BR-day1
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[00:00:00] Welcome, welcome, welcome to day one of the Breathing Room Challenge. I am so excited to have you here. This is one of my favorite times of the year because what we're going to be going over over the next couple of days is going to change the way that you deal with your household forever.
Now, while you're watching this, I would love to hear your breakthroughs and your biggest takeaways. So you can take a screenshot of you watching this challenge, this live session. You can snap a photo of your computer and just send me a DM and tag me on social media. Whether you're on TikTok, Facebook, or Instagram, you can just search the Maximizing Momma and it will come right.
Now, you are in the right spot if you have been trying to get organized, if you've been trying to get your house in order, but it keeps getting cluttered and messy again and again. Also, you're in the right spot if you know the value of having an orderly, peaceful home. And if you feel like [00:01:00] you're spending all of your time tidying up and dealing with your belongings.
However, you're not in the right spot. This challenge, this live session is not really going to be a good fit for you. If you have a fixed mindset and you're not willing to try new things, because what I'm going to share over the next couple of days is not like anything you've heard before now, unless you've been in one of my challenges before.
If you are new to me and the Maximizing Momma and my brand and my community, Then this is going to be all new information to you, and you must be willing to try new things because it's going to make a huge difference in your home. You're also not in the right spot. If this, the chaos and the piles and the clutter and the messes, if that doesn't really bother you, because.
That that's great. If that's the case, some people, it just doesn't affect them. And if that's so, then you can take that as a sign that this is not one of your top priorities right now. [00:02:00] And you're also not in the right spot. If you do not have 20 minutes to spare each day. But today what you're going to learn is why the traditional behaviors and actions that you've been doing in your home They're not really making a difference You're gonna learn the peaceful home roadmap that will get you a tidy Peaceful home once and for all and you will learn the big three messes Which is my unique method that will make it very easy for you You know for you to know exactly what to do with every single item in your home So I'm going to go over a bit of my story very quickly in case some of you have never met me before.
If you're wondering, you know, who is this woman? Why is she qualified to teach me all of this? So my name is Nicole. I'm a mom of four. I'm a part time bartender, an animal lover, a chronic illness lawyer, and I'm a decluttering coach who my favorite thing in the world is having free time to myself. In 2016, [00:03:00] right when my youngest child was born, my house was overflowing with stuff, and I organized every single inch of it.
Then, We downsized into my late mother's house, and we truly did not have room for all of our belongings. This photo right here on the right is what our garage looked like right after we downsized into that house. So I, that's when I realized like, Oh my God, I need to get rid of some of this extra stuff.
And I started decluttering one step at a time and I made incredible progress. I got rid of a lot of things from my house. This is what my garage looked like afterward about two years later. However, my house was getting messier than ever. So I really focused most of my decluttering efforts on my garage since it was literally stacked to the ceiling.
And the more that I was decluttering and letting go of stuff from my garage and creating space, the worse the inside of my house was getting. I was spent. All of my time [00:04:00] tidying up, and I was constantly overwhelmed and stressed out and pissed off, really. But what really drove me to make a change was when I realized that I had spent years cleaning up after my kids childhoods, and I had missed out on their baby and toddler years with nothing to really show for it.
I literally have like, No photos. I mean, of course, we lost everything in a house fire, but the photos that I had taken on my phone. I think I probably have like less than 10 over a two year period of me with my of my kids and very, very few of me actually with my kids. I have no memories because I was so consumed.
With trying to get my house in order and so stressed out and just counting down the hours until bedtime. And so once I realized this, I decided that I was not going to waste any more of my time. I was never going to miss out on any special memory or moment or even let a month pass [00:05:00] me by where. My household was holding me back from being the present mom that I had dreamed of being for my entire life.
And I'm going to try not to cry here because that was always my goal. My mother, growing up, she was a single mom. She was a very bad alcoholic. She worked hard her whole life, and I was raised by babysitters and friends, and so I vowed to myself as a young child that I would always be there for my kids.
And so when I had this realization that, like, I wasn't there for them because I was so stressed out by my home, I was like, We're going to make a change. I'm not going to let this continue happening. The good news is that I eventually uncovered the roadmap that helped me gain traction in my home and make more progress than I had made in years, even more progress than I made decluttering and letting go of decades worth of stuff.
And today I'm going to share that strategy with you too, so that way you can have more [00:06:00] breathing room in your home. In the last year, I have helped over 150 people transform their households so they can have breathing room, peace of mind, and free time to make memories with their kids and with their loved ones, or even just free time for themselves.
So let's get started. Go ahead and drop the word, let's go, in the chat if you're ready to find out how to get more breathing room in your home.
Now the first thing that I want to talk about is why you're here. Because awareness is always the first step. You're here because. You want to have a tidy, clutter free home. Karen said, let's go. Sue said, let's go. Elizabeth said, let's go. So I'm going to take a stab in the dark and assume that you all want to have a tidy, clutter free home.
And as a result, you have been [00:07:00] downloading decluttering checklists and cleaning schedules. You're pinning organizing ideas on Pinterest, and you're watching Clean With Me YouTube videos. And that really amounts to any given week, you're doing some of all of this stuff that you see on the screen, the cluttering a drawer, organizing your counters, tidying up your living room, deep cleaning your bathroom, shuffling things around, buying new baskets and bins and home edit containers on top of the laundry, the dishes, the meals, the trash on top of all of that stuff.
