The Clutter Connection. Cassandra Aarssen
into one organizational style, when in fact, there was more than one way to organize. My “stick it to the man” approach to life was finally paying off and, high on fumes from dollar store plastic containers and chalkboard labels, I launched my own organizing business with the enthusiastic intent of blessing the world with my newfound expertise and wisdom. To my delight, my “less is more” approach to organization was actually a huge hit…for a while.
All good things come to an end I guess.
Fast forward one year, and I’m standing in a client’s home office as she sheepishly explains that the paper system I designed for her “just isn’t working.” I held in my tears (and thankfully resisted the urge to throat-punch her), as this was the THIRD time in as many weeks that I’d come back to redesign her space. Did I mention that my redesigns were all pro bono? Yeah, in my organizing arrogance, I had declared to all of my clients that, if they were not 100 percent satisfied, I would redesign the space for free until they were. I was now seriously regretting that promise.
Walking into that third visit, I believed that this client was just simply lazy. The first system I created for her huge piles of paperwork was a simple basket system, similar to the one I used in my own home. One basket for bills, one for receipts, one for current clients, and so on. No extra micro-sorting into small categories such as “Electricity” and “Gas,” just one macro-organized pile of mixed-up “Bills” in a pretty basket. Her reaction to my “genius” simple organizing solution was less than enthusiastic.
“Nothing is even really organized,” she gasped in horror as she surveyed the rows of pretty matching baskets labeled with simple categories such as “Home,” “Manuals,” and “Taxes.” She insisted that she couldn’t find anything at all and that it was in fact, less organized than the mountains of paper piles that she had started with. I assured her that this system had worked for all of my previous clients and that she needed to simply “get used to it.” A week later, she informed me that she would never get used to it and that she needed a much more detailed system. She craved order and perfection. I was completely shocked. Order and perfection were not my friends. Apparently, not everyone was made for my simple and easy organizing system after all.
Her redesign used filing cabinets instead. I made her a traditional filing system, complete with color-coding for all the hundreds of detailed categories and adorable tiny labels for her hoard of papers. I sorted…for days…and created a very orderly and traditionally perfect paper filing system. I even made her a little printout directory and quick-find guide for her files. I thought it was overkill, but she was thