Disclosure: For your convenience, this post to help simplify your life may contain affiliate links.

If you know me, you know that organization isn’t necessarily one of my strengths. Which means a blog post about how to simplify your life isn’t something you would typically see on Me Plus 3 Today. But one of my strengths is helping other people, and I thought this idea might be able to help someone out there who feels like me. So, here I am sharing it with you!

Basically my feelings are that I want to be organized. I want to declutter. I want to simplify my life. But actually doing all of this seems overwhelming and daunting. I don’t know where or how to start, and it just doesn’t seem like I have enough time to even tackle that kind of task.

Sound familiar? Maybe you have had some of those same thoughts?

In a widow’s group I am in, there was talk of baby steps. The discussion was that as long as you are moving, even if it is only the slightest bit, you are making some progress. So, I decided that instead of looking at a major project of organizing, decluttering, or simplifying, I would look at it in baby steps.

This isn’t the Kon Marie Method and this isn’t one of those daily challenges where you accomplish a specific organizational task in one day. This is much smaller than that… This is just 5 minutes! Five minutes to take a teeny, tiny step and make a little bit of progress towards being able to simplify your life.

Some people may think that it seems like such a waste, that what I’m doing won’t really account for much.

That argument brings me to the fact that sometimes the hardest part of any task is just getting started. When you break it down into a 5-minute chunk of time, it seems a lot more doable and might actually motivate you to do even more. When I start to do one of these items from this list, I typically end up tackling a much bigger project right after because I feel energized and ready to accomplish even more.

As a former mechanical engineer, I have to compare this to overcoming inertia and gaining momentum with Newton’s First Law of Motion. In layman’s terms, Newton’s First Law basically says: “An object at rest will stay at rest and an object in motion will stay in motion, unless acted upon by an outside force.”

I know, I know… What’s with the physics lesson? Well, I think it’s a good motivational quote for beginning something that is new and/or difficult. By attempting just 5 minutes of work, it might result in that little bit of force that pushes you to get moving, and probably keep you moving!

So once you get started with one of these 5 baby steps, you might just continue and complete a major project. Even if you don’t, you are at least 5 baby steps closer to a more organized, less cluttered, simplified life!

If you are looking for even more resources to help you with decluttering, simplifying, and organizing your lie, then check out the AMAZING bundle offered at the end of this post or simply click here to learn more!

 

 

5 Things You can do in 5 Minutes to Simplify Your Life

1. Go through your social media accounts and unlike, unfollow, or leave at least 5 different pages, friends, or groups.

If you aren’t interested in what they share, why spend time scrolling by it? In 2013, the average person on Facebook in the United States followed 70 pages! (source) That doesn’t include even friends or groups and I’m sure that number has only gone up since then. With only a portion of those pages showing up in your feed anyway because of social media algorithms, it is probably time to just get rid of that dead weight.

2. Go into your email and unsubscribe from at least 5 different email lists.

I’m sure there are at least a few emails that you delete without even opening because you just aren’t interested in what they have to say. Then there are the stores that are sending you offers and just tempting you to spend money and add more clutter to your life. So get rid of the temptation once and for all by unsubscribing!

3. Walk through your house and put 5 things back where they belong.

If you are like me, then miscellaneous items tend to travel throughout the house and eventually end up where they don’t belong. Whether it be a book, magazine, coat, shoes, toys, or whatever, simply pick up 5 things and put them away. It is really that easy!

4. Go through your kids toys and choose 5 things to donate.

Put them in a bag right away and then put it in your car to drop off the next time you are out and about. You don’t need to save it up until you have a huge load of stuff to drop it off. If you are out running errands anyway, it is easy to swing by your local donation center and drop off that one bag. Then it is out of your house and out of your mind!

Note: If you have already done your kids toys, then other options would be to choose 5 things from your closet, your kids closet, or even your kitchen cabinets. Just choose 5 items from any one area.

5. Clean out your purse and/or wallet.

Do you have receipts or stray gum wrappers collecting at the bottom of your purse? What about spare change or a even few pens jingling around? For a lot of moms, the most random stuff ends up in your purse, including crumbs and dirt that kids seem to be a magnet for. Ultimately, you end up wasting time digging past all of that stuff to find your keys or cell phone. So dump everything out on the table, throw away the trash, and put away anything that doesn’t belong in your purse. Utilize a purse organizer to simplify your life even more. It will seriously feel like a weight has been lifted!

 

Conquer Your Clutter Super Bundle

Earlier in this post I mentioned getting even more resources for decluttering, simplifying, and organizing your life. The Conquer Your Clutter Super Bundle includes 38 tools that will help you accomplish your goals, including 5 E-courses, 15 planners, and 18 E-books! Get the Conquer Your Clutter Super Bundle by clicking here!

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If you are like me and want to organize, declutter, and simplify your life, but just can’t find the motivation to start, I hope that doing one (or more) of these 5 things helps you get a few baby steps closer to your goals!

Click here to follow my Organization Tips Pinterest Board for even more ideas!