Purging Your Life

 

 

I remember in university having one essay returned at least four times with the same failing mark and 'edit further' written in red pen.  I was careless with frivolous words so that many times my ideas became lost in fluff.  I learned to editing myself brutally (no sarcastic comments about why I don’t do that with my blog posts). I learned that if you cut out everything that’s not necessary you’ve got a more meaningful story.

 

I highly recommend editing your life.

 

Today’s edit: The rooms in your house, one at a time.

Are you surrounded by clutter in every room in your home?

 

Clutter is visually distracting and stressful — every item that you see demands your mind’s attention, and despite that it is subconscious, these little distractions add up. It’s difficult to have peace and to focus amid this clutter. I recommend that you edit each of the rooms in your house, one per week, until you have de-cluttered your home and made it a peaceful and calming place to be.
 

 

Here’s how:

 

Choose a room to do this week.

Focus on one room, and try to do 15 minutes at a time.  Seven steps to heaven!

 

1) Skip the closets and drawers that are out of sight for now. Focus on the things you can see.
 

2) Like Debt-Snowballing, start with the big things. Is there too much furniture in the room? What is necessary, which furniture do you love, which stuff is just too distracting.

3) Clear all flat surfaces. Desktops, tabletops, counter tops, dressers etc. Remove all papers, piles of stuff, little junk, knick-knacks, anything. Put it on the floor/bed. Now get a trash bag and two boxes. Sort through everything in your pile(s), one item at a time. Each item should be either thrown away in the trash bag, put in one box to give away/sell (to friends, family or charity), or in the other box to put in another room in the house.

4) Put back only a couple select items on the flat surfaces, such as a family photo or something that functionally belongs there.

 

5) Now go around the room and edit what's left.  This may be things on the walls. Be merciless and edit brutally - the more you get rid of the better.

6) Purge and Place. Put recycling out, throw out the trash and take the other box and put that stuff  away where it belongs. 

7) Sit down and look around - enjoy peaceful goodness.

 

Now, this editing process is not a destination, but an ongoing process. It won’t last long if you don’t have a system and develop habits to keep it de-cluttered.

Here’s the system:

SYS1 ~ "A place for everything, and everything in its place"

SYS2 ~ Inbox all incoming papers.  No Piles anywhere

 

SYS3 ~ Clean up at night before bed.

SYS4 ~ Every six months, declutter

Purge away little savers!

Thanks to Zenhabits uncopyright. Ideas taken and edited. He is a great resource.