'Kick the clutter habit' with 'Unstuff Your Life'
BY SANDEE SUITT • SUITT@DNJ.COM • August 27, 2010
If anyone is looking for me today, just check in the kitchen. I'll be there with my head in a cupboard, pulling out all the lid-less plastic containers and doing the sniff test on old jars of spices.
Any container missing a lid or herb that is old enough to have lost its scent will be out of there.
I recently read Andrew J. Mellen's "Unstuff Your Life!" and am determined to follow his advice, at least for organizing the heart of my home, the kitchen.
But then Mellen warns, "The kitchen is not the hub of the house if you're thinking 'war room' or 'command central' or 'Houston, we have a problem.'
"Rather, the kitchen is a workroom. ... It should also be foremost a room that functions well and serves its purpose without any unnecessary complications."
The kitchen, Mellen contends, is to be used solely for the preparation and consumption of meals.
While it's nice for the kids to do their homework at the table while the parents prepare dinner, "the homework doesn't live in the kitchen," Mellen says. "Neither does the checkbook."
Grab a pencil
"Unstuff Your Life!" is very much a workbook. Mellen intends for the reader to carry it with her into the area to be organized and follow his guidelines, circling priorities and marking off checklists.
In the kitchen, we start with writing down everything on the counter.
OK, I've done this, and was shocked at the amount of stuff residing there: "toaster, coffee maker, dead basil plant in pot 12-year-old son made in kindergarten, keys, checkbook, cell phone, bills, purse, school notes, spelling-word flash cards, salt, pepper, olive oil, real lemons, fake lemons, bananas, empty flower vase, wooden spoons, basket of breads. ..." The list goes on and on.
I could never fulfill my Betty Crocker dreams of rolling out the perfect pie crust on this crowded workspace. In fact, it's not even a workspace, I realized. It's a storage place for things that don't have a home.
Mellen's advice is to cull out what is broken or unused. The reader looks back at the list and then circles the items that are essential to have on the countertops. Seldom-used items, like perhaps the toaster, find a home off-counter. The rest of the stuff finds a home, either in the trash, in a donation or garage-sale box, or elsewhere in the kitchen or house.
In Mellen's plan, each item is assigned a logical home, and it stays there, except when in use. And the home is near where the item is used. He explains how to set up work stations in which like items are stored together and nearby, but not in the junk drawer.
The junk drawer? Mellen allows no room for no junk.
"Let's not have a junk drawer that contains all sorts of random things, some of which are clearly trash," Mellen writes. In other words, don't use the drawer as a trash can. Don't stuff receipts or papers into the drawer when they clearly belong in the garbage or an appropriate file. Just put them in the garbage or in the file.
Mellen writes of organizing the home into a world where missing keys and cell phones are not part of the daily stress, where mail does not pile up into an unsightly stack on the table and closets are not filled with unmatched shoes and out-of-style or ragged clothes.
The key? It's really simple. Organize your home and then keep it that way by making a habit of the act of putting things where they belong. You can either put things away immediately when you're finished with them or save a few seconds initially by just throwing your keys and receipts and school papers on a table. But like buying things on credit with interest accrued on your loans, as your clutter grows, interest grows in the form of your time, Mellen explains. Spend a few seconds putting things away in a timely fashion, or let the pile of clutter go and spend many more minutes looking for lost items.
Mellen's advice is methodical but he offers it with a tongue-in-cheek humor that encourages without criticizing. He's the best friend who can tell you honestly, "This place is a mess," without hurting your feelings because he then says, "Let me help you clean it up." He also asks pointed questions to help determine what needs to go and redirects the reader away from rationalizations.
If "elephant bell-bottom hip-hugger jeans" ever come back in style, "you'll buy them at the Gap like everyone else," he writes. As for that pair in your closet: "Let them go."
Sandee Suitt is Lifestyles editor at The Daily News Journal. Contact her at suitt@dnj.com or 615-278-5160.
MY THOUGHTS
the real culprit is the junk drawer. that space we reserve for things that should be thrown or given away. it's hard to let go. in the beginning. especially when you think of the possibility of needing these things again. before you know it, your desk, your room, your house is so cluttered there's no space for anything else.