So you're doing all of these things. randomly within any given week. And the thing is that all of those things do need to be done. They all fall under the umbrella of what I call your home life. So you've been piecemealing solutions together from different corners of the internet, trying to figure out how to make this all work for you, your lifestyle and your household.
[00:08:00] You're trying to figure out how to make All of these tasks that need, that fall under your home life, you're trying to figure out how to piece them together. But if there's no rhyme or reason for when you're doing these tasks, you end up stuck in an endless cycle where you're living in a never ending groundhog day.
You're kind of wading through piles of stuff, cleaning up the same messes, and tidying the same areas. And you're having to do it all the time, with no end in sight. The problem is that all of those home life solutions that you've been trying, they were all developed to help people maintain their homes.
So the cleaning, the tidying, the decluttering a drawer and organizing your counters or practicing a daily reset. All those different things that you've been trying, they were all created to help people maintain their homes. They were never ever developed to help somebody organize a [00:09:00] messy and cluttered home.
But nobody's saying that. No one is talking about how there are several different phases that you might be in with your household. No one is talking about how of course it's easy for that one expert to keep a tiny house because she doesn't have any clutter. Because she already cleared it all away.
So these home life solutions that I'm talking about, the cleaning, tidying, decluttering, organizing, all that stuff, those things were all developed to help people prevent their homes from getting out of hand. And so all the experts and the pro organizers that you're likely finding online or reading their books or anything along those lines, they're not saying, Hey, Your house might be in a different phase than mine, and therefore, this isn't going to work for you.
Nobody's saying, like, if your house is at, you know, a phase one, or [00:10:00] if your house is even at a hoarder level, like, this doesn't work. They don't say that. And that's the problem. So because you haven't been told that you see these cleaning, organizing and decluttering experts, and there are many different ones that fall in each category, these experts and these influencers and they're sharing their tidying routine and their favorite organizers.
And one thing that I've seen on Instagram a lot lately is a lot of them will say the one question. That you should that you should ask yourself to declutter your things. So that's just an example of something that they're saying. They're sharing the one question that helps them declutter. They're sharing their tidying routine, their favorite organizers, and that has you believing that that's what you need to be doing to get your house to look like theirs.
And I want to say that I feel like I'm guilty of this too, but I try really hard to make it known that this isn't. [00:11:00] Let me rephrase that. I feel like I'm guilty of this too, because if I share a video of my house on social media, and I say, you know, like, here's what's going to help you get a tiny home, I feel like it's really easy for people to see that and say, okay, if I do what she does, my house can look like hers.
But that's why I really make a point to put it in the caption of my videos, like this is the process, this is what we're going to do, you're in a different phase of what I'm in right now, and we need to get you through those phases one at a time. And the problem is that nobody else is saying that. So you've been led to believe that.
What these other experts and influencers are sharing online, or even in these, you know, books that you can buy on Amazon or the magazines that you can buy. I bought those magazines where they talk about the cluttering and organizing and you think like, okay, if I declutter my things in the order of a [00:12:00] rainbow, my closet's going to look like that and it's really frustrating.
So you decide to do the same things in your home and that leaves you with a hundred piece puzzle and no picture on the box to replicate. So I wanted to kind of create this picture for you to understand. And I was like, thousand piece puzzle, but there's not really a thousand pieces that you need to put together to get your house in order.
It's more like, You know, a 12 or a 24 piece puzzle, but I figured 100 piece puzzle would would do the trick. Imagine if you're trying to put together a puzzle that has 100 pieces, and you don't have a picture on the box to replicate because that picture is not. That is not the same stage that you're in with your home.
So that's really what this amounts to. And this is why it feels like you're spinning your wheels and why it feels like you're [00:13:00] doing all the things because you literally are. You're doing all the things for every single room in your house. You're cleaning, you're decluttering, you're tidying, and you're organizing.
Cleaning could be laundry dishes, trash, sweeping, mopping, vacuuming. Wiping down surfaces or disinfecting the cluttering could be sorting through piles, deciding what to let go of or emptying out a space like the home edit says to do. Tidying could be any combination of picking things up and putting them back where they belong.
Straightening up an area to make it look more orderly and then finally organizing is when you're arranging things in an orderly way, containing your staff and bins and baskets or relocating your items to excuse me. So you're literally doing all of this stuff, all the things for every room in your house.
At any given time, and for some of you here, you may have been doing this for [00:14:00] many, many years because you didn't know better because you were never taught any different. So the problem is that lasting change will never come from sporadically doing all of these things from sporadically tightening, decluttering and organizing random areas in your home
Those concepts, those home life solutions were developed with one goal in mind, and they each have their own purpose. Like I said earlier, they were created to help people prevent their homes from getting out of hand.
So the tidying was really developed. And I tried to figure out, like, when tidying became a thing, and I couldn't find it anywhere. But if you, I mean, if you put two and two together, tidying became a thing to help people put things back where they belong, to maintain a tidy space. Organizing became a thing in 1984 when a group of professional women realized that they could offer a [00:15:00] service to help people organize all of the items that they were consuming when consumerism ruined popularity in the mid 80s.
