Calm, In Control and Happy at Home
Law #3 of Organizing: Consistency
Check out the next installment of our blog seminar on the Laws of Organizing—basic principles that simplify getting and staying organized. If you’re joining our seminar for the first time, check out post #1 and post #2 in this series.
Last month we learned Law #2—KISS—our acronym for Keep It Super Simple when it comes to your organizing methods and systems. The reason KISS is so important is that it will help you master Law #3 -- Consistency is Key.
Let's revisit the health club analogy we used last month…if you skip workouts and stay way from the gym too long, what happens? You have to kind of start over again -- taking steps backwards (e.g., lighter weights, fewer reps, slower treadmill speed) to go forwards--until you achieve your previous level of proficiency. So, too, with keeping clutter under control!
Maintaining order is essentially nothing more than consistent good habits. The more you keep up on a daily basis, the easy and faster it will be to remain clutter-free. Think of it in terms of a pyramid -- taking a few minutes a day to stay organized is the foundation of living an orderly life. Trust me, this is much easier than you think if you deal with clutter in the moment or "real time organizing" as we say at clutterfree. For example, hang up your clothes when you come home from work, rather than tossing them over a chair to deal with later. Toss the magazine when you’re done reading it vs. leaving it on the coffee table. File office papers before you shift gears to work on a different project... and so on.
The more you consistently return items to their designated homes in the moment -- which typically takes just seconds -- the less likely you’ll have to spend time dealing with clutter later. Experts say it takes 28 days to break a habit, or form a new one. So if you start now, by the end of November, you'll have nailed the Law of Consistency!
