We begin “Kitchen month” with organizing your kitchen with 3 easy rules (video).The kitchen is the “heart of the home.” So many activities happen in the kitchen besides just meal prep. There’s dishwashing, storage, and recycling. Maybe there’s homework, bill paying, and mail sorting. It all piles up and that leads to Rule #1.

Rule #1: Circulation Prevents Accumulation

If you know my services at all, this won’t be a new one. I actually wrote a book about it called The Circulation Solution. What I mean by circulation is a plan for movement in series of manageable reliable stages. Dishes are a great example, but you’re  probably already doing that. To keep your kitchen organized you need everything to circulate. If a process is missing manageable reliable stages, create them!

Rule #2: Revere the Clear

Your number one organizing tool is a clear work surface. This is true in the office, the dining room, or the kitchen. A clear surface is more than just nice to look at or a nice idea. It must be revered, because it is the key to staying organized. A clear surface allows you to spread out, to prioritize and then process away. The key is to maintaining a clear surface is to never squander it on storage. So you need to create storage solutions that support this precious storage. That leads to Rule #3.

Rule #3: Prioritize to Organize

With so many activities in the kitchen you have to make sure the top priorities are easiest, when you get organized. For example, this time last year, my word of the year was “Health.” That became my top priority. My health coach recommended a daily smoothie that required a lot of ingredients and a lot of space. So I DE-prioritized a part of my storage cabinet to organize the best solution. I stored some items in the basement and some went in this “lesser used items” drawer, giving the priority to my smoothie components.

This relates to another principle from my book: Frequency Merits Facility. The more often you do something the easier it should be. I access this 4 mornings a week, so it better be easy! Organizing should make your life easier, but always ask if it is serving your priorities first.

So remember circulation prevents accumulation, revere the clear, and prioritize to organize. This is how to go about organizing your kitchen with 3 easy rules.