What’s so wrong with having a cluttered home? Well, whether it’s old clothing piling up in the wardrobe (or on the floor), stacks of papers on your desk, or just a lot of ‘stuff’ all over the place, the fact is that a cluttered house is not a relaxing place to be – whether consciously or subconsciously, clutter causes stress.

However, the house of decluttering can be just as stressful, especially if you have a busy schedule and if you don’t know where to start. The good news is we’re here to help with both of those issues; we’ve got some useful advice about how to declutter your home in one day, so keep reading to find out more.

Have A Goal

Before you can start with your decluttering task, think about the areas of your home that really do need the most attention. Once you’ve worked that out, create a list of specific goals you want to achieve by the end of your one day of decluttering, starting with the jobs that will focus on the worst areas.

Your list could include decluttering your wardrobe, organising your kitchen cabinets, or perhaps clearing out your home office – it doesn’t matter what it is as long as you have an excellent place to start and you know how you want things to look by the end of the day.

Gather Supplies

Surely the last thing you’ll need when you’re decluttering is more stuff in the house? That’s true, but when you’re gathering supplies to help you declutter, they’re not going to make more mess – they’re going to reduce it.

The supplies we’re talking about could include bin bags, storage containers, cardboard boxes, markers for labelling those boxes and cleaning supplies. If you’ve got everything on hand to get the job done, you won’t have to keep stopping to find those items, and your focus and flow won’t be broken, making you a lot more productive.

Don’t Organise

What do we mean when we say don’t organise? It’s sometimes hard to know the difference between decluttering and organising, and the former is a lot more useful than the latter, so working that difference out is crucial.

Decluttering is all about getting rid of items you no longer need or use, but organising is more about keeping those items and just arranging them in a tidier way – as you can see, there is quite a difference here. Start by sorting through each item and decide whether to keep, donate, recycle, or reuse it, and be as ruthless as possible because your home will be much clearer and less stressful.

Use The Four-Box Method

The four-box method is a really simple but fantastically effective way to declutter your home. You only need to label four boxes with ‘keep’, ‘donate’, ‘sell’, and ‘rubbish’. As you go through each item, put it in the right box based on what you want to do with it. When you work in this way, it speeds up the process and makes sure that you look at every item and decide about it.

Whether you’re decluttering because you’re about to decorate your home, because you’re moving and want your North London removals company to have less to take from place to place, or simply because you want a more comfortable place to live, working in a methodical way like this will undoubtedly help you declutter in just one day.

Set A Timer

One of the problems with decluttering is that even if you start off with all good intentions, sooner or later, you’re going to start getting tired and distracted – after all, decluttering isn’t the most entertaining or fun thing in the world to do, and you’ll probably rather be doing something else. That’s why the slightest disruption means you’ll get distracted, and the job might not get finished at all.

The best way to combat this is to set a timer for 30 minutes at a time. You can speed through half an hour of decluttering without getting too unfocused, knowing that at the end, you can take a ten-minute break to do something more fun. Set a timer at the end of ten minutes and head back to decluttering for another 30 minutes, and soon enough, you’ll find you’re really making progress.

Reward Yourself

It’s really important to look back at everything you’ve achieved over the course of a day and reward yourself in whatever way suits you best once you’re done. Whether it’s enjoying a cup of tea in your newly organised kitchen or taking a luxurious bath in a spotless bathroom, the good feeling you get will help motivate you to do more when the time comes.