Several years ago I wrote a post called, ‘Creating Peace at Home Through Organizing’. Click on the link to read the full article. The article explains why decluttering and organizing the spaces in your home is so important to achieve peace in your life.
In that post I used the acronym PEACE to describe the five steps in the organizing process. The acronym was created to depict the result of organized spaces – peace. This post is the first in the series to provide more details for each step in the organizing process.
You’ve already determined that you want to get organized. My recommendation is to avoid the overwhelm of the size of the project by starting small. Choose a drawer, a cabinet, or maybe a smaller closet to ease into the overall project.
Step 1 – Put like items together
Remove all the items in the space and put like items together as they make sense to you. The reason I say ‘as they make sense to you’, is because everyone is different. What makes sense to me may not make sense to you. This is called a broad sort using general categories. The finer sort comes along later in a succeeding step in the process.
An example would be office supplies. Anything you would use in an office goes together – like items. Pens, markers, envelopes, paper clips, stapler, sticky notes, electronics, cords, etc. Another example is personal care items. Soap, shampoo, deodorant, first aid, hair care accessories, makeup, shavers, etc.
You can use boxes, bins, or piles for the categories. I use sticky notes and a marker as labels for the categories. Put the labels on the boxes, bins or on the wall or floor if you are using piles. You may come up with additional categories such as returns; return to the library, return borrowed items, etc.
Now that you have the broad sort complete, you are ready to move on to the next step, Eliminate Excess. Stay tuned for the next post!
Good for you Susan! I’m proud of you! You took the first step, maybe the most difficult step. It’s a liberating feeling, keep up the good work!
I’m SO excited to be getting started with this “broad sorting”! I’ve already done one drawer in our kitchen! Well, I need to give the initial credit to my extremely patient and forgiving boyfriend, Brendan, who originally sorted all of the crap, I mean items, from the drawer into labeled, ziplock baggies in January 2018. Well, I then got into the habit of being too much ‘in a hurry’ when putting items into, or back into the drawer and I wasn’t using the baggies. I’d put items into the drawer, but I’d put them in front of the baggies, not into them. And I’d always say to myself, “I’ll sort them LATER, when I’m not in a hurry,” hoping Brendan wouldn’t notice. Well, he noticed and was STILL very patient with me… AND “later” never came… not until last week (the first week of May, 2018). I dumped everything out, cleaned the drawer, inside and out, with spray cleaner and paper towels, threw away lots of the packets of salsa, ketchup, etc., that I had been holding onto for “just in case” reasons, and put the other things into better, more obvious homes. I was, and still am so proud of myself, and I have even MORE ambition than before, to get the broad sorting (now that I know more about it, thanks to reading this article) of my entire house DONE and move onto the next step!
I want to P.E.A.C.E. so that we all can HAVE PEACE in our house and in our lives!!!! It’s a really BAD situation to be SO COMPLETELY swallowed up in disorganization and to actually FEEL that disorganization inside to the point of physical distress… I’m on the right track now, and with YOUR help, Sally of S.O.S., I will give my family, and myself, the PEACE we all want and need!!! Thank you SO MUCH for this article and ALL that you do! You are a GODSEND! LET’S DO THIS!