When the itch to declutter hits, my natural tendency is to tackle a junk drawer or the linen closet or some other hidden, cluttered space.
Those spaces need to be decluttered, but I can’t start there.
Using up my decluttering energy in a space no one sees (and that rarely gets used) means the house as a whole won’t look any better after all my work.
I have to follow the Visibility Rule.
I make myself focus on tackling a visible space that I see every day but I might have stopped noticing.
My home looks better and my family functions better and the visible progress encourages me to keep decluttering!
And renewed decluttering energy is way better than still wanting to hide when the doorbell rings after working all day long on a space no visitor would have a reason to see.
Which I’ve totally had happen.
Need more words about the Visibility Rule to help you wrap your brain around it?
Don’t worry. I have lots of words:
How to Prioritize Decluttering Projects
Visibility, Visibility, Visibility – Podcast
Visibility Rule Deep Dive – Podcast
Visibility Rules Ins and Outs – Podcast
My book, which goes deep into the whole decluttering process, using the Visibility Rule throughout: Decluttering at the Speed of Life.
Following the visibility rule for decluttering is a great way to stay motivated. When I clean and declutter an area that nobody including myself can readily see I lose interest quickly. Great article!
This is great advice! I walked around my house around New Year’s and made a list of all my problem areas and marked them with stars (1for quick&easy, 4 for the big jobs) and taped it to the fridge. I have definitely noticed that I can keep the momentum snowballing when I tackle visible spaces first, or at least heavily-used spaces like the pantry. Feels so good! I figured I’d be doing one or two tasks a week, but it’s been more like two or three a day!
I use a combination of visible and easily do-able. I started with a frequently used drawer (I don’t have a junk drawer). The 5 or 6 minutes it took to finish the task motivated me to continue to the chair where I stash my library books and needlework, an ongoing problem in full view. Weeks later the drawer is still neat. A pleasure each time I need something stored there. Opening the drawer reminds me that I can finish a task. The chair was emptied and refilled several times, but I keep at it!
I am what my husband calls a “flat-surface-sprawler.” Any counter top or table or anything can become my dumping ground. The visibility rule helps me with those flat surfaces. Once they go where I know I will look for them, then I can tackle a drawer to put the things that need to go inside away! I also bought little containers for inside the drawers.
My husband does the opposite of this, and it drives me nuts! Instead of picking up the most visible clutter, he starts reorganizing the most obscure stuff in the back of the closet, and ends up with more stuff “out”!
On the visibility rule and its importance in decluttering…and giving you the inspiration you need to CONTINUE the work of decluttering.
When my son was 2 and newly diagnosed with autism, my sister came to visit me once to help me cope and specifically to help me declutter my mess of a house. Ours was a two income earning household with two kids.
I was still in shock from the diagnosis of autism for my son, Luke. I was starting my son on a gluten free, dairy free diet that was meant to help clear up his skin and other autistic symptons. I already tried taking away dairy and had seen immediate improvement. He seemed brighter, more engaged and his eyecontact improved.
Now I needed help getting the cupboards organized to make room for all his wheatfree foods and to put the gluten options out of reach if not even out of the house. I was overwhelmed because this was just one of the many ways I had to try to change our environment to “organize for autism” to give him the structure and organization to allow therapists in the house and a place for them to work with him without tripping over all the mess of toys and paperwork and junk mail and important mail and bills to pay and insurance EOBs and letters of medical necessity and appeals and receipts and so much other stuff of life. She and I did get a lot accomplished but in the afternoon when I started to fade I noticed she was spending all this energy decluttering a basket of business cards and rubber bands and pens and notepads, receipts, etc on top of the microwave.
she kept asking me: Do you need this? (receipt, business card, broken pencil) and I realized: This is the biggest waste of her help! it’s taking forever and that basket wasn’t even a problem (Now I know why: It is what Dana White calls “the container concept,” it was contained! all in a relatively small, utilitary, handy basket… where I knew to go when looking for a business card or rubber band or pen…right next to the landline phone and calendar. it was working for me)
Not that I didn’t appreciate her help but I agree: it’s import to focus on the VISIBLE clutter that is ACTUALLY stressing you out, not the clutter that isn’t or is only a vague bit of disquiet but hidden away in a drawer or basement.
Still, that’s why I slightly disagree with Dana’s idea that “stuff shifting” isn’t decluttering. Because, f I move books/reading material/paper clutter to the basement (which I know Dana doesn’t have one) it means that it IS one step closer to getting outta the house. Stuff there in the basement is outta sight, outta mind and it is easier to toss it later after I realize: “No, I never am going to read that book, need those insurance EOBs, school papers, medical articles etc.” AND it is so much easier to throw it in a bag and toss it down there so I can have company over (in this case, Luke’s home therapists) than trying to go thru it all and organize it, file it or toss it.)
