Why You Need to Make Office Decluttering a Habit

It’s not enough to declutter once or even occasionally. In order to truly keep clutter at bay and stay organized, you must make regular office decluttering a habit. In today’s post, learn why you need to make office decluttering a habit and where to start!

Why You Need to Make Office Decluttering a Habit

Clutter is sneaky. It slips in unnoticed like a practiced burglar, and before you know it, you’re drowning in stuff and cluttered nonsense.

But there’s a simple way to beat this sly robber of all things calm and peaceful: regular decluttering!

By creating a habit of regular office decluttering you can kick clutter out of your office before it has a chance to grow and expand and throw you off your game!

Before we jump in here’s an important caveat: please, please know that this is a judgement-free zone. We’ve all lost the battle against clutter at one time or another. We’ve all felt the negative emotions that clutter evokes. We’re in this together and there’s no judgement here. 🙂

The Negative Impacts of Clutter

Before we jump into the how, let’s talk more about why regular decluttering is important and the negative impacts of clutter.

Clutter is a thief.

Plain and simple.

It steals your:

• Time – How much time did you waste searching for that doodad?
• Space – There’s no place to sit down and actually work!
• Money – How many do you own?
• Physical Energy – How many times have I shuffled that pile from here to there and back again?
• Emotional Energy – How much guilt, shame, and overwhelm have you suffered because of clutter?
• Storage Space – Could I find something more meaningful and peaceful to store here (maybe even just some open space)?
• Attention – Clutter is constantly competing for your attention and stealing it from your most important people and goals!

But clutter isn’t just a thief.

It also adds a few choice things to your life. Lovely things like:

• Stress
• Overwhelm
• Guilt
• Shame
• Overload
• Frustration

It’s impossible to focus, let alone rest or relax, when clutter is stealing from you, revving up your emotions, and piling on the stress!

Why Regular Decluttering is Important

In case you aren’t yet convinced to go ham on clearing clutter, here are a few more reasons why regular decluttering is important.

Decluttering helps you to:

• Manage the Ebb and Flow of Stuff: Often items come into your life because you need them, but when they’ve outlived their usefulness, they don’t leave. You have to kick them out! Regular decluttering helps you to clear out items that are no longer needed or useful.
• Maintain open space: There’s something very calming about seeing open space. Regular decluttering will help you clear a little space so you can enjoy the resulting calm.
• Pay More Attention: As mentioned above, clutter is constantly competing for your attention. By clearing the clutter through a regular decluttering habit, you’ll have fewer distractions and less decision fatigue which means you’ll be better able to focus on the important stuff.
• Increase Your Energy: A little open space + fewer distractions + less decision fatigue = more energy for the important stuff (see the bullet above).
• Have More Time: No more wasting time rooting through piles for items or shuffling stacks to make room to work, because those piles and stacks are G.O.N.E., baby!

Convinced that you need a regular office decluttering habit?

Yay!

Want to learn how to build that habit already?!

Read on, my friend!

How to Build a Regular Office Decluttering Habit

Establishing a regular office decluttering habit is simple.

But it’s not easy….

But you can totally do this! And you’ll reap the rewards in spades!

Here are a few steps that will help you to build a regular office decluttering habit.

#1 Clear the clutter

If you haven’t decluttered in a long time (or ever), you might want to set aside time to complete a full office clutter kick out.

It can be helpful to give yourself a fresh start or at least a bit of a head start.

Here are two posts that will help you with this:

• Spring Clean and Declutter Your Office in 4 Steps (Psst, it’s not just for springtime!)
• 8 Steps to an Organized Home Office

Or if you want a step-by-step option with lots of support and encouragement, sign up for my 7-Day Office Organization Challenge!

#2 Schedule a regular time to declutter

Once you’ve gotten a jump start on clearing the clutter, you need to schedule a regular time to declutter.

It’s best, especially in the beginning, to declutter every workday. By decluttering a little bit each day, you’ll establish the habit faster and more easily.

Just 10-15 minutes each day is often enough! I like to set my timer and declutter for a few minutes at the end of each workday.

Find the time that works best for you!

#3 Break your office into decluttering focus areas

The birth of decluttering focus areas:

I started tje timer for 15 minutes, feeling fired up and ready to bust a move on clutter:

“I want to declutter today, but I’m not sure where to start….

How about here….

Or what about over there….

Oh, there’s a lot of stuff in this corner….

Just look at the piles on this surface….“

*Timer goes off. Completed NO decluttering.*

Face palm.

We’re not going to do that, m’kay?!

At least not again.

By breaking your office into focus areas and assigning one focus area to each week in the month, you’ll avoid the decision fatigue and lack of focus demonstrated above by a totally random person. Not me. 😉

Break your office into focus areas in any way that makes sense to you.

Here’s how my office focus areas breakdown as an FYI:

• #1: Desk (including file drawer)
• #2: Wall with the Bookshelves
• #3: Closet
• #4: Floor and the Corner by the Window

If you can create four or fewer focus areas (say that 10 times fast), then it will be easy for you to declutter one area each week of the month.

If you have more than four, try to consolidate. As you work through these areas for a few months you’ll know which can be combined and which areas need an entire week all their own.

#4 Track Your Progress Until It’s a Habit

I’m all about tracking progress! It helps to keep you focused and on track.

So, here’s a habit tracker to help you make decluttering a regular habit.

Grab your habit tracker HERE!

Why You Need to Make Office Decluttering a Habit

It’s not enough to declutter one time or even occasionally. In order to truly keep clutter at bay, you must make regular office decluttering a habit! In today’s post you learned why you need to make office decluttering a habit and you picked up some tips on how to build that habit!

I hope you found today’s post helpful!

Related Posts

If you enjoyed today’s post, you might find these related posts helpful:

• My Favorite Clutter-Busting Tool for the Office
• 10 Quick and Easy Ways to Declutter Your Desk
• The #1 Habit You Need to Make Office Organization Successful

How has clutter impacted your work time? And what clutter-busting tricks have you picked up?

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