clutter control          Ever buy an item only to discover you already had 6 of them buried in your closet? Chances are your closet needs some CPR. No, there’s no clever acronym here, but for a closet to serve you well, it needs to start breathing. Your closet needs clear passageways so Items can circulate in and out easily.

All too often, a closet become a black hole. Matter goes in, but doesn’t come out. To convert your closet from a black hole into a valuable organizing tool requires a fundamental shift in thinking. You can no longer think of your closet a place to hide things, but as a place to FIND things. You need easy systems, so it’s obvious where to store something AND where to retrieve it. Easy in, easy out, just like healthy breathing.

Now I’m not suggesting you need a giant pair of hands to pump oxygen into your closet, but a good place to start is with a good clear out. When your closet is completely clear it is much easier to rethink how you are using it than by only going half way. This is a great opportunity to get rid of the items you don’t need any more and reassign less important items to top and bottom shelves. The goal will be to use dedicated zones and make the items as visible and accessible as possible. This will allow your closet to breathe. Packing in as much as you can, chokes your closet. For complete details on how to organize your closet, check out my series on Top 10 Closet Storage Do’s and Don’ts.

TODAY’S KEY TO UNLOCKING CLUTTER: A non-breathing closet works about as well as a non-breathing you.