The Get Organised Challenge: Week One

Dejunk expert Helen Foster encourages us to take an honest look at our daily lives and explains how to identify our clutter-crisis zones

Look at your life
How much time did you spend last week deciding what to wear, looking for your keys or sorting through a huge pile of socks (without finding one matching pair)? And how much time did you spend utterly relaxed, not worrying about an unpaid bill, the endless stream of washing, or the missing TV remote control? Be honest!

This workshop will explain how to clear the clutter from your house and mind - studies show that 62 per cent of us want to simplify our lives. The problem is that most of us don't have a clue where to start. We think that creating more time, more money or less stress involves a major revamp of our jobs, budgets, or personalities - not necessarily true. Setting small goals and changing daily habits will relieve huge amounts of built-up tension.

Junked-up
We've grown up in a society where what we have is more important than what we do or who we are. The result is that the average person has twice as many possessions as their parents did. Our houses are crammed full of things and there is always something else we absolutely must have. But how much of this stuff is actually useful?

For the average person, 80 per cent of all possessions are only used 20 per cent of the time, if at all. Most of this excess junk could be chucked away and our lives would be none the poorer - precisely the opposite, in fact. The truth is, clutter wastes our time, increases stress, drains our finances, and it can even sap our energy and motivation in life - according to practitioners of Chinese medicine, too much junk around us stops the flow of energy (chi), leaving us feeling sluggish.

Emotional baggage
So many of us hoard piles of things that belong to our past - tickets to fun events; old newspapers; clothes we've grown out of; broken childhood toys... the list goes on. All the possessions we accumulate have an effect on our emotions, making it difficult to move on and face fresh challenges with confidence. As our houses get over-crowded, so do our minds. So the first step in getting organised is looking at what's cluttering your life.

Action: identify your clutter
Most of us don't realise how much junk we have until we look for it - so do just that. Go into every room/cupboard/drawer at home, and through your desk at work: look at what's in there. How much of what you find do you never use? How much of it would be useful but is stored in a way that makes using it a hassle? Chances are, you'll benefit from organising these areas.

Clutter-crisis zones
For most of us, 40-50 per cent of each room will need a clear-out. But tackling everything at once is asking for trouble - you'll feel overwhelmed and will inevitably shove it all back in a cupboard before slinking off to the pub feeling worse than ever. The secret is to identify your 'clutter-crisis zones'. This means up to three areas that'll benefit you most: for example, if you spend 20 minutes pulling at piles of clothes every morning, your wardrobe is a vital hot spot. If you're permanently paying interest on your credit card because you forget to pay the last bill, it's the paperwork pile.

If you can't decide where to start, take your time and spend a couple of days really analysing how clutter affects you. Look at: