The Different Types of Clutter Will Change the Way You Deal With Your Belongings Forever
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[00:00:00] If your house is a total wreck and decluttering and organizing never really seemed to make a difference, identifying the different types of clutter and messes will make it so much easier for you to create a tidy, functional home that serves you and your family for years to come.
Hey there, I'm Nicole from The Maximizing Momma, and I am obsessed with creating a home that gives me more peace of mind, more time to myself, and more time with my kids. I teach you the tried and true secrets to clearing your clutter, getting organized, and managing your household in a realistic and sustainable way.
This show is where we talk about things like motherhood, decluttering, organizing, creating routines. Mindset, energy, and everything in between. Our homes are the foundation for the rest of our lives, and it's so important to have a calm, relaxing household so you can have the time, the peace of mind, and [00:01:00] the freedom to truly enjoy motherhood.
So sit back and get ready to take charge of your home.
Hello. Hello and welcome back to the Take Charge of Your Home Show. So in our last episode, we were breaking down how how all clutter is is not created equally. I shared the story of how in my late mother's home, after we first moved in, in 20 18, we had a lot of clutter piling up. But we also had a lot of messes that were left out around our house because. Because we didn't have room for any thing since our storage spaces were bursting at the seams with clutter. And I didn't really understand the difference. Because sometimes. I described my house as messy and other times. I would say that it was clutt ered.
And in the years since since then, since I've been doing this work I've realized that many the people across the world do the same thing. Where they're using the words, [00:02:00] messy and cluttered interchangeably. But when this happens, it becomes very easy to blur the lines between how to ditch the mess and how to clear the clutter. And then you end up . Accidentally treating all of the chaos in your home the exact same way by just shuffling it all from room to room to make your house look more neat and orderly so today I have a better solution that will change the way that you deal with your belongings for ever .
It will make it super easy for you to distinguish the messes from the clutter, so you can easily clean up and tidy the messes and effectively sort through the the clutter and begin to get it all out of your your house. It's called the Big Three Messes and and here's how it works. Every single item that is causing you trouble in your home, will fall into one of three categories . An everyday mess [00:03:00] that needs to be put put back where it belongs. Homeless clutter that does not have a dedicate dedicated home. Or accumulated clutter that is piling up and accumulating in places. So let's go over each of them in more detail.
So everyday messes are going to be any item in your home that are getting left out that need to be put back where they belong. And this can truly be any thing that already has a dedicated spot where it belongs, it's just not getting put there. Even trash because trash belongs in the trash can, right. Or dishes or laundry, whether they're dirty or clean because dirty dishes need to go in the dishwasher and clean dishes need to go in the cabinets and dirty laundry should go in the hamper. And if you have laundry baskets full of clean clothes that are setting out around your home, they need to be put away. Or if your kid's toys are strewn all over the place, or if you come home every day and you just throw the mail [00:04:00] on the counters and it needs to get put back where it belongs. These are all going to be everyday messes. And the antidote to these items is that you need to pick them up and put them all back where they belong.
No. I know that seems easier said than done, but a huge mistake that I see so many people make in their homes is where they're trying to tidy everything up randomly, trying to make an entire space look more orderly. So instead of doing that, just focus on finding the everyday messes and putting them all back where they go.
And the second of the Big Three Messes is homeless clutter. And this will be any item that is left out in your home because you don't know where to put it because it does not have a permanent dedicated spot where it belongs. It could be that you have never found a home for something, or it could be that you don't have room for something, or you just don't know what to do with something. So as an example, [00:05:00] In our old house before the fire, we had library books that were stacked on top of the cube shelf, because I didn't know where to put them. I had tried putting library books in the cube shelf mixed in with my kids, other books. And I learned from that mistake one day when I went to go return the library books and I left half of them at home because I mixed them up with our regular books. So from then on out, I started stacking them on top of the cube shelf because I didn't have anywhere else to put them.
So they became homeless clutter. Now in this rent house that we're currently staying in, a lot of our things have actually become homeless. A lot of the things that we have acquired since the fire, it's all homeless because we don't have small pieces of furniture. We don't have bookshelves and desks and and nightstands and all those types of. Smaller furniture pieces, we don't have any containers [00:06:00] or bins or baskets or anything like that. So, My kids' toys they're just left on their floor because we literally don't have anywhere else to put them. I noticed earlier today that we have some of those scented plugins that you would plug into your wall, they're just sitting on our microwave, uh, along with batteries. Now, normally centered plugins and batteries would go on a junk drawer, right. But in this house, we actually only have three drawers in the kitchen and they're all being used for kitchen utensils and things like that. So, We need to find a home for the scented plugins and the batteries. But right now we just don't have a home, and therefore those things have become homeless clutter. Now for most people who have a household with regular amounts of stuff, your junk drawers where your scented plugins and your batteries would typically go, your junk drawers are likely full and [00:07:00] bursting at the seams with stuff. And therefore you don't have room to put the batteries and that's why they're getting left out on your microwave. But that's just one example. Like I said, any item that is left out because you don't know where to put it, that is going to be homeless clutter. And the antidote for homeless clutter is that you need to find a permanent dedicated home for every one of those items.
