Clutterbug - Real-Life Hacks and Tips to Declutter, Organize and Clean your Home Fast - Organizing Tips just for Crickets - What ClutterBug Are You? | Clutterbug Podcast # 40

Episode Date: February 7, 2018

The final podcast in our What ClutterBug Are You? series is the Cricket! I hope you enjoy. For more information and for a copy of my free eBook, visit: http://clutterbug.me   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome back to another clutterbug podcast. We're still doing our clutterbug series. This is going to be the last podcast in this series. And today we're talking about the cricket. Again, if you're just joining us, we're talking about the different organizing styles. Organizing is definitely not one size fits all. And I learned this the hard way, being a professional organizer in my community, failing to set up systems that work for everyone. I'd have one client and something would work amazing for them. Or it would would work great for me or a family member and not work for someone else. And I could not figure out why. And it took lots of trial and errors for me to discover that there are actually four distinct styles. And today we're talking about a cricket. A cricket is someone who really likes visual simplicity. So they don't like looking at everything, all their belongings. They like things behind closed doors, in closets. They like things to be really neat and orderly. But they also are a bit of perfectionists, and they really like to have detailed micro-organizing systems. This means sort of organization within organization. When they set up a system, they want things to be

really sorted and everything to have a really proper home. Sometimes this need for perfection can lead to procrastination. What I mean is sometimes the ideal organizing system that the cricket wants, It's going to take time and effort or even money to set up. So what they do is they pile things in the meantime. They pile things until they're done using them. And they pile things until they have a chance to put it away properly. And oftentimes these really perfect organizing systems that they're hoping for aren't really attainable in the time frame that they have to put them.

You know, we're busy. We have a lot of crap going on in our lives. And we don't always have the time to set up these really. really perfect systems. So there's definitely all sorts of crickets. There are ones who really struggle with perfectionism and really struggle because they're very busy and just don't have time to set up these systems so their home is going to be more cluttered. And then there's crickets who have figured it out, who've had found the time to set up these systems and use them and they're having really tidy, immaculate homes. So being a cricket doesn't mean that you're

exceptionally tidy and it doesn't mean that you have a lot of piles everywhere. definitely it's a sliding scale and a cricket can be any of those things or anywhere in the middle even what it really means is your ideal organizing style is behind closed doors it's hidden away and it's really detailed it's really meticulous the great thing about being cricket is that most organizing systems you can buy most organizing systems you see on tv or on pinterest are really tailored for a cricket. I think this is because people who become professional organizers are generally crickets. Or bees.

They're people who really love that part, that detailed part of organization, and they enjoy setting up these really detailed systems and using them. So they tend to do that for a living. And then that's what we see when we look in magazines and when we look for inspiration and advice from the experts. most of the experts have this really perfectionist personality. So they're true organizing in the whole traditional sense of the word. So this is great.

This means you can use file systems and binder systems. And you can use any organizing system. Walk into the container store. Basically anything you find in there is probably going to work for you. The real challenge for a cricket comes with letting go of that perfectionism, letting go and saying, this system is good enough. I've had clients who have organized and reorganized spaces over and over again with the attempt, with the purpose of trying to find the perfect, most functional, most logical, best system. And then they've hired me to come in.

And my first thought is, wow, these people are more organized than I am. And they're looking, they're really, they're over organizing their home. They're looking for this solution, which honestly doesn't exist. Here's the thing. Our homes are always changing. We're bringing in new stuff. We're getting rid of stuff. We're growing. We're changing. And the way we use our home is constantly changing too. So having and spending time and money to set up a really detailed system in everyday used spaces can be a complete waste of time, honestly. Having this perfection when it comes to organization is something you're probably going to have to redo all the time. That's just part of being organized. It means maintaining the systems, tweaking them sometimes, and sometimes having to

completely redo it based on what you have. So maybe you get an instapot for Christmas. Your perfectly organized kitchen now has to accommodate and everything has to be moved around to accommodate your new instant pot. You're kind of getting the idea. So that would be my biggest tip for a cricket is really to just let go a little bit and consider setting up macro systems in the meantime. The other thing a cricket really needs to do is definitely purge. Like every other bug, we all have too much stuff. And a cricket is not exempt from that. So making purging the first step really can help you tackle if you are a person who has a lot of piles, make those piles more manageable. trying to buy yourself, like fancy containers or set up systems to get organized is like

borrowing money to get out of debt. If we have too much stuff, it doesn't matter what system we implement. It doesn't matter what fancy containers or like closet organizer we buy. We're not going to be able to set up and maintain a system because we have too much stuff. So step one is always, always, always the purge. And it doesn't have to be even some huge, epic, life-changing minimalism-type thing. It can be just grabbing a box and picking 21 items from your home every week for a month. 21 things that you're not using and loving. And when you are going to set up a system, really make sure the things you want to keep are the things you love and use the most often. One of the biggest challenges with almost every cricket I've encountered

