How does Rock Star get you out of household overwhelm? DOGS!

Declutter, Organize, Get-Equity, and Systematize. 

A clutter-free and organized home isn’t just easy on the eyes; it can significantly impact your overall well-being, relationships, and quality of life. However, achieving and maintaining an organized home isn’t just buying an organizing bin or doing one decluttering round. We believe you should look at your home through four different categories because, for some, one step without the others might bottleneck you and make things more stressful for you.

 I will introduce you to our four-step process to help you zero in on where your energy should go when you don’t know where to start. Is it decluttering, organizing, getting household labor equity, or systems, habits, and routines? Do you need to focus on just one of those? All of them? Let’s see!

Decluttering: Do it and do it some more.

Decluttering is the foundational step towards a well-organized home, where our average client gets the most significant wins. It involves purging unnecessary items, creating more space, and ensuring that what you keep serves a purpose. Here are some points to consider when decluttering. 

• Before you get started decluttering, do some mental work around what you anticipate your challenges will be. Do you have clutter because you are sentimental about all the things? Are you struggling with sunk cost fallacy and can’t let that Care Bear waffle maker go? Feel guilt about those unwanted hand-me-downs for your kids that your neighbor gave you? Have aspirational clutter because, damn it, this is the year you start that soap carving hobby? Or is it a lack of time or energy? Knowing your potential bottlenecks (and figuring out how to overcome them) before you start is a good time spent. 
• Everything in your home should be earning its keep. If you don’t love or need it, consider sending it into the universe for someone else to love and use. If an item is not providing value in your life, it’s like an unemployed boyfriend spending all day on the couch watching NASCAR and leaving crumbs everywhere. You deserve better than a house filled with unemployed boyfriend vibes. 
• Slow the roll!  As you declutter, reflect on your purchasing habits. No shame allowed! But it’s a good time to know what is coming in while you get the extra out. 

Organizing: Key activities, zoning by level of use, and maybe some containers, too.

Once you’ve decluttered, the next step is to organize your space. At Rock Star, we define organization as knowing what you have, where it lives, accessing it quickly, and putting it away easily. Here are a few tips on approaching organization.  

• Storage Solutions: Don’t buy any product until you have done your decluttering step. This way, you’re buying for your actual inventory. Some things to consider when evaluating your storage solutions are: do you prefer visible or non-visible? What is your budget? What type of material? Does aesthetics matter?
• Labeling: Labeling is how your stuff gets an address. Clearly label storage containers, drawers, and shelves to streamline finding and returning items to their designated places. Maybe everyone will stop asking you where everything is. 
•  Zones: Organize your home into functional zones based on activities or item categories. For example, create a designated area for work or study, a space for leisure activities, and a specific place for frequently used items in each area.

Dividing Household Labor – Get Equity!

Maintaining an organized home is a collective effort. Dividing household labor ensures that the mental load, invisible labor, emotional labor, and daily care tasks are shared, reducing the burden on any individual and fostering a sense of shared ownership. Here’s how we approach dividing household labor:

• I (Ronnette) am licensed in the Fair Play Method. This system is a gamified approach to equitably dividing household chores. It gives you a shared language, mutually agreed-upon standards, and automation. It can give you time back, and you might dig your partner a bit more after implementing the system. Because nothing is more romantic than knowing you don’t have to remember or be responsible for it all by yourself. 
• We have a virtual consulting package to get Fair Play up and running in your house in four weeks. Or you can read the book, watch the documentary, buy the cards yourself, and jump in on your own. Either way, we believe in the serious value this system brings. 

Systems, Habits, and Routines

Sustaining an organized home involves establishing systems, habits, and routines that become ingrained in your daily life. Consistency is key to maintaining the order you’ve worked hard to achieve. Here’s how to approach sustaining your organized home:

• Tidying Routines: Develop short bursts of daily tidying that return stray items to their designated homes. Spending a few minutes daily tidying up common areas or returning items to their designated places prevents clutter from accumulating into the horrific piles that haunt you in your slumber.
• Household systems: To get time back, reduce stress, and save some money, put some energy into process improvement in the big three household systems: laundry routine, food management, and cleaning routines. 

By incorporating the Rock Star DOGS approach to reducing household overwhelm through decluttering, organizing, getting equity, and sustaining through systems, habits, and routines, you can create a living space that serves you, reduces stress, and increases time freedom for you and your family. Remember, the key is consistency, so embrace these principles as a lifestyle rather than a one-time task, and enjoy being the Rock Star of your home.

If you would like support in transforming your space, please let’s talk about your challenges and goals!