The Difference Between Organizing And Simplifying

You can spend hundreds of dollars on cute organizers to color-code everything from your socks to your kitchen utensils, but it’s still overwhelming. Piling overflow shoes and clothing from your closet into stackable bins makes things easier on the eyes, but does nothing to streamline your life. Put simply, organizing your house isn’t the same as simplifying your life.

Simplifying focuses on reducing the number of things you own, so you spend less time, money, and energy on items you don’t want or need. Organizing is a tool to sort and categorize the things you keep, so you can access and use them more efficiently. Simplifying requires a mindset shift and encourages decluttering. It comes first; organizing is second. 

Understanding the difference between organizing and simplifying leads you to create a space that looks good and functions well. You’ll also transform how you feel living in your home, since when you focus on simplifying, you’ll drastically decrease chaos and stress.

Breaking Down The Difference Between Organizing And Simplifying

The best way to think about how organizing and simplifying your home differs, is to think of simplifying as a mindset and organizing as a tool. Simplifying focuses on reducing what you have, so there’s less to concern yourself with.In a word — decluttering.

Organizing is what you then do with the remaining things you own to make handling them as efficient as possible. This primary difference is why it is so important to declutter before organizing if your goal is to create a peaceful, functional, tidy space.

Simplifying Focuses On Being Intentional About What You Keep

Simplifying your home (and your life) is about removing what no longer serves you. At its core, it’s decluttering. You are reducing the inventory in your house, so you have fewer things to manage.

Trying to juggle a bunch of stuff results in a waste of precious time, energy, and money. Decision fatigue is very real, and when you have too much stuff, you amplify the number of choices you have to make each day.

An overload of options and stuff becomes tiring, and it leads to a more complicated, stressful life. So, simplifying is about decreasing the stuff to reduce the number of decisions.

Questions To Ask When You’re Simplifying Your Home

As you set out to simplify and declutter your home, ask the following questions with regard to your items.

• Do I need this?
• When was the last time I used this?
• Does this thing add value to my life?
• What would happen if I no longer had this item?
• Is this something I could easily borrow if I no longer had it?

As you go through these questions, remember the goal. You want to reduce the mental and physical load of your belongings. It’s not about cleverly storing everything. It’s about having less to store, which also means fewer things to clean, repair, and manage.

It’s also essential to reframe your mindset about simplifying. It’s not about depriving yourself. It’s about surrounding yourself only with the things that you truly use, need, and enjoy.

Organizing Is How You Create Order With The Things You Decide To Keep

After (and only after) you’re done simplifying your items, do you organize them. Organizing comes second to simplifying because it’s a tool to arrange the items you’ve decided to keep. This is the step where you categorize and decide the best way to store your belongings.

If you try to organize before simplifying, you end up wasting a lot of energy, time, and money on things you don’t even want. Instead of creating a calmer environment, you likely end up with even more chaos than before.

Most of the time, you end up adding more stuff to your life. Typically, organizing first leads to buying a bunch of containers and storage solutions to contain everything you own.

However, this isn’t what organizing is at its core; it’s not about simply containing things. Organizing is the art of arranging, categorizing, and storing your belongings, so you can access and use them more efficiently.

Questions To Ask When You’re Organizing Your Home

The questions you ask when you’re organizing are different from the ones you ask when you’re simplifying your home.

• Where should this item go, so it makes the most sense with how and when I use it?
• How do I store this?
• What category does this item best fit into?
• How often do I use this item in a given day?

As you answer these questions, focus on creating systems that make sense for your habits and lifestyle. The idea is to streamline your life, organizing only the things that add value, not every item you own. You can’t organize your way out of a chaotic, cluttered home.

Why Do People Confuse Simplifying And Organizing?

It’s easy to see why many people confuse organizing and simplifying. Organizing feels productive, providing quick visual results and giving you a tidy space that feels as if it’s calmer in the moment. However, it doesn’t hold up in the long run.

Simplifying requires more emotional investment and reflection, leading many people to skip it. But taking the time and energy to go through the process pays off in dividends and requires you to spend less time organizing afterward. Overall, simplifying doesn’t just create space; it creates time.

Six Signs You’re Organizing Without Simplifying

Have you ever organized a drawer or closet, only to have it revert to chaos within a month? That’s because it doesn’t matter how great a system you put into place if you still have too much volume.

If you have excessive inventory, including a bunch of things you don’t actually use, your system will eventually break down. Here are six clear signs you’re organizing instead of simplifying:

• You continue to buy containers or storage solutions.
• There isn’t enough space, even after organizing.
• It still takes you a long time to access what you need.
• You realize you’re rearranging the same items repeatedly.
• Your home looks tidy, but it still feels stressful and hard to maintain.
• Cleaning takes more energy than you want to give.

If any of these ring true for you, you’re likely using organization to compensate for clutter. Therefore, it’s vital to simplify first if you want to see lasting change.

Simplify First, Organize After

Now that you understand the difference between simplifying and organizing, check out the benefits.

• When you simplify first, your storage needs shrink.
• With fewer things, you can create simpler systems.
• You won’t spend as much on storage solutions.
• Finding what you need is faster and more efficient, leading to increased productivity.
• There’s no need to force items to fit or waste energy on unnecessary things.
• You spend less time cleaning and maintaining your home.
• Organizing after simplifying makes daily tasks go faster.
• You’ll reduce stress instead of adding to it.
• Your frequently used items are front and center, right where you need them.
• It’s more manageable for everyone living in the home to uphold the systems that are in place.
• You’re no longer focused on managing stuff. Instead, your systems support the lifestyle you want.

Simplifying first makes organizing easier. In the end, you get a home that doesn’t demand constant attention. Instead, your home serves you and reflects your values, freeing up time for rest, pursuing hobbies, and hosting friends and family.

Fewer Things To Manage Leads To More Life To Live

Both organizing and simplifying play important roles in creating a more functional, comfortable home that makes you feel good living in it. However, trying to do them out of order rarely works. 

You need to organize after you simplify. This order of operations ensures you don’t waste a bunch of time on things that aren’t adding value to your life.

Simplifying sets the stage for organization. It focuses on having fewer things to worry about, so you can spend more time living life instead of organizing it.

Relted Guides:

• Conquer Clutter Chaos: 8 Common Clutter Zones And How To Fix Them
• Organize Your Home To Make Life Better, Not To Look Perfect
• Organizing Mistakes To Avoid If You Want To See Results