When we cleaned out my dad’s house after he died, I found many bags just like that of various papers in their utility room… I actually enjoyed going thru it … like little time capsules of old bills, long paid off, community directories from the 70s, 80s, old school paperwork, shopping lists for dinners long over. It could ALL go in the trash now, later rather than sooner, but it didn’t impede my parents’ ability to entertain and have bridge parties and stuff back in the 70s while they were in their prime and we were messy teens. “Just make your bed and CLOSE your door,” mom would say about the messes in our rooms when they had company. Making the bed would make the room look at least 50 % cleaner and the rest? well, she wasn’t going to let that ruin her day. She had better things to ask us to do (like vacuum the living room and clean the bathrooms and dust before their company came)
When my mom got sick (with ALS) , dad got a maid who forced him to declutter somewhat (or at least make piles of IRS stuff to bag up) …
Dad wished he could be more organized with all the paperwork, but he had a lot to take care of from my mom’s illness where he had to take over all the hosuehold duties, plus running Mom’s family’s chicken farm that had been in her family since the 1700s…but it was in NC and we lived in VA so it was a lot of coordination with the man who ran it and accountants in that state etc.
“I’m just leaving it all for you to deal with when I die he said of the clutter, bagged up and hid in utility room and the boxes that had come from his own parents’ home when they died” …I just can’t deal with it. So he left it out of sight, out of mind and lived a really active life until he died suddenly (no warning) at age 87.
I admired he could compartmentalize the clutter and do so many OTHER things with his time: bible study, family and Navy reunions, lunches with friends, cooking pies and soups to bring friends, funeral-going, traveling…
I let my stuff WEIGH me down. I’m trying, w/ inspiration from Dana’s podcast, to get it to a point where I can be more like Dad. Because emptying my childhood home, while a huge task, was so much easier for me than him. My sister and I COULD toss all his old letters and keepsakes and moldy books from HIS parents that had sat boxed up for 50 years when HIS parents died.
Not everyone has the time or ability to declutter this way, I CAN do it, but I need “inspiration” and listening to Dana’s podcast really helps. ESPECIALLY her concept of “make it better, not perfect” DO NOT do what experts say and empty an entire closet … instead just grab out the trash, then the things you can part with that are over crowding the space, then STOP because “life happens” and you have other things to attend to.
I’ve been meaning to reline ALL my kitchen drawers and cabinets and bought the shelf paper over 2 years ago. Finally the other day I was about to empty the dishwasher silverware into the silverware drawer that was lined only with wrinkly wax paper (I’d lined it that way before I bought the new shelf paper)
Wait a second… the drawer is already HALF empty, what if I took the rest out RIGHT NOW and cut up a piece of shelf paper to replace this wrinkly wax paper?
I did it! it all took less than half an hour and now I just LOVE opening up the silverware drawer and seeing it look so nice and neat. That was DANA’s doing. Otherwise my “project brain” would have continued to look at the kitchen relining of the shelves as an all day project and it would still be undone because WHO HAS HALF A DAY to devote to a project like that that is neither “urgent” nor “important”?
But I was so happy with how it looked that I continued the next day with 2 more drawers .. and best of all , I know that when I choose to attack ONE more cupboard, it will be done realtively quickly and not take up my entire day so that I CAN go about all the business of living as well as decluttering/cleaning.
THANK YOU, Dana K. White.
(Sorry to write a book! Hope I didn’t go over word limit… but this comment/blog post qualifies , stream of conscious as it is, as my weekly essay for my Personal History, memoir writing group which started in 20 minutes ago! better late than never and I’ll be attending vs. staying home to declutter (visable OR invisible clutter 🙂
So yes, as Dana advocates: I do support her strategies for “decluttering at the speed of life, not light.” Thanks again for the inspiration, support, and validation.
While the visibility rule is great for motivation, it doesn’t solve the problem for me. I have to declutter the hidden spaces – the closets, cabinets, and drawers – so that I know how much space I really have and how much I can actually keep without everything sitting out everywhere. I can’t put things AWAY if “away” is full of junk.
I read somewhere to take photos. Somehow you see the mess more in a photo as you get used living with things and don’t ‘see’ them anymore. I tried it once and it helped. Now I’m in a new house with boxes EVERYWHERE. Doing the visual method first
Yes Dana, I learned this simple trick from you it is so helpful. AFTER doing the dishes and tidying the kitchen, I look for anything else ‘left out’ that day (or week), and get set putting things where they belong. This isn’t decluttering, but for me it goes hand in hand now. When my messy areas are tidy, I want everything else to get tidied up and I can do a small decluttering task, and over time that adds up to a load to drop off the next time i make a run to town. Well worth it to keep the momentum.
Many of your tips have helped my brain see things in a different way, and my family is thankful for that. Less clutter is less stress! Plain and simple. Less IS more…
My problem is my kitchen counter, it is too long 9 feet. It is wonderful when company comes and we have a big pot luck. but when nobody is coming it becomes a big space to fill up with almost nothing. I see it all the time, and I must use this visibility thing, more often. I uncluttered it one day, and then 3 days later it is cluttered again.
I agree JS, I wanted to clean my studio and then realised if I cleaned out the drawers & cupboard in the walk-in robe I could make room to store more stuff I needed to keep in there. This would lessen the amount of visual stuff on display in the room and things would look more organised and neater and I’d be very proud of myself. This is my goal for tomorrow! Wish me luck!