in my life, including my husband, is paper. Crickets tend to have a really difficult time organizing paper. They want to do it perfectly. They want to make sure that they're not getting rid of anything that's important. So they tend to hold on to too much with the fear that maybe something is important. And I really suggest if this is your temperament, if you have anxiety about getting rid of paper, that you consider going paperless in every aspect that you can. And there's a couple of ways you can do this. Obviously contacting all of your utility providers, your electricity and gas and all of those things and getting electronic statements is a much, much better way for you.

I also really recommend investing in a scanner, like a little fancy scanner. I have a neat scanner, but there's even better ones now that scan both sides of the page at once and automatically save it to your computer. And you can have folders on your desk so then you can immediately shrink. read that paper knowing that you have a copy. And remember, too, that all paper isn't important. Once you've paid a bill, if you're not using it for a tax write-off, so if you're not running a business from your home, there's no reason to keep it. You can definitely shred and let go of monthly statements and monthly bills that you have been holding on to and then set time for

yourself to call all of those places and start going paperless. Make that transition in your life because your life is going to be so much easier with less paper. It's also important that you set up time to create a paper system. So for crickets, I really recommend having an action file. That means when you first come in your home, you have, even if it's just a basket, you're probably going to want more than a basket that you're going to want like a file folder, an accordion file folder that has mail, that has things to be read, to be paid, to be filed, a spot where you can drop those papers as soon as you come in the home. If you have kids, set up a paper system again when you're first coming in for flyers, newsletters, kids' calendars, papers you need to sign, have a file folder right there for all

your school papers too. And then you need to set up what's called a short-term file and a long-term file. So a short-term filing system is things like your statements that you've paid but you don't want to shred or things for your taxes that are coming up. papers that you have to deal with, but you don't need to keep forever. You want to make a short-term filing system for those, and then you want a long-term filing system. And I think it's really important that you don't mix these. So I've had a lot of clients that use a filing cabinet, and they keep both short-term and long-term papers together, and it gets really full, really fast, and it gets confusing about what you can get rid of and what you can't.

So a really easy solution is having a portable accordion file folder for your short-term papers. So these are things like monthly statements. Maybe you've got a speeding ticket in the mail. I don't know. Whatever it is, these short-term things that you know you don't have to keep forever. And then having a filing cabinet, a little filing cabinet for your long-term. This is going to be where you're keeping contracts and your taxes that you need to keep for seven years. maybe you're keeping marriage certificates or photocopies of your identification or yearly financial statements,

things that you want to hold on to for the long term. And this means that you have the ability at the end of the year to shred and deal with your short term without having to worry about getting rid of any important papers because the important things have been put in your long term file. So that's definitely what I would recommend for a cricket. is focusing on the paper if you're struggling with paper. If you have no issues with paper, well then, you know, don't worry about it. But I tend to find many of, most of the clients I've had anyways that have been crickets have like one area that they really struggle with. For my husband, it was tools.

He wanted like this meticulous organizing system for his tools. So in the meantime, he had them piled in neat piles, but piles everywhere in our garage for years. I'm not even kidding. years. And he had to schedule himself time and it took weeks for him to set up this really meticulous, perfect organizing system. And now that it's set up, he has no trouble maintaining it. So that's something you're going to have to do as a cricket is make time to set up those systems. But if you're living with people like me, who is not a perfectionist and not a cricket, understand that

you're really detailed systems, no matter how hard the other bugs in your house try, we probably can't maintain them. We probably can't keep up with them. So this is where it's important to let go and realize that we're going to need really simple solutions. So this is where the compromising has to come in and it's probably going to be hard for you because you're a perfectionist. But try understanding their style and coming up with easy macro systems that your whole family use. Make sure you're labeling them so everyone can get on board with. organization, trying to cram us into your perfect cricket box is probably never going to work. I have tried four years in vain to try to be a more meticulous organized person and I fail.

And I don't think it's about me being lazy. That's just not how my brain works. That's not my organizing style. So my husband has graciously let go a little bit and we have really easy systems for our papers, for our bills that we can both use and we're both happy with that are definitely simpler than he would like, a tad bit more complicated than I would like, but a perfect compromise. So anyways, thank you guys so much. I'm hoping you are feeling inspired if you're a cricket to set time today to make those systems a priority and remember the other bugs in your house and let go and embrace good enough organization for them. Thanks so much for listening and I'll see you next time.