And then the cluttering I mentioned this yesterday during our kickoff call, the cluttering has been around for a long time. I mean, I'm sure even 300 years ago, people knew to let go of things that they didn't need anymore. But it really grew in popularity because professional organizers realized about the turn of the century, the early 2000s, professional organizers realized that some of their clients had way too much stuff, and it couldn't all be organized.
It couldn't all be contained in bins and baskets. And so that's why de cluttering became so popular. So really, when you think about this timeline of events from. The fifties on, or we'll say from the Great Depression on, you know, after the Great Depression, people started buying more and [00:16:00] more things and having more and more stuff in their homes.
Then, boom, in the 80s, consumerism just took off like a rocket with the development of Sears catalogs and, and people just continued bringing more and more stuff into their homes, and that is when professional organizing became a thing to help people out. And so they were able to organize all this stuff that they were buying, but nobody ever thought to themselves.
Hey, if I keep buying all this stuff in 30 years, my house is going to be bursting at the seams. Nobody knew that. Nobody, nobody really thought about it. And so the turn of the 21st century, all of a sudden our homes were overflowing with stuff. And that is the reason why the cluttering became so popular.
And. Let me rephrase that, because decluttering became popular to help people let go of the excess stuff. [00:17:00] But what really ended up happening is as we moved into the 2010s and beyond, is people started putting all of these home life concepts together. They were jumbling them together. Hiding, decluttering, and organizing randomly and sporadically.
And that's what we've been doing ever since.
So, if you don't want to get stuck constantly tidying up the messes, if you don't want to get stuck trying to organize and rearrange your clutter, if you don't want to manage your household on a random schedule that doesn't even seem to work anyway, and if you don't want to keep living in this never ending Groundhog Day, You need a framework that will tell you how to take your entire home from cluttered and messy to calm and organized.
Because the fact is, those random home life solutions that I keep talking about, they're not it. They're [00:18:00] not gonna work. The fact is that trying to declutter and organize random spaces in your home sporadically is never going to make a difference when your entire house is messy and cluttered. But when you can have a framework that will tell you step by step of what to do to turn your entire household around, you can take control of the messes.
You can declutter the excess stuff. You can organize what you want to keep. You can get your family on board. You can refine your habits. Keep a tidy home consistently. And best of all, you can have breathing room. So let me know who is excited to hear about this framework drop. I need this in the chat. If this sounds like something that you need, it is essentially a plan that will unify.
Everything that you need to do in your home for [00:19:00] the rest of your life. It's hiding, decluttering, organizing, you know, all that stuff that you're doing randomly and sporadically, this framework will unify all of it.
Yes, Sue, you are not alone in that. I don't think, I think every single person who is here in this community and who wants to get their house in order feels the same way and regardless of the age of your children. One thing that I always like to bring to call attention to is And I don't know the name of the generations.
You would think I would because I have kids that age. My oldest is 15. His generation, the generation right before his, like the ones that are 21, 25 years old now, they don't want anything. They literally, [00:20:00] like, want to live in tiny houses and just travel the world and live in a van in the back of their car.
They don't want a single thing. So they damn sure don't want anything from our homes. And that's why this is so crucial. That's why it's such a big deal that not only are we able to make a change in our homes because our kids don't want our stuff, but you can, you can bet that their kids are going to Are going to be the same way, and it's really a good thing because they're learning from our mistakes.
Like, I just shared that timeline of after the Great Depression. And over the last 70 years, we've just consumed more and more stuff. And then there was, like, this break in the timeline, and now all future generations are realizing, like, oh, my God. We can't have all of this stuff. We can't just keep consuming and consuming and never letting go.
So it's a good thing. And that's why you're here to really make a change.
I need this. I need this. All [00:21:00] right. So this framework that I'm going to share with you comes down to tackling your home in phases. Because as we've established, trying to tidy, declutter, and organize each space in your home one at a time will not make any difference when your entire house is full of things that you want to keep and it's full of things that you need and want to let go of.
But when you're tackling your home in phases, what's essentially happening is you're going all in on one phase. for your entire house until you have fully mastered it. And that is exactly what the peaceful home roadmap is all about. That way you can say goodbye to doing everything randomly. Instead, you can follow along with each step of the roadmap as you master one phase at a time.
The very first phase is called the overhaul phase, and this is when you're overhauling the mess. [00:22:00] And what you need to know is that mess Basically, comes down to anything that you want to keep that's scattered around your house. It's not clutter, it's mess. Overhauling is when you're tackling the messes around your house.
After you've done that for every room in your house, then you move on to phase two, which is the decluttering phase. This is when you're ditching and demolishing and letting go of all the excess clutter. Then, it's the organized phase. That's phase three. And that is when you're highly focused on organizing your mind, your life, and your home, so you can finally stay organized.
And then finally, phase four is the maintenance phase. And this is when you're maintaining your peaceful home, you're refining your habits, you're learning to put things away when you're done using them, you're getting your family on board, and you're creating a lifestyle change, so you can prevent new clutter from coming back in.[00:23:00]
Now, each day of this challenge, we're going to go over one phase of the Peaceful Home Roadmap, so that way you know exactly what to do to clean up and overhaul the mess, clear away the clutter, and get more breathing room. Now, let me know if you're ready to get into the first phase, the overhaul phase, and we're going to get right into it.
