Tips For Organizing When You're Overwhelmed

If you have a place to call home, the odds are good that at some point you think about getting organized. Then, you look around and realize that clutter is the king of your castle. It’s so overwhelming, you simply can’t bring yourself to do anything about it. So, what do you do?

Don’t focus on all of the clutter in your home. Instead, approach organizing your home in small chunks, even if it’s one drawer at a time. Celebrating these small wins will motivate you to keep going and tackle larger projects. Ask for help to keep you on track, and concentrate on getting rid of items before you try to organize everything.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed, whether by your stuff, limited time, budget woes, or you’re just exhausted, it’s hard to find motivation to organize. However, when feelings of stress start to bring you down, use these tips to get started.

When The Thought Of Organizing Overwhelms You More Than The Clutter

First, take a moment to think about the idea of home organization, because the concept doesn't look the same for everyone. Some people picture a meticulously clean house with walls of bins and matching labels. Others consider finding their keys in less than 5 minutes being organized.

If you think an organized home has to resemble the after photos in an HGTV magazine, you may never start. These images are staged to look perfect in pictures and aren’t how actual people live. When you look at them, you might be inspired, or the very thought of organizing could make you panic.

Therefore, what does an organized home look like to you? Do you yearn to find precisely what you need when you need it? Is your goal to have a place for everything and everything in its place?

If you don’t have an idea of what it means for you to be organized, the unknown adds to your inertia. You don’t know how to start or what you’re trying to do, so you don’t do anything. Therefore, picture your organized home, and focus on how to push through what feels overwhelming and start organizing.

Tips To Overcome The Overwhelm When You Want to Get Organized

These tips will help you approach organizing your home differently. When you keep these recommendations in mind, you’ll find the idea of sorting your stuff and tidying your home less daunting.

1. Don’t Look At The Big Picture

If you think about every piece of clutter in every single room of your house at once, it’s no surprise you feel overwhelmed. Stressing about never finding the things you need, wasting money on buying duplicates, or running late every day does you no good.

If these things make you freeze and suck out any bit of motivation you have, stop thinking about them. In this case, it’s okay to not look at the big picture. Instead, compartmentalize your approach to organizing your home and focus on one small space at a time.

2. Celebrate Small Wins

Think about a time when you worked toward a long-term goal. Maybe you lost 20 pounds, improved your golf game, ran a 5k, or learned a new language. It’s likely you didn’t go full steam ahead until you reached your goal and then decided to celebrate.

Instead, you likely broke your goal down into milestones, celebrating when you reached each one. These small wins keep you motivated and encourage you to continue moving toward the overall goal.

Therefore, set mini-goals when you organize your home. For example, clean out the junk drawer, get rid of two boxes of items, or clear your closet floor.

3. Start With A Plan

Don’t let panic and stress hurl you into an organization project you aren’t ready to do. Otherwise, you’ll likely burn out, get frustrated, and give up on the whole thing. Instead, make a plan and set a timeline for when you want to get organized.

Scheduling time to work on organizing means you won’t worry about it interfering with other plans. An agenda also gives you a chance to lay out what you need to do (like gather supplies) and when you need to do it.

4. Ask For Help To Organize Your Home

Once you have a designated timeline and plan for your project, ask friends or family for help. Tell them the days you plan to work in your home and see who is able to lend a hand. If you’re really stuck, it might be worth hiring a professional organizer.

Having someone by your side helps keep you on track and holds you accountable. It also gives you someone with whom to celebrate your small wins when you accomplish them.

5. Declutter First, Organize Second

One of the biggest organizing mistakes people make is trying to get organized before doing anything with their clutter. If you’re like most people, you have a lot of stuff you don’t need.

Before you attempt to organize your belongings, go through your things and decide what can go. If it’s broken or worn-out, toss it.

If it’s in good condition but you don’t use it, love it, or have too many, donate them. Selling items in another option, but commit to a deadline, so your sell pile doesn’t seep back into your clutter.

6. Stop Looking At Pinterest (For Now)

Put away Pinterest. Quit looking at pictures of perfect homes if they’re making you feel bad about your house. Once you start making progress, you can attempt to revisit your pins for some inspiration and ideas.

7. Chant The Five-Minute-Rule

When you find yourself in a slump, keep this mantra in mind, “I can do anything for five minutes.” Then, set a timer and start doing something. Walk through your house and gather dirty laundry or sift through the pile of junk mail on the kitchen island.

You’d be surprised what you can accomplish in five minutes. Plus, quite often, those small accomplishments spur you onward to bigger things.

8. Be Yourself (Don’t Organize For Imaginary People)

If you’re not familiar with Dawn Madsen ( The Minimal Mom), check her out. She talks a lot about decluttering, reducing inventory, and being intentional about what you have in your home. Don’t let the word minimal scare you — she doesn’t tell you to get rid of everything but your toothbrush.

However, she does talk about the idea of everyone having a fantasy self that leads them to hold onto things they don’t need. For example, you keep the pottery wheel you bought five years ago because you’re going to make custom vases one day. You bought out the scrapbook aisle because you plan to create beautiful baby books (for your kids that are in high school now).

Don’t organize your home for someone in the future. Organize your home for the season of life you are in right now. Your home needs to work for you as you are if you expect it to be a happy and efficient place.

9. Work In Sections Instead Of Pulling Everything Out

Many organizers recommend pulling everything out of a space when you start to organize it. This is a great suggestion and one of the best ways to approach an organizing project (in my opinion).

You get to see everything you have and the actual space you have to put it. It also makes it easier to declutter and get rid of things when you see it all in one place.

However, if you tend to get overwhelmed easily, don’t do it. If you need to pause the project, you end up with your entire closet sprawled across your bedroom for weeks. 

Instead, pull items out in sections you can manage in short amounts of time. For example, if you want to organize your closet, focus on your shoes first. Only pull out your shoes, sort and declutter them.

Put the ones you plan to keep in a container and set it back in your closet. Next move to your dresses and repeat the process, etc. Once you’ve finished going through your items in this way, assess what’s left, pull out the containers, and plan your new closet configuration.

Pace Yourself: You Don’t Have To Organize All At Once

There’s no law that says once you start organizing your home you have to finish in two days. Pace yourself, take breaks, and work one section at a time.

Organizing is not an all or nothing affair. If you can’t finish the whole house in one week, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t start.

Do what you can, rest when you need to, and get back to it when able. Give yourself a little grace to love your home and all its imperfections. Tell yourself, as long as you keep moving forward, it’s okay if you trot along at a steady pace instead of at a gallop.

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