How to tidy up your home? What a joy it is to have a clean and tidy interior, filled with objects that you love and can find again instantly. Unfortunately, it’s not always easy to take action and start tidying up. That’s why I’m sharing 6 steps to make tidying up easy.

1 – Decide to tidy up your home and know why

In life, one decision changes everything. Unfortunately, we confuse desire with decision.

“I want to tidy my house” is a desire and nothing changes. But “I decide to tidy my house” is a decision, and it changes everything.

That’s why I invite you to pay attention to the verb you use.

Once you’ve decided to tidy up, it’s important to know why. What’s important to you in tidying up, and what benefits will it bring to your life and your happiness?

Take a few moments to list all the reasons.

Here are the main reasons why we decide to tidy up:

To save time, because we spend too much time looking for things.
Self-care, because we relax much better in a clean and tidy interior.
Greater self-confidence, because we feel prouder of ourselves when we have a tidy interior.
Improved self-awareness. A tidy home is a home filled with the things we love. It becomes a reflection of who we are and our personal tastes.
Be happier, because we become more grateful for our good fortune in having a home under which we feel good.

2 – Make it your one and only goal for the moment

How do you tidy up your home? By dedicating yourself to it.

It’s hard to get to grips with the task of tidying up your home if you’re working hard to pass your midterms, or if you’re working on a big project at work that’s taking up a lot of your time and energy.

Indeed, we need to concentrate, because tidying up will require not only energy, but also a great deal of thought.

Our minds need a certain amount of concentration every day, and every decision we make reduces that amount.

What’s more, if tidying up is our priority at the moment, we have a better chance of achieving our goal.

So, every day, all we have to do is take one small step, one small action, to move in that direction.

3 – Tidy up your home: don’t be afraid to throw things away

To tidy up our home, we have to throw things away! Throw away all objects that are not useful to our happiness.

Yet many of us are afraid to throw things away, because we’re afraid of running out. So we keep a lot of things “just in case”.

The problem with these “just-in-case” items is that they clutter up our home, wasting our precious time and fragile patience. What’s more, they hide the things we really love and that make us happy.

That’s why it’s time to overcome our fear of throwing things away.

4 – Sort items by category

Once you’ve prepared yourself to throw things away or give them away “just in case”, it’s time to start sorting.

To do this, it’s best to work by category rather than by piece. Why is that? Because it avoids duplication.

Take, for example, clothes or papers in several rooms of the house…

To tidy up your home properly, let’s take ALL the objects in the same category out of the house at once.

Then, there are some categories to be done first, because the fear of throwing away and missing things is stronger for some objects than for others.

It’s a good idea to start with clothes, because we’re less afraid of running out of clothes than we are of our photos or souvenirs…

Start with clothes, shoes and accessories
Books
Miscellaneous items: cosmetics, pens, notebooks, electronics, wires, batteries, crockery, administrative papers…
Sentimental items: photos, collections, memories of the past.
Once you’ve identified the categories, once you’ve piled up all the objects in the same category, there’s only one question left to ask:

Do I like this object? Do I like using it, seeing it?

Here, we’re not talking about utility, because we keep so many objects that we say are useful, but which clutter us up.

To be happy in your home, keep only objects you love.

5 – Tidy up your home: find a place for everything

“An object that isn’t tidied up is an object that hasn’t found its place.

By the time you get to this stage, you’ve sorted everything in your home. In other words, you should end up with 1/3 or 1/4 of your original items. And, right away, it seems easier to put them away. (laughs)

There are a few simple rules to follow to tidy up your home:

Use simple shoeboxes to tidy up
Put objects of the same type in the same place
Put items belonging to the same person in the same place.
Don’t scatter storage spaces
The aim is to see at a glance all the objects we own, for greater happiness and peace of mind.

6 – Making housework a pleasure

Now that our home is sorted and tidy, we need to take care of it – in other words, clean it regularly.

But don’t panic! Because a sorted and tidy house means a lot less stuff! In other words, cleaning is simpler and faster.

Here are a few tips to make housework a joy:

Wear comfortable clothes, or even special cleaning clothes. An outfit that puts a smile on your face and motivates you.
Put on music you like or listen to a radio program you like. Sometimes I listen to personal development podcasts.
Use cleaning products that we like and that are good for the house and the environment.
Plan a small or even large reward for yourself afterwards. A guaranteed source of motivation. (laughs)

Find out more:

I invite you to read these 2 complementary articles:

Discover 20 things to do when you’re sad
Discover Declutter your home: 4 tips to feel better at home

I recommend this inspiring book:

Spark Joy: An Illustrated Master Class on the Art of Organizing and Tidying Up by Marie Kondo

In Spark Joy, Marie Kondo develops her revolutionary method of tidying, offering practical ideas and illustrations to guide readers in transforming their homes into spaces of joy and order. The book offers a detailed, visual approach to decluttering, organizing and maintaining an orderly living environment. Kondo’s philosophy emphasizes keeping only those objects that bring joy, fostering a deeper connection with one’s possessions and surroundings. Through a systematic and thoughtful process, readers can not only tidy their homes, but also cultivate a sense of harmony and well-being in their living space.

It helps you put away the things you keep because they’re necessary or bring you joy (my ironing board doesn’t bring me joy, but it’s necessary). (my ironing board doesn’t bring me joy, but it is necessary). Show you how to fold clothes to put them away better, find them more easily and make them more beautiful.

Thank you very much for reading this article.

If you liked it, let me know in the comments.

Take care of yourself