So, phase one, overhauling, is about conquering the mess, like you can see from this photo. It's when you're conquering the disaster and the chaos. Because as I shared earlier, I think I might have shared this earlier, tidying, tidying up is not always effective. Because most of these items, I did not share this earlier, forgive me.
So most of these messes, these items, are left out. Because you don't know where to put them. Some of them you do. Let's look at this [00:24:00] photo for example. You know, we can see that these are clothes. Maybe they're clean, maybe they're dirty laundry. You know where to put them. But like the sunglasses as an example back here.
Maybe that's left on that desk because this woman doesn't know where to put them. I'm just giving a tangible example here. But this is the reason why tidying up doesn't always work, because a lot of these messes are left around your house because you don't know where to put them. And since tidying up literally means to put things back where they belong, some of these items are impossible to tidy, which is why they keep getting left out.
So if you feel like your house is a mess, I'm going to bet that you need to overhaul. Here's another photo example. If you feel like you're a lot of rooms in your house look like this, then you need to overhaul. Because while this might look cluttered, it's [00:25:00] visually cluttered to the eye, it is not clutter.
Clutter is an accumulation of stuff. And so therefore, If your house looks like this, the cluttering isn't going to help. So when your house is like this, this is when there's messes scattered across your main living areas. There's laundry and dishes that you need to deal with. There's paper stacked on the counters, and there's just a bunch of stuff that you don't know what to do with.
When your house is like this, it feels so overwhelming that of course you can't declutter because you see this chaos on what I call the surface level of your home. That's anywhere that you can see with the naked eye and you just want to get it all cleaned up. But unfortunately, because of the clutter that's taking up all of your storage spaces in your closets, your cabinets, your drawers, the [00:26:00] bins and baskets for all the clutter that's behind closed doors, because all that stuff is there.
There's no room to store these messes and so they're going to creep back out again and again and again. That is why overhauling is so crucial because it helps you tackle all these items around your house. So then that way you can have a tidy home, the peace of mind, the sanity, and the breathing room to start decluttering like a boss in phase two.
And one thing that I want to make very, very clear here is that These different phases of the peaceful home roadmap, they go hand in hand. You can't have one without the other. If you overhaul your home and you don't move on to phase two of the cluttering, your house will get messy again, because as I just shared on the last slide, when there's too much clutter behind closed doors, there's no room to store the messes and they will get [00:27:00] left out.
So. Once you're able to overhaul the mess and you have a tidy home, the peace of mind and the sanity, then you can move on to really decluttering like a boss. Uh oh, I hope I didn't get my slides frozen. There we go. So once you've completed phase one, the overhaul phase, you will have quite literally overhauled your home.
I wanted to share that little quote in there because people ask me all the time, What's the difference between overhauling and decluttering? Well, decluttering means to let go of your excess stuff. You're deciding which items you no longer need, use, or want, and you're getting them out of your house.
Overhauling is when you're literally overhauling the areas around your house where there's just stuff and chaos and messes. And when you do this, it's going to feel like a new home, but best of all, you will get it done quickly because the overhaul phase is all [00:28:00] about taking fast action. You're quickly overhauling your home so you can have a jumping off point and a place to start decluttering.
Now, before you learn how to overhaul your home, you must fully understand something that I call the big three messes. Because the fact of the matter is that not all clutter is the same. The messes that are scattered all over your house, those things that you want to keep, if you try to identify those messes as clutter, you will try to declutter them.
And then you will end up feeling frustrated and overwhelmed because you cannot declutter things you want to keep. As I just said, decluttering means to let go of the excess stuff. So, like, one of those example photos I shared on the slide a few slides back, if you're trying to declutter a messy looking kitchen.
You can't really, you don't want to let [00:29:00] go of any of that stuff. So what almost always ends up happening is you're just kind of tidying and putting things back where they belong. And then that's a problem because when it comes to the true clutter, You're doing the same thing. If you decluttered your kitchen when it was full of messes, and then you try to declutter a pile of things in your master closet, you're just going to end up tidying up and putting things away and making everything look more orderly, and you're not really going to let go of enough stuff to make a difference.
And that is the reason why I have this unique method, the Big Three Messes, to tell you exactly what you need to do. With all the stuff in your home, so we're going to get to your question in just a minute before we we get to that. I wanted to share the [00:30:00] big three messes because. they're related to the overhaul phase.
So the big three messes is a proprietary framework that will tell you what to do with all the items that are giving you trouble in your home. First, we have the everyday messes. Everyday messes is anything that you know where it goes. It's just not getting put there for one reason or another. The second of the big three messes is homeless clutter.
And these are the items that You don't know what to do with, hence why they are called homeless. And then the third of the big three messes is accumulated clutter. And this is the stuff that is piling up and accumulating that you need to sort through and decide what to let go of. So the overhaul phase is when you're tackling the first two of the big three messes.
It's when you're tackling the everyday messes and the homeless clutter, [00:31:00] because those are the messes, the items that are, that need to be overhauled, essentially. The third of the big three messes, the accumulated clutter, you're 100 percent focusing solely on the accumulated clutter during the clutter phase.
Does that make sense? So today, for day one, you're going to focus solely on the everyday messes. To better explain this and to answer your question, Sue, so the overhaul phase, phase one of the Peaceful Home Roadmap, like I said, that's when you're tackling the messes. Well, all the messes can be broken down into two categories, everyday messes and homeless clutter.
