How to start decluttering

Excess stuff usually just distracts you from the important things in life. Decluttering is easy and it will help with productivity, time management and more.

If you have a clean work space, house, garage, etc, then you can focus on what's important in life. You won't need to spend any more time organizing your stuff because you won't have the stuff in the first place.

"Organized stuff is just another form of hoarding, compared to the usual unorganized hoarding."

1. Start Small

Sometimes we get discouraged because we have so much stuff and we don't know where to start. If you start with some small stuff that you know you won't need then work your way up. You will have a better chance of sticking to minimalism in the long run.

2. Set aside some time

One way to jumpstart minimalism is to set aside maybe a couple of hours to declutter. If you block time out of your day than you will be likely to take action.

3. Be merciless

You want to start small, but still be merciless. Throw away anything that you haven't used in a year. Any papers that are sitting around should be thrown away. Someday item: items that you think you might use someday. You should throw away almost all of these items. Try the 20-20 rule. If the someday item costs less than $20 and it takes less than 20 minutes to get a new one than throw it away. You will only end up using 5% or less of these items that you have.

4. Have fun

Have fun while decluttering your stuff. You could play the minimalism game.  The Minimalism Game: This game will take 30 days. On day one you give/ throw away 1 item. Than 2 items on day 2, until you reach day 30. So once you get to the higher numbers it starts getting tricky. Say you are on day 24 than you would have to declutter/give/ throw away 24 items.

The minimalism game was created by the the minimalists. They are a great source for information on this topic.