These 8 steps to declutter your life will help you not only get rid of unnecessary stuff, but also free up your time and energy!
Happy New Year! One of my three resolutions for 2018 is to live an even simpler life. However, we all know that the highest of hopes often go unrealized if we don’t make some practical goals moving forward!
In the last couple of years I’ve worked on gradually downsizing my closet (and selling clothing I don’t want anymore on eBay). Though I’m not super consistent yet, I’m trying to purchase higher quality, more versatile clothing when I do need to shop. That often means being willing to pay a bit more for something that will last.
I’ve also found more joy in giving things away! I love it most when I can think of someone in my life who might enjoy something I don’t use. But if I can’t think of anyone, I like donating to thrift stores who use donations to help people in need.
Decluttering my closet is a great first step, but there are so many other areas of my life that I still really want to simplify.
As I’ve tried to unpack ways that I can live more simply, I’ve come up with 8 practical steps to declutter your life.
Just a heads up: This post contains Amazon affiliate links. That means if you click a link and make a purchase, we may receive a small commission at no cost to you. As always, all opinions are entirely our own. Thanks for supporting us!
1. Get rid of stuff!
The first step to decluttering your life is decluttering possessions. Go through your home, and set aside things that aren’t purposeful, or meaningful; things that don’t spark joy. Then get rid of those things.
If you’re just getting started with decluttering, you might want to check out my list of 120+ items you can get rid of in your home right now with zero regrets.
I love these 5 questions from Thrivent that help you decide whether to keep something:
- Can I get away without this?
- What’s the worst that could happen if I get rid of this? What would I do in that situation?
- Could someone else use this more than me?
- When was the last time I used/wore this?
- Does this spark joy?
2. Go paperless.
Right now, I have an expandable folder with all my most important documents filed in it. However, as life goes on I know I’ll soon not be able to keep track of everything important in a single file! If you’re in a similar boat, consider making the switch and going paperless. It’s essential in order to declutter your life.
When you have digital copies of all the important or even sentimental papers in your life, you will have so much less clutter. And you’ll spend less time trying to find things, or figure out where to put them. Plus, storing files digitally can be totally disaster proof, whereas a storm or fire could destroy physical papers.
Google Calendar is an extremely helpful tool for keeping track of your schedule and things you need to remember. It syncs between your computer and phone, and you can share calendars with family members to keep everyone in the loop. You can also easily set reminders with events for any number of days or hours before the event.
One of the resources I use to keep better track of important information is Evernote. You can use it on your phone or computer to create notes or store photos of things in a highly organized way.
I found this incredibly helpful post about going paperless. It goes into detail about how to use a scanner to scan documents into digital files. He also explains how to use Evernote to organize pretty much everything in your life.
3. Create systems.
Organize your belongings in a purposeful and functional way. Store like things together. For example, organize your beauty products by type: nail products, face products, hair products, etc. And organize food products according to type, or what you use them to make. For example, keep grains together, and keep smoothie ingredients together.
Also, be intentional about where you store things. For example, keep your coffee by the coffeemaker and not across the room from it! This saves you and your family members lots of time in the long run.
4. Declutter your phone.
I only have 16GB of storage on my iPhone, but I’ve chosen not to upgrade it for more space. That’s because having limited space forces me to periodically backup my phone, and clear out apps, messages, photos, and videos that I don’t need to keep. It can be annoying, but I like the way it keeps my phone simple. Even so, there are definitely more ways I can declutter my phone!
Here are some ideas:
Delete and organize apps.
Delete apps you don’t use, or won’t use again for a while. Airline apps are a great example. If you don’t fly with that airline monthly, you can delete the app and download it again if you need it in the future.
Organize the rest of your apps. Put apps together into folders by category, like “Games,” “Social Media,” and “Productivity.” Or, organize using screens, to group similar apps together.
Make time for uploading photos to your computer or hard drive and deleting ones you don’t need to keep.
Take the extra few minutes to actually organize them into folders on your computer. It might seem like a hassle now, but you’ll actually be able to find them when you want them in the future!
Close apps when you’re not using them.
This will save your battery life and help your phone run most quickly. Plus, you don’t have to flip through a bunch of open apps to get back to the one you want.
Delete message threads when you’re finished with them.
They can take up a lot of storage space on your phone, especially if they’re full of photos, videos, GIFs, and Bitmojis, like mine can be.
Delete old voicemails.
If you’re trying to clear up space on your phone, voice mails are often overlooked, but they really can take up a lot of space! Know that when you delete them the first time, they just go into another folder called “Deleted Voicemails.” You need to delete them from that folder a second time for them to truly be gone.
Change notification settings and consider deleting social media apps.
Unless you have a legitimate reason, you really don’t need a popup notification for every email you get and every social media action. As much as possible, turn off notifications! You can do that in settings or in the actual apps themselves.
A few months ago I altogether deleted Facebook from my phone and I have not regretted it once! For me it was just one more time waster for me to go to when I could be doing something more productive or meaningful. I can still of course check Facebook on my computer or in my phone’s browser when I want to, but I do it way less.
If you wish you didn’t spend as much time on social media as you do, turning off notifications or deleting apps altogether will help you a lot!
5. Declutter your email inbox.
6. Declutter your calendar.
I don’t just mean organizing your physical calendar, but simplifying your schedule. That means, if you’re too busy, declutter your life by reducing the number of commitments you have on a weekly basis.
It may help you to make a list of your top commitments, the 4-5 things that are most important to you, then analyze the rest of the things on your schedule. Consider whether it would bring you relief to say no to the other commitments. Consider your time as valuable, a thing to be guarded.
I read a book called Boundaries: When to Say Yes, How to Say No To Take Control of Your Life and it was really helpful! It helped me learn how to discern which things are good and healthy for me to say yes to, but also how to say no to other things without feeling guilty. Creating healthy boundaries is one of the best ways to declutter your life.
Saying no to unnecessary things isn’t enough, though. You can also make a habit of scheduling in the most important things each week, like date nights, quality time, and self-care.
7. Practice single-tasking.
You’ve probably heard some depressing statistics about how our generation has more and more trouble focusing on any given task for any length of time, compared to former generations. Much of that is attributed to technology, and the continual disruptions of notifications and distractions of social media.
For this reason, it can be extremely stretching but growing for us to practice single-tasking! That means putting aside everything else and only allowing yourself to do one thing in one moment.
I came across a list from Jo Chunyan of 13 ways to practice single-tasking, and I love her ideas!
Two of my favorites are: eat breakfast without reading a book / newspaper / going online / checking your phone, and have only one browser window open at a time when you are on the internet. So challenging!
8. Get inspired.
Another great step to declutter your life is to learn from others! I love listening to people talk about things they’re passionate about, because it often makes me more passionate about that thing too.
If you want to simplify and declutter your life, you can get inspired by listening to people talk about how they’ve done it, and the impact it’s made on their lives.
I love this collection of 8 TED talks that inspire minimalism.
