Dana K. White - Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

H eres my promise to you for this book: everything you read here will be based in reality. Keeping a house under control is not natural for me. My home used to turn into a disaster zone again and again, no matter how many quick tips or nifty tricks I tried. I eventually hit rock bottom and started an anonymous blog where I recorded my thoughts and processes as I worked to figure out what I was doing wrong and what I should be doing instead.

I eventually figured it out. Tips help, but no simple trick will magically turn your house into the one you dream about. Thats why were calling these strategies. Some of them will be quick to implement and will make the overall process of changing your home easier, but others are mindset shifts and changes to the way you do day-to-day tasks that will ultimately make a bigger difference than storing your toothbrush in a different container.

As someone who audibly groaned at promises of quick fixes for my lifetime of messiness, Im excited to share what Ive learned in the bite-size, easy-to-grasp-and-implement format of this book. Theres a lot of value in that. But if you need more words, more answers to all your what-ifs and but-what-abouts, Ive got those too. Theyre in my other books, Decluttering at the Speed of Life and How to Manage Your Home Without Losing Your Mind. Feel free to continue your organizing and decluttering journey with those helpful resources!

H ave you ever stared in awe at a friends clean home and wondered, What in the world do they do that I dont do? Or have you felt like your head might explode when that friend claims she never cleans? Let me explain what People Like Them know that People Like Me dont: there are three layers of a clean house, and cleaning is the last layer. If the first two layers are peeled back, cleaning wont be as daunting.

The first layer that has to be removed to get to a clean house is clutter. It simply isnt possible to clean a surface, space, or room that is piled with stuff. Decluttering has to happen for a house to look clean, be cleaned, and stay clean. Quick cleaning tips dont make much of an impact in a house thats overloaded with stuff.

The second layer of a clean house is daily stuff. Certain tasks need to be done every single day, or at least almost every day. (I will teach you the four daily tasks to start with.) Doing a weeks worth of dishes isnt cleaning your house; its catching up on daily stuff. Picking up toys or shoes or math worksheets from the living room floor isnt cleaning; its picking up. Not doing the absolute basics every day means that when you clean, you spend hours excavating the kitchen. By the time youre done, all the cleaning energy you started with is gone.

The third layer is the actual cleaning: dusting, vacuuming, mopping, wiping, and scrubbing. When my house was full of clutter, I was forever behind on daily tasks. Cleaning my house was a huge and daunting project that I continually put off.

Once I peeled back the first two layers of a clean house, I understood those people with perfectly fine houses who said they never cleaned. They were talking about actual cleaning. Thats the beauty of understanding the layers of a clean house. If layers one and two are under control, layer three doesnt feel so urgent.

So, yes, this book will contain tips and tricks, but I want you to know that I understand those of you who balk at Ten Easy Ways to Keep Your House Perfect lists. I understand, because there was a time when I didnt understandand thats the perspective from which I write this book.

I define clutter as anything that continually gets out of control in my own home. Defining clutter this way has improved my home because this definition means clutter is no longer an ambiguous idea. I no longer need to evaluate each item in my home for its potential to be used in the future or how it makes me feel.

Instead, I know that if a space in my home continually gets out of control, theres too much stuff in that space. There is clutter, and I need to declutter that space. If it keeps getting out of control, theres still clutter. I need to keep decluttering until Im able to keep it under control.

Clutter is anything that gets out of control in your home. Clutter is personal. Your Clutter Threshold is why its personal.

You have a Clutter Threshold, and if your home is usually out of control, youre living above it. Your Clutter Threshold is the amount of stuff that you, personally, can easily keep under control in your own home. If your house is constantly falling back into disaster status, you have too much stuff.

The good news is that once you reach your Clutter Threshold, youll like your home more. The bad news is that you can only find your Clutter Threshold by decluttering. Theres no way to predict what your threshold will be. Solve the problem of your home making you crazy by decluttering. Does it still make you crazy? You need to declutter more. Is it still driving you bananas? Keep decluttering.