Aloha Lovelies,
I’m in the midst of my year-end reset. It involves reviewing, reorganizing, and purging items in each of the rooms of my home and in my digital realm as well.
I feel so good when I complete an area. I feel uplifted because I’ve reduced the excess and reorganized for optimum usefulness, productivity, and aesthetics.
You can probably figure out how to do a reset on your own. But maybe you need inspiration to kickstart your own year-end reset.
If so, let’s go!
The Reset Process
My reset process involves the following steps with slight variations depending upon the space:
Empty all items onto a clear space. For example, in the bedroom empty all closet items onto the bed. In the kitchen, empty all items from the cabinets (or one set of cabinets at a time) onto the kitchen counter. Using this approach, you won’t miss anything and you’ll be able to see everything in context.
Once you have a pile gathered from a particular space, go through each item and ask the relevant questions I’ve listed below. This will help you decide whether to keep an item or let it go.
Sort your items into three piles: keep, not sure, donate or trash.
When the first round is complete for a set of items, go through the “not sure” pile and make a final determination for each remaining piece. Place it in the keep or donate/trash pile.
Clean the empty area. For example, if it’s a closet, wipe down the shelves and sweep or vacuum the floor.
Before you replace items, you have the opportunity to reorganize the space to work better for you. You could buy storage boxes, containers, baskets, or even a new piece of furniture for optimum organization. If you’re low on funds, you might be able to find what you need at a dollar store or reuse store.
Replace the “keep” items. Organize them by category if this works for you. For example, in your closet hang all the shirts together, all the dresses together, and all the pants together. If you have a mishmash of hangers, consider replacing them with a new set of identical hangers. It will make your closet look less cluttered.
If you have trouble with strict organization, that’s okay. Everyone has a different organizing style. You don’t have to be an extreme organizer like organizing expert Marie Kondo unless that’s your preferred style.
To figure out your style, read: The 4 Home Organizing Styles, Which One Fits You Best?
For example, you can just use baskets or containers and dump like items together like all the underwear, protein bars, or medicines. Use clear containers if you prefer to see everything and opaque containers if you prefer visual simplicity.
Each area might take the better part of a day. You can plan to do one or two areas each weekend in December or one each day during the last week of the month.
If the thought of doing every single room feels too much, reset one area in December and commit to resetting one new area per month starting in January of the new year.
Or just do as much as you can. A partial reset will feel better than no reset at all.
The Reset Questions
The reset questions vary slightly from room to room. Choose from the following list as appropriate:
Do I really need this?
Does it still fit?
Is it in good shape? Look for holes, tears, or stains.
Does it bring me joy? From Marie Kondo.
Is it past the expiration date? For food, medicines, and the like.
Is it a duplicate or triplicate? Do I more than one?
Have I used it in the past year?
Add your own questions to the list.
I’ve completed the reset in my home office. I felt so good at the end of that day.
Since I reset my closet frequently throughout the year, I don’t need to do it again. I don’t have a dresser in my bedroom. But I will go through my bedside table.
I don’t need to reset my kitchen. My diet is very simple. I only eat fresh foods so I don’t have a large store of canned or packaged foods. And I don’t have many kitchen gadgets. But I did de-stash a small number of remaining carbohydrate foods like quinoa and gluten free pasta since I’m on a low carb diet now.
Next up is my digital reset. That will involve removing unnecessary apps and files from my phone and desktop and decluttering my e-mail inbox. I’ve started by deleting contacts on my phone that I no longer need.
If you’re inspired, you could do your own reset in the month of December. Do one or two rooms each weekend. If that feels too much, do one room in December and then commit to doing one more room per month starting in January.
I can’t explain it, but I feel so good when the excess is gone. Since things are better organized now, I won’t lose time and energy looking for lost items. The new year can truly be a fresh start.
What about you? Do you feel inspired to do a year-end reset? I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments.
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Until Next Time
We’re under a wind advisory until 6 am tomorrow morning. That’s how the weather is where I live in Hawaii. You never know from one day to the next whether it will be rain, or shine, or in this case, windy.
Thanks for reading. It means a lot to me!
Much love to you. Wishing you well, always.
xo Sandra
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I am doing a different sort of letting go, Sandra. At 77, I am giving away things that I have loved and know that I will never use again and have not used in many years! The last give-away was my antique Christmas tree decorations to my Chinese friend, Jing, who wanted to really experience Christmas with a beautiful tree and all of the trimmings! I asked if she would like my ornaments' and she was so excited to get them and put pictures of the tree and ornaments all over FB! :). Someone else wants my Nativity set and all of the other decorations I had as a child. I love giving the things I have enjoyed and loved to people who I know will also love them. I have a lot of things I am getting rid of in the kitchen but I sort of do that bit by bit. One of these days I will tackle the medicine cabinet. So I am doing something a little different but it gives me so much joy to see my things bring joy to others! <3 Love to you, Sandra <3