Tomorrow for day two, we're going to dive into the homeless clutter. Today for day one, we're going to start with the everyday messes. So an everyday mess, these are a lot of examples right here on the screen as well as this photo. It's toys on the [00:32:00] floor or it's anything on the floor. It's dirty or clean laundry.
It's dirty or clean dishes or trash or items left on counters. It's essentially any item. That has a dedicated spot where it belongs. It's just not getting put where it goes. And then, like I said, tomorrow for day two, we're going to be tackling the homeless clutter, because as you can see from this photo of a challenge participant from our last challenge, you can tell that a lot of this stuff is homeless.
Like, um, this looks like some contact paper that would go in a cabinet. You know, if somebody gave me contact paper, or if I went out and bought some right now. I wouldn't know where to put it either because I don't have a home for contact paper. So it would just get piled up next to my microwave just like this photo.
So with that said, I really want to differentiate these two here [00:33:00] because my goal is to have you fully understand how to tackle the everyday messes separately from the homeless clutter. And the reason why this is so crucial is because The everyday messes are really simple and really easy to take care of.
You already know where all of these items belong, but the homeless clutter, these are the things that you don't know what to do with. And what you've likely been doing before now is when you see, like, we'll go with this example right here. When you see a space like this, you're trying to deal with all of these items in the same way.
You're, you're, you're trying to find somewhere to put them or, or straighten up the area or make it look more. Orderly and tidy, but instead, when you just walk up to an area like this and you just gather the everyday messes, for example, like the [00:34:00] Ziploc bags and the, um, press and seal and the foil and stuff like that, you know, let's say you walk up to this area in your kitchen and you're like, I'm going to gather all the, uh.
Bags and the cooking utensils and I'm going to go put them in the drawer where they belong. Well, bam, you've taken care of the everyday messes. When you can differentiate these actions that you're doing in your home, it is going to make a world of difference for your entire household. So the biggest, the key difference in the everyday messes versus the homeless clutter is everyday messes are the things that you know where to put them.
But the homeless clutter is any item that you don't know what to do with. Now, here are some examples of everyday messes from our previous challenge participants. It's this stuff that's just left out on the counter. It's stuff that could be on the floor or your bathroom counters or piles of things on a dining [00:35:00] room table, a coffee table, a nightstand, even on your bed.
It could be anywhere in your home. The main differentiator is an everyday mess. It's something that you know where it belongs. So with that, I would love for you all to Let me know in the chat. Look around the room that you're sitting in right now and tell me if you can identify an everyday mess next to you.
Something that you know where it belongs. You just need to get up and put it away. It could be laundry, dishes, trash, or any item, any material item.
Now, I'm going to share with you how to clean up these messes as easily as possible. How to clean up the everyday messes as easily as possible. Toys. Karen said she can see a big everyday mess right here on the desk. Yeah, like flat surfaces are a magnet for everyday messes and homeless clutter, which we're going to get into tomorrow.
Um, [00:36:00] of course I tidied my desk right before I went live, but, uh, like Kleenex right here, you know, this has a spot where it belongs. So I'm going to go put it back where it belongs. But when your entire house is full of everyday messes. As well as homeless clutter and piles of accumulated clutter. What you've been doing before now is you're looking at your house as a whole, and it feels super overwhelming.
That's why I'm here to help you break this all down into baby steps, actionable steps that are very realistic. I'm sitting in my office and realizing there are a few things that are everyday messes, and it's mostly homeless clutter because my family often comes in here with stuff that they don't know where to put and they just leave it here.
Yes, Dorianne. That will often happen when there's literally no room in the rest of your house. A [00:37:00] lot of people will choose 1 room to pile up the homeless clutter in. Some people will pile it up on 1 shelf or 1 desk or something like that. And, um. The good news, like I said, for day two, day two, in my opinion, is like one of the most important days because the homeless clutter I bet for most of you is going to be the biggest, the biggest problem.
So to overhaul the everyday messes, all you need to do. Is put them all back where they belong. It's very, very simple. However, we tend to make it a little bit more complicated than it needs to be because we get caught up. I just said this. We get caught up trying to deal with every item in one particular area.
So like Dorianne just said, it's very easy to sit in her office and try to tidy everything. But instead, for today, we're just going to focus on the everyday messes. You just need to put them back where [00:38:00] they belong. You would gather them all up and put them all back where they belong. When you can learn how to do this simply today, you will be able to do the same thing for every single space in your home.
And that is the very first step to overhauling the mess and getting a tidy home. Because once you get these everyday messes under control, you can do the same thing. For all of the homeless clutter, which again, we're going to get into tomorrow. The homeless clutter is going to require a totally different strategy.
And then you will have the mental clarity and the breathing room to demolish the accumulated clutter. Now we're going to get you there. We're going to get you doing this. We're going to get you there one step at a time. Today is meant to get you taking action. With the right actions. So you can do the same thing for every other space in your home by just putting the everyday messes back where they belong.
[00:39:00] Then from there, you will have a roadmap that you can follow to continue making progress in your home as you overhaul the homeless clutter. Demolish the accumulated clutter and then organize everything that's left. So day one, we're focusing right here on just putting the everyday messes back where they belong.
