Make A Difference In Your Home's Messy Look And Declutter These Common Items

Messy homes happen. It doesn't matter if you have pets, children, roommates, or if you live alone — clutter can sometimes catch up to you. And when it does, it can be overwhelming to figure out how to clean up and get organized again. That said, having a strategy for your cleanup will help reduce the project's stress, as will attacking the whole mess in bite-sized increments rather than all at once. 

The best first step for tackling clutter is to conduct a "trash walk" around your house and collect anything that should be in the garbage or recycling bin. Yep, decluttering with purpose starts by removing trash and recyclables that don't belong in your space anymore. Just make sure you know which unexpected items you really shouldn't put in your recycling bin, so you don't have to sort through them again later.

Trash walks are great because, although you may think that your space is a cluttered mess, once you go through and get rid of the stuff that should or could be thrown away, you'll likely realize the room isn't quite as messy as you thought it was. Nonetheless, even picking up things you can easily get rid of can be overwhelming if there are too many of them, which means it's important to take some extra precautions during your trash walk — including things like setting a five-minute time limit per room. Basically, think of it as soft decluttering: making progress without committing to a full reorganization.

To break the steps down more easily, grab a trash bag and a paper bag — use the trash bag for garbage and the paper bag for recyclables — and start in one room of your house. Pick up trash — as in, anything that is considered actual garbage, like wrappers, tissues, and empty plastic packages — along with recyclables, like empty boxes and paper bags. If one of the bags gets full while you're still in the same room, grab another and keep going. 

Once the trash and recyclables are cleaned up in the first room, head into the next one. If you can't get it all done in one day, spend a few days working through it instead. Remember, stick to five minutes per room, focus only on the surface layer, and don't dedicate a whole day to decluttering right now. The idea is to make this easier, less of a chore, and a manageable task that doesn't overwhelm you.

Moving forward, to keep this tactic going, make a plan to start each day with a quick five-minute trash walk through your entire home. This way, you'll prevent the buildup of this type of mess over time and develop an easy habit that leads to a clutter-free space.