It happens pretty much every time I declutter or straighten or whatever.

I think I’m done and I smile smugly and turn away from my totally finished project.

Only to run smack dab into One More Thing.

One more thing that needs to go in the spot I just filled as full as it can be before it morphs into a mess.

One more thing I can’t believe I didn’t see in all the time I was focusing on dealing with this space I truly believe I deserve to no longer have to deal with.

One more thing that makes me question whether my new “solution” will actually work, and whether there’s ever any point whatsoever in trying to come up with a solution since things like this happen to me every single time I think I’ve made progress.

Yes. I’m aware of my tendency to be over-dramatic.

But even though I initially reacted in the same old way, I used my hard-earned knowledge to deal with this problem.

I practiced the One In One Out Rule.

I’d found some old burp cloths that I now use as cleaning rags. Using them means they’re not clutter, y’know.

But the container for cleaning cloths was full. My auto-response was to pile them on anyway, tucking a corner in here or there and convincing myself they’d stay under control and not spill out everywhere.

My auto-response isn’t usually a good thing.

As soon as I realized what was happening, I took out enough of the microfiber cloths to make room for the burp cloths. That’s how one in one out works. I got to keep what I wanted to keep because I made room in the container by getting rid of things I didn’t love as much.

That’s the Container Concept.

That plastic box determined how many cleaning cloths I could keep. No analysis or math or hem-haw-pondering was necessary.

Yay for grasping concepts that once eluded me.

 

No idea what the Container Concept is? Here’s the post where I finally understood it:

Ooooh! “Contain”er . . . Now I Get It!

And a few more that might help:

Baskets? Oh. I get it now.

One In One Out

Containers and Limits and How They’ll Change Your Life – the podcast

One In One Out – Podcast

 

And . . . today’s affiliate links: Microfiber cloths, plastic shoe box sized containers.

 

There’s a difference between a ridiculously cluttered table and a table with stuff on it. Even a table with too much stuff on it. Oh. You don’t think there is? Well, it’s my blog and I say so. There is. Oh the dining room table. The bane of my Slob Existence. The glorious flat surface […]

Read More

It’s déjà vu, y’all. (And yes, I had to google how to spell déjà vu and then copy/paste it to get the marks correct.) Remember a while back when I revealed the scary underbelly of my living room couch? And then remember when I had to let washing machine delivery men into the house just […]

Read More