Organizing for the Rest of Us Quotes

“Just because a space is empty doesn't mean it is available to fill with stuff.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“Less” and “better” are more effective goals to work toward than “finished” or “done.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“can create a pile of random stuff with zero awareness I’m doing it. Things leave my hands without any notice of when or where they left.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“Time yourself doing the thing you put off doing. Get a reality-based understanding of how long it takes to do this thing instead of letting your mind exaggerate. My best example of the impact of timing a dreaded task is emptying the dishwasher. I would have thought”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“Idefine clutter as anything that continually gets out of control in my own home.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“Rule out pooping during the five-minute pickup. Every family has a pooper procrastinator.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“When you “take it there now,” you can stop at any point, and your space is better off—with less stuff in it than it had when you started. Less stuff equals decluttering success.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“Piles and Keep Boxes seem more efficient, but they are actually just procrastination stations.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“force yourself to make a final decision about each item as you deal with it.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“Most of all, I realized my family deserves space in the container that is our house more than anything else, so the more stuff I crowd in, the harder it is for my family to function in our home in the way they need to function.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“This frees me because I get to blame the container. Once I realized the purpose of a container was to contain, I accepted that limits were a thing. I don’t have to assess the value or future potential usefulness of every item in my house.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“decluttering without using emotions is the driving force for the steps in my decluttering process.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“I attach emotions to stuff. I let things represent my feelings for the person who gave them to me or the stage of life I was in when I obtained them. This is why I can’t use emotions to declutter. If I assess each item according to how it makes me feel, I will want to keep it. All of it. “Keeping it all” is what caused my house to get out of control.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“The core problem of Stuff Shifting is procrastinating on making decisions. I counted on future me to know what to do.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control

“I fell into the trap of viewing my stuff as money. I felt guilty about money I'd wasted, feared spending money to replace something, or dreamed of money I'd make if I sold it.”
― Dana K. White, Organizing for the Rest of Us: 100 Realistic Strategies to Keep Any House Under Control