3 Simple Ways To Organize Your Paper Piles!
Have You Ever Wanted To Organize All Your Nagging Paper Clutter?
Ahh….the paper piles….we all have them…or should I say our kitchen tables, nightstands, desktops, even the floors in our home or office have them. It’s as if paper elves come in the night secretly piling pages on horizontal surfaces while we sleep…
Breathe…I’ve got you covered. Or should I say uncovered.
Ever wake to face what was yesterday only a few papers neatly placed, to a mountainous, precarious pile of…well let’s face it, you’re not sure what’s in that pile?
Just looking at the stacks makes you feel overwhelmed and paralyzed how to start.
Today I’m sharing 3 simple steps to organize your paper piles in no time.
Step 1: Approach your first pesky paper pile with a breezy attitude, because you’re about to effortlessly blow this pile, along with your guilt and anxiety, away…
Pull out any thick pieces such as catalogs, magazines, stapled packets and toss them into the recycle bin if they are not current or are just junk mail.
Voilá…you now have an instantly smaller pile. Even if you stopped now, you have successfully lessened some of the paper mess. Congratulations!
Step 2: Now that you’ve made a small dent, gather all your loose documents.
One reason people create paper piles is they are afraid that “out of sight – out of mind” will lead to wasted time searching for one piece they suddenly need.
Contain your papers in one place.
Now if you need a document, you only have one place to look through until you get them filed or where they belong.
A rectangle basket with a lid (a picnic basket works) or document boxes such as these works. Home Goods has all sort of lidded boxes that allow you to choose your style; solid, patterned, modern, vintage.
Step 3: Accept that all these papers did not come into your office or home at once. Give yourself permission to organize a little at a time, steadily.
Schedule 15 minute “paper dates” on your calendar a few times a week to take out a handful of papers from your container to handle once and for all.
Put any bills or important documents on top.
During your “paper dates” sift through your handful of papers and quickly toss any trash. Be ruthless: expired coupons, notes you wrote that now appear scribbled in some unintelligible language, business cards of people you can’t recall meeting (or foresee contacting).
Next, handle papers that require action: put events, appointments, phone numbers and relevant information in your calendar.
If you can take care of an item with a brief call or action that requires less than 2 minutes, do it now. Otherwise note the task on your To Do List. Read more about To Do Lists on my blog here.
Bonus: If you notice you keep sneaking a paper back in the box under a stack (who me?), ask yourself why you struggle to handle this item.
- Is it because it has no home so you don’t know where to put it? No file or folder?
- Is it sentimental? Could you take a photo of it, keep the picture and toss the original? Or put it in a memory box or album?
How do you handle the deluge of paper in your home or office?
I’d love to hear if any of these ideas helped you, and about your paper organizing strategies as well. Leave a comment or question below. I’d love to connect!
For now, I have to attend to my own few papers waiting on my desk…before the elves get here.
This is brilliant! My paper elves are constantly creating bigger piles throughout my home and office. Thanks for the “paper dates” idea.
So happy you found my post helpful! Gotta have those paper elves evicted 🙂
I deal with things right away (like bills, other docs, etc.). I have a binder for my year plan and to-do list and notes/brainstorms/ideas. I also keep info in binders (in the closet of my office) based on topic or course if it’s important to keep. I regularly go through things as well.
I do as you do with bills and documents, I handle right away, so they rarely pile up. Though, on a packed week or for the unforeseen, sometimes I cannot be on schedule. However, I find I can handle things fairly quickly as my systems are in place even when I had to let put something off for later. Love your binder idea. I use Evernote, but pen and paper are great for many people.
I have them grouped with paper clips, by category, until I put them in a file (talking about receipts here). Thanks for this, Jul’s, I think that there’s nobody who doesn’t need your help 🙂
Hi Llyane, that’s a good way to keep your receipts organized by paper clipping by category, awaiting filing. You are so sweet to say that everyone, or most everyone can benefit from my help! There is no right or wrong way to organize; it’s personal and can change over time. I love helping people by creating, designing and tweaking the “how” (to do it), so it supports their “why” (why do it). It’s in the details…as always thanks so much for sharing your comments 🙂
Oh gawd, the dreaded papers. This is what bugs me the most and used to cause the most mess in my home office.
I like your suggestion to handle a little at a time – puts an end to procrastinating because you don’t “have enough time to do everything”.
I’ve recently tried to make my office paperless and have been using Evernote to do so (how I love Evernote) so now I just take pictures of any important papers and allocate a tag to them ( eg car insurance, electricity bill, tax receipts etc)and save them them to the cloud. That way I have access to everything from my phone or computer.
Oh Sandra, I am an Evernote lover as well, though I may write a future post regarding the pitfalls of Evernote as there are some for different people. Happy you found my suggestion of a little at a time to help take action. I find I am actually more productive and successful when I take on small bits of a huge project and just keep on it. Thanks so much for your comment!
Hiya Kimberly,
Thanks so much for your comment…I might be a mind reader, or mayhap I just know paper pile-zilla—what a great new name you created–is the biggest complaint I get from people.
So glad I could help!
It feel so good to handle some of that paper, doesn’t it?
Check back and tell me what fancy and pretty containers you end up using.
Happy de-cluttering!
Jul’s
Jul’s are you reading my mind? I was just talking about my piles of paper clutter and voila. A post about helping me move through it.
I love the breezy attitude part most of all.
I tend to see it as a paper pile-zilla (which means I’m tackling it like a task and tasking is nooooo fun.)
Thank you for helping me do some much needed de-cluttering I feel a trip to a fancy container store coming in my near future.