So if you're ready to have more breathing room in less than 20 minutes, here is your action step for today. I want you to choose one space in your home that has everyday messes. This photo that you'll see right here, this was our dining room in the house that we lost in the fire, full of everyday messes.
This was my daughter's like, you know, art play area, whatever. And they would just leave it piled with, maybe not piled, but leave it covered with just a bunch of random stuff. So, for your action step today, when you choose one space in your home that has everyday messes, [00:40:00] it could be any area. All you need to do is gather up all the everyday messes and put them back where they belong and that is it is very, very simple, but it is so, so powerful because.
My goal is to help you identify and recognize and differentiate the everyday messes from the homeless clutter. So that way, if and when your house ever gets messy ever again, you can easily identify and spot like, hey, that's an everyday mess. That's, I can go put that away. And then again, Once you learn how to overhaul the homeless clutter tomorrow, you can tackle that in the way that it needs to be tackled.
Because the problem is when you're trying to handle them the same way, that's exactly the reason you haven't been able to make any progress before now. Now, Sue, I was going to get to that. You can [00:41:00] do the entire house if you want to. However, I'm going to give a little, um, what's the word I'm looking for?
Uh, like, uh, a warning. I don't want you to go too hard and then get burnt out because over the next couple of days, we're going to be doing all of this one step at a time in your home. As I keep saying, the goal is for you to be able to continue doing the same thing after this challenge week is over. And what I've experienced time and time again is I go so hard and I'm like, you know what, I'm going to, I'm going to declutter my entire living room and then I'm exhausted and I don't feel like doing anything the following week.
And then what happens? You fall off track and your house gets trashed and cluttered and chaotic all over again. So with that said, if you are really excited to do this for your entire house and you [00:42:00] have a really good Understanding of your energy and how much time and capacity you have available, then by all means, you are welcome to do that.
But if you're the type of person where you feel like you tend to go really hard on things when you're motivated, and then you fall off track a week later. Maybe you can just do one space at a time. It's really gonna, I'm going to recommend to do what is best for you and your lifestyle and your habits.
Now, the action step for today is to just do one space to make it as simple as possible. You can choose your dining room, your kitchen counters, your living room floor, the space next to your bed, your nightstand, any space. And one other thing I want to say is that this space that you choose. It can very well have everyday messes and homeless clutter.
It can even have piles of accumulated clutter. However, the goal is for you to just focus on the everyday messes. [00:43:00] So once you do this, once you overhaul these everyday messes and you put them back where I want you to share a before and after photo for a chance to win. 40 points. I'm going to upload a photo that looks like this in the group.
You can add your progress photos as a comment under this post, or you can create your own post right here in the group, however works for you. But at the end of the challenge, the top three participants with the most points will win our grand prize winner award. Will win a full scholarship to cluttered it to calm my signature program.
That's opening on Wednesday. It is a complete home management system and online course that will get you a tidy organized home hours of free time and the peace of mind to fully enjoy your life. And it's a 797 value. So our [00:44:00] grand prize winner will win a full scholarship to that program. Our second place winner will get a 30 gift card to Amazon.
And our third place winner will get a 20 gift card to the container store. Now our last challenge last fall, we had multiple winners from each category. So. There very well may be more than three winners. We'll just have to see how everything goes throughout this week. Now remember, the goal of these action steps throughout this challenge is to get you taking action in your home to help you break the behaviors that you have been doing unknowingly before now.
We're going to shatter the norms, change your habits, and get you on a different path to give you a tidy home, peace of mind, and breathing. So does that sound doable to you? Are you excited to tackle the everyday messes? Today, let me know [00:45:00] in the chat.
And like always, like I can't help myself. I said it was going to be 45 minutes and here we are in an hour. I do my best. I really do. Like it's always a goal of mine. Every time we have a challenge or a masterclass, I'm like, I'm going to stick to the time limit. And then I never do.
So up until now, so far today, you have learned. Why you've been trying to do everything randomly in your home. You've learned how all of these tasks that you have been doing do need to be done, but doing them all sporadically is never going to create lasting change when your house is messy and cluttered.
You've learned that society, which is Really, you know, the, the experts and the organizers and the, and the books that you buy in the magazines, that society, they're basically teaching you that you [00:46:00] just need to do a better job at doing all of these things. That's kind of what you're picking up from. All of the things that they're suggesting.
And so as a result, you're downloading new apps and checklists and buying new planners, and then you are either burning out or you may be just avoiding the mess and the clutter altogether. You've learned that instead of doing all those things randomly, you need a framework. To take you through one step in one phase at a time, so that way you can tackle and overhaul the messes and demolish the clutter.
You've learned how tackling your home in phases is the key to lasting change, why overhauling is the very crucial first step of the process. You've also learned how not all clutter is created equally, and there's actually three different types of stuff that could be giving you [00:47:00] trouble in your home.
You've learned how to tackle and overhaul the everyday messes by putting them all back where they belong. And finally, you learned that the key to making this all work is to help you break free from your old habits of trying to tidy the clutter and organize all at once. Now all that's left is for you to go take action on one space in your home by just tidying the everyday messes and putting them back where they belong.