Now, finally, the third of the Big Three Messes is accumulated clutter, and this is going to be any type of area in your home where you have clutter piling up and accumulating. It could be in closets, drawers, cabinets, or shelves, or even bags or boxes or bins, or even piles of stuff. It's anywhere where clutter is piling up and accumulating. And the antidote to the accumulated clutter is that you need to sort through all of [00:08:00] it and decide what you want to keep and what you want to let go of.
Now. The Big Three Messes. It will truly change the way that you deal with all of your belongings forever, because every single item that is giving you trouble in your home will fall into one of those three categories. And when you're sorting through your accumulated clutter, every single item that you choose to keep will either become an everyday mess that needs to be put away, or it will become homeless clutter that you need to find a home for. So when you can really identify the big three messes in your home, You will be able to deal with every one of your items, every one of your belongings, strategically and with intention, which is the entire goal. So instead of grouping your things together and trying to make each space [00:09:00] look more orderly, instead of shuffling your things around and tackling the surface level of your home repeatedly as you deal with all the same items in the same areas... Instead of doing all of that, because it doesn't really work anyway, you can prioritize each of the Big Three Messes strategically. Now, this is exactly what we covered in our recent live workshop, How to Keep a Neat and Tidy Home.
So, if you want to learn more about how to handle the Big Three Messes, be sure to catch the replay of the workshop because we have another live event, our third and final live event happening the last week of September, that will give you a holistic plan to deal with the Big Three Messes and to help you get organized. So you can have more breathing room in your home and your life. So I'm going to drop all the links in the show notes, the link to catch the replay for our recent workshop where you [00:10:00] can find out more about the Big Three Messes. And the link to save your seat for our upcoming three-day challenge where we're going to be tackling these items together. And also one more thing, if you know in your bones that you are ready to take charge of your home and have a simplified way to create a calm, peaceful, organized household, well, I'm opening the doors to my signature program, Cluttered to Calm later this month. It is a very comprehensive, first class course that will unite everything that you could possibly need to tidy, de clutter, organize, and maintain a well-run functional household that serves you and your family for years to come. And when you joined the VIP waitlist, you can save $75 off enrollment when the doors open later this month. So I'm going [00:11:00] to drop that link in the show notes as well. We have a lot of really incredible things happening over the next couple of weeks to help you get your home in order before the busiest most wonderful time of the year. So if you have been waiting for a good time to start decluttering and organizing, this is your chance.
Okay. So today you learned about the big three messages and you now know what to do with the everyday messes. You know that you need to put them all back where they belong. You also know that you need to find a permanent dedicated spot for the homeless clutter. And you know that you need to start sorting through your accumulated clutter. But that begs the question. What should you do if you have all three, if you have everyday messes that need put away, and you have homeless clutter that you don't know what to do with, and you also have piles of [00:12:00] accumulated clutter. How on earth could you possibly tackle all three of those? Especially when you consider how tidying, decluttering, and organizing at the same time doesn't really work. Well, in our next episode, we're going to be breaking down what you should do to tackle your entire household when you're struggling with everyday messes, homeless clutter and accumulated clutter, because there is an entire concept that you need to be prioritizing in order to really tackle these messes and clear away some of the clutter. So that way you can have a more tidy, peaceful, orderly home. And the space and the peace of mind to go all in on decluttering. I'm going to be publishing that episode later this week, so go ahead and subscribe to the Take Charge of Your Home Show so that way you don't miss it. And in the meantime, don't forget to check out all the links below in the show notes. So that way you can [00:13:00] catch the replay for our recent live workshop, How to Keep a Neat and Tidy Home, and you can save your seat for our upcoming three-day challenge, Breathing Room. And also you can add your name to the waitlist for Cluttered to Calm, which is going to be opening later this month. So check out all those links in the show notes and get signed up and I will talk to you soon. Bye.
Thank you for listening to another episode of the Take Charge of Your Home Show. Go ahead and take a few moments to celebrate yourself for being here, doing this work, and really learning how to create a calm, relaxing home. Don't forget to check out the show notes and feel free to leave a rating and a review so I can know what you want to hear more about because you and your journey are what make this show a reality.
I'll see you next time.