BY SANDEE SUITT • SUITT@DNJ.COM • August 27, 2010
If anyone is looking for me today, just check in the kitchen. I'll be there with my head in a cupboard, pulling out all the lid-less plastic containers and doing the sniff test on old jars of spices.
Any container missing a lid or herb that is old enough to have lost its scent will be out of there.
I recently read Andrew J. Mellen's "Unstuff Your Life!" and am determined to follow his advice, at least for organizing the heart of my home, the kitchen.
But then Mellen warns, "The kitchen is not the hub of the house if you're thinking 'war room' or 'command central' or 'Houston, we have a problem.'
"Rather, the kitchen is a workroom. ... It should also be foremost a room that functions well and serves its purpose without any unnecessary complications."
The kitchen, Mellen contends, is to be used solely for the preparation and consumption of meals.
While it's nice for the kids to do their homework at the table while the parents prepare dinner, "the homework doesn't live in the kitchen," Mellen says. "Neither does the checkbook."
Grab a pencil
"Unstuff Your Life!" is very much a workbook. Mellen intends for the reader to carry it with her into the area to be organized and follow his guidelines, circling priorities and marking off checklists.
In the kitchen, we start with writing down everything on the counter.
OK, I've done this, and was shocked at the amount of stuff residing there: "toaster, coffee maker, dead basil plant in pot 12-year-old son made in kindergarten, keys, checkbook, cell phone, bills, purse, school notes, spelling-word flash cards, salt, pepper, olive oil, real lemons, fake lemons, bananas, empty flower vase, wooden spoons, basket of breads. ..." The list goes on and on.
I could never fulfill my Betty Crocker dreams of rolling out the perfect pie crust on this crowded workspace. In fact, it's not even a workspace, I realized. It's a storage place for things that don't have a home.
Mellen's advice is to cull out what is broken or unused. The reader looks back at the list and then circles the items that are essential to have on the countertops. Seldom-used items, like perhaps the toaster, find a home off-counter. The rest of the stuff finds a home, either in the trash, in a donation or garage-sale box, or elsewhere in the kitchen or house.
In Mellen's plan, each item is assigned a logical home, and it stays there, except when in use. And the home is near where the item is used. He explains how to set up work stations in which like items are stored together and nearby, but not in the junk drawer.
The junk drawer? Mellen allows no room for no junk.
"Let's not have a junk drawer that contains all sorts of random things, some of which are clearly trash," Mellen writes. In other words, don't use the drawer as a trash can. Don't stuff receipts or papers into the drawer when they clearly belong in the garbage or an appropriate file. Just put them in the garbage or in the file.
Mellen writes of organizing the home into a world where missing keys and cell phones are not part of the daily stress, where mail does not pile up into an unsightly stack on the table and closets are not filled with unmatched shoes and out-of-style or ragged clothes.
The key? It's really simple. Organize your home and then keep it that way by making a habit of the act of putting things where they belong. You can either put things away immediately when you're finished with them or save a few seconds initially by just throwing your keys and receipts and school papers on a table. But like buying things on credit with interest accrued on your loans, as your clutter grows, interest grows in the form of your time, Mellen explains. Spend a few seconds putting things away in a timely fashion, or let the pile of clutter go and spend many more minutes looking for lost items.
Mellen's advice is methodical but he offers it with a tongue-in-cheek humor that encourages without criticizing. He's the best friend who can tell you honestly, "This place is a mess," without hurting your feelings because he then says, "Let me help you clean it up." He also asks pointed questions to help determine what needs to go and redirects the reader away from rationalizations.
If "elephant bell-bottom hip-hugger jeans" ever come back in style, "you'll buy them at the Gap like everyone else," he writes. As for that pair in your closet: "Let them go."
Sandee Suitt is Lifestyles editor at The Daily News Journal. Contact her at suitt@dnj.com or 615-278-5160.
MY THOUGHTS
the real culprit is the junk drawer. that space we reserve for things that should be thrown or given away. it's hard to let go. in the beginning. especially when you think of the possibility of needing these things again. before you know it, your desk, your room, your house is so cluttered there's no space for anything else.
