Five Five-Minute Decluttering Tips

Zenhabits.com offers a lot of great advice for busting through the clutter taking over every aspect of our lives. Each of these tips takes less that five minutes and over time can help us to take control of the clutter that is taking over our lives.

1. Pick up five things and find places for each of them. That’s it. Do it again tomorrow. And, the next day. At the end of the week, you’ve reassigned 35 things that have been cluttering up your living space to more appropriate locations.

2. Clean out your medicine cabinet. Get rid of outdated and expired medicines and organize what’s left in a single spot in your home.

3. Establish a spot for papers. Don’t actually sort anything. This is about baby steps. Instead of piling mail on the counter, the kitchen table, a random end table, set up an inbox and put everything there. Things will instantly look less cluttered and at least you will know exactly where to look when you need something.

4. Clean off a counter. The ultimate goal is to clean off all flat spaces. But for now, pick a single counter, or even part of a counter, and focus on that. Put away everything except for the coffee maker and the toaster, for example. Things that you use everyday should be on the counter and accessible. Everything else belongs elsewhere.

5. Schedule a decluttering weekend. The thought of combating clutter might be overwhelming today, but putting a date on the calendar will give you a target to aim for and enable you to get the whole family involved.

Do you have any proven tips for combatting clutter?