and make something out of it" (me) can do it, SO CAN YOU!!

Let me give you some nuggets to start your wheels turning before the new year...I am reading a book right now that my dear friend Susan gave me called "The Happiness Project" by Gretchen Rubin, and in short, she is on a year long mission to find more "happy" in her life. She tackles a different area of her life each month..amazing, isn't it, that the first thing she goes for is her "stuff and clutter". She says that she "craved a existence of order and serenity". Does that speak to you like it does to me? go figure that I LOVED this chapter. Here are the "kinds" of clutter that she talks about in her book. Think through these one by one, and can I suggest that you even write them down on index cards of a sheet of paper to refer to when you are doing your clutter clean up in the weeks to come? I am..and over the next month, together, we will use these categories as we get rid of our unnecessary "stuff". 

Nostalgic clutter- things you hang on to from your earlier life that do nothing for you now..(5 million sorority tee shirts)

Conservation clutter- things that in their own right are useful, but completely useless to you. (30 florist vases in your cabinet)  

Bargain clutter- things that we have purchased because they were a great deal, but you now find little or no use for them. 

Freebie clutter-  things that have been given to you because someone else had no use for them and thought you did! Thanks a lot for that!

Crutch clutter-  things you use, but know you shouldn't..can't wait to tackle this one.

Aspirational clutter-  things you have that you want to use...but end up just causing you guilt..like my scrap booking paper....it's been in the house for several years...and not moved..it's not going to happen..its not in me..it's going bye bye!

Buyer's remorse clutter-  okay, we all know what this is...the shirt that has had the tags on it for a year...or the shoes you have worn twice in 2 years...

Okay, now instead of feeling overwhelmed, you need to try and think of this as fun...keep in mind how exhilarating that it will be to have closets, drawers and cabinets clean and orderly. And to be able to find things when you need them. Take baby steps...one day at a time...one drawer at a time.

I hope that you will journey with me, and If you know someone that may find this useful,  please share this with them..and encourage them to subscribe to my blog!!