And then we're going to be back here tomorrow at the same time and same place as we talk about how to overhaul the homeless clutter. And like I said yesterday during the kickoff party, today, day one, was going to be much longer because I really wanted to share, like I said, awareness is the first step. I wanted to share it.
Why, like what's been happening before now, because again, the goal is to get you out of those same habits that you've been doing maybe for [00:48:00] years or even decades to help you break the process of doing that and get you into the process of doing something different. So tomorrow, day 3 and bonus day 4 are going to be much quicker.
Uh, Debbie said she may do more than 1 area. Yes, you are welcome to do as many areas as possible. You want, and, uh, again, just focus on the everyday messes, just put them all back where they belong. And one thing that I did not put in these slides, because I was trying to save time, is, um, and I figured I would go live later to talk about this.
Now that you know how to overhaul these everyday messes, what you want to do going forward is spend about 20 minutes a day, Putting them back where they belong every single day, once a day, minimum. Now, if you have multiple children, [00:49:00] I have four kids, my youngest is seven, but when they were all under the age of 10, I had to do this like three times a day, morning, afternoon, and night.
If you don't have kids or if your kids are older, you may only need to do this once, and this is what I call. A daily reset or a daily tidying routine or tidying up with intention. And it's essentially when you're going around to every room in your house, you're gathering up just the everyday messes and you're putting them all back where they belong.
So that's essentially what I'm having you do today for one space in your house, but if you want to do it for every space, you're more than welcome to do that. And then going forward, you can do this same routine, this daily tidying routine consistently, because 1 thing that we've kind of gone over throughout the last hour is that these everyday messes, they're going to keep coming coming back. They're going to, one, keep coming back as long [00:50:00] as you have clutter taking up all of your storage spaces, but they're also going to keep coming back because they're just a part of life. They're the things that your family's leaving everywhere, like the tissue I left that there, but you know what I mean.
There's an LOL doll that's sitting here that was here from last night. My daughter brought it in here and just left it on my desk. The um, The empty coke bottle that my husband left on the dryer. You know, they're just things that they really form as as a result of our habits. I mentioned yesterday that my husband leaves his dirty clothes on the bathroom floor.
Those are an everyday mess. And so the key to keeping your house tidy consistently for the rest of your life is to do this daily reset every single day, this daily tidying routine. Now, when you're following the Peaceful Home Roadmap, and this is not something we're really going to get into throughout this challenge, but I want to share with you [00:51:00] how it works.
Like I said, it's a four phase process where you start by overhauling the messes, then you're clearing the clutter, then you're getting organized. And finally, for phase four, you're maintaining and refining your habits. Well, the fourth phase, the maintenance phase, that is when you get to focus 100 percent solely on refining your own habits, learning to put things away when you're done using them, teaching your kids to clean up after themselves.
Getting your husband on board, your spouse on board, your partner on board, and just learning, like, you know, when I get up, I'm going to go put this tissue back where it belongs. Once you're in that maintenance phase, and you are able to learn to always put things away when you're done using them, this daily tidying routine, It won't be so necessary because the everyday messes will be fewer and farther between.
But this is so important for me to point out because what most of us [00:52:00] end up doing is we think that we need to do this now, we think while my house is messy and cluttered, and I'm at the beginning phase of the process, I need to learn how to put things away and then that will solve the problem. And yes, that's true. That that is one thing that can solve the problem. But back to what I was saying, when all this stuff needs to be done, you can't just do it randomly. You can't decide tomorrow that you're going to teach your kids to put away their, their Barbie dolls if You didn't have them do it today. Does that make sense?
So that's why it's so crucial that you focus on each and everything that falls under the umbrella of your home life. We're going to, we're going to get there in one phase at a time. And so right now you're just Picking up the everyday messes and you're putting them back where they belong and then going forward you can continue doing that on a daily basis because it will make it easy for you to [00:53:00] keep a tidy home as you move through the rest of the peaceful home roadmap.
Does that make sense?
So yes, Dorianne, at first it's, it's going to probably take more than 20 minutes. That's why, that's really what the overhaul phase is about. Today, if you do it in one space, you can do it in 20 minutes. If you want to spend more than 20 minutes, you can spend an hour today. But inside of my program, Cluttered to Calm that is going to guide you through this entire process and hold your hand as you, as you do this for every space in your home, I really teach to spend about 30 minutes a day overhauling one space in your home, one room in your house, and then you do it again the next day for your living room, your dining room, your kitchen, your bedroom, etc. The whole goal is to get it done as quickly as [00:54:00] possible by putting the everyday messes back where they belong. And then, as I said, we're going to build on this tomorrow with the homeless clutter.
So, time for our q amp a, which is kind of what we're getting into, let me know if you guys have any questions.
Okay. So I didn't read the last of your question, Dorian, the dishes and the laundry. Those are an everyday mess, but that's not what we're focusing on right now. Right now we're dealing with the material stuff, the stuff that's getting left out, the dishes and the laundry kind of going back to Sue's question earlier about how to overhaul your home, there is a four step process called the home overhaul blueprint.
And I'm going to share that with you guys tomorrow that will teach you exactly how to overhaul your entire house. This home overhaul blueprint includes laundry and dishes. So [00:55:00] right now we're just doing the everyday messes, but the laundry and the dishes is a, they're considered an everyday mess because there are things that you're going to have to do for the rest of your life. As long as you have a house and clothes, you're going to have laundry and dishes. And so it's something that we must accept as normal. I have heard so many people say, but, you know, I do the dishes and I'm going to do them again tomorrow. That's, yeah, that we do and it sucks and that's life and the more easily we can get on board and recognize that, the more easier it'll be for us.
So, with that said, the best way to solve that problem is to get into the swing of doing them on a daily basis. Now, with that said, when your entire house is a mess and the laundry is piled up and the dishes are piled up, of course, it's not going to take only 20 minutes to overhaul your entire house.
That's [00:56:00] why the home overhaul blueprint will help you do it. And then at the end, you'll have routines to help you maintain the laundry and the dishes on a daily basis and keep the messes from coming back. And then from there, you will have a tidy home and you will be able to focus a hundred percent on clearing away the clutter.
Yes. Debbie, that's exactly it. Um, that's the best way to handle the dishes. It's so, it's so much easier said than done. I know. Like, I, my dishes are piled up right now because I'm sick and we've got this challenge going on and the internet guy came this morning and my kids started summer school for the first day.
Normally, I unload the dishwasher in the morning. I didn't get to it. So what's going to happen is they're going to be piling up by the end of the night tonight. And then I'll be like, you know, then you're faced with a decision. Uh, do I just go to bed or do I just leave them? You must have [00:57:00] the commitment to really commit to yourself.
Like I'm going to deal with these dishes because if I can do it now, it's only going to take me 10 minutes. But if I wait until Friday, it's going to take me 45 minutes.
So Karen, no. B, I didn't answer your question yet. So I will post a photo in the group. You can comment under the photo, like the thread of where to put your progress photos, or you can create your own post. Whatever works for you. There's no hard and fast rules that you must follow. Sue, the deadline is Friday, this Friday, June 7th.
Around, I think 5 30 PM, because I will be going live here in the group at 6 PM to announce the winners. So we'll say 5 o'clock, um, 5 PM central standard time this Friday to share your progress photos for a chance to win. And you could, it could be [00:58:00] Friday at 5 o'clock, and you decide you're going to do all 4 days of the challenge and you're going to share all the photos.
That's fine by me. I would like for you to do a little bit each day, but you do what works best for you. So does anybody else have any questions about, the everyday messes? Hi Dee, I see you, I see your comment. Let me know if you all have any questions about the everyday messes. Like I said, I know this is very simple. It seems like basic, basic stuff, but I promise there's a method to the madness. It's to get you to visually identify the things that can but easily be put back where they belong, because as I just said, that's something you're going to have to do for the rest of your life. There's always going to be tissue on your desk for the next 30 years, and you're going to have to pick it up and put it away if you want to be able to maintain a tidy home [00:59:00] consistently for years to come.
All right, no more questions. So my kids, it's kind of a frustrating thing. For the first time in many years, I finally got them enrolled in summer camp. I've been trying to do this for years because I have extreme health issues and my younger two kids. You know, of course, they're going to model what I'm doing if I'm laying around all day, elevating my swollen legs because I have lymphedema, of course, they're going to do the same thing.
And so every year for the last three years they've gained a little bit of weight during the summer and I've been like, I'm going to get you all in summer camp, but I never realized like how cutthroat it was and how. You must enroll them in like January or all the spots are going to be taken. I finally got them enrolled this year and I was so excited.
And then their school offered a summer school thing like a, you know, it's not like necessary summer school. It's just kind of like a way to keep them engaged. And my kids were like, we [01:00:00] want to do it. And so I was like, you want to do summer school and summer camp? And they said, yes. So every day through the rest of June, I take them to summer school, I'll pick them up at 1 30 and then take them to summer camp, which I mean, that's fine.
I that's what I want for them to do. I want them to be engaged and have fun. But today's the 1st day. So we're going to see how it goes. Dorian, you're very welcome. I'm excited too. Um, yes, yes. That sounds like a plan. Just gather. It could just, it doesn't even have to be your entire office. You could just choose your desk if that's all you have time for.
Dee, what do you mean you're lost in chaos? Oh, you mean like in your stuff, in your house. So what is one room that you can focus on right now that has everyday messes, which are things [01:01:00] that you know where they go. If you can name one of those areas, that's what you should focus on for today. And that's the whole goal of this challenge is to get you out of that chaos and to help you develop these baby steps because one step at a time is going to get you the breathing room and the peaceful orderly home.
So, it could be, um, the, it could be like, uh, your kitchen counters or your office desk or your nightstand or your coffee table, just choose 1 little space and then, um, gather up the everyday messes. And put them back where they belong. That's it. That's all you have to do for today. Your bedroom. That sounds like a plan to me.
And then you can share your progress photos in the group for a chance to win 40 points. You're very welcome, Sue. Thank you for being here. We're going to get [01:02:00] more into the question you asked earlier, Sue, about how to overhaul. We're going to share more about that tomorrow. So that way, you know exactly how to do this for every single room in your house for your entire household.
So that way you truly can overhaul and tackle the messes. And then you'll be able to move on to phase two, the decluttering phase. You're very welcome, Rose. I will be back in here later. I'll probably go live later just to answer any questions that are coming up. Um, I'm going to pick up my kids, take them to summer camp and then I'll have a few more hours kid free. So I will be back soon and I'll talk to you guys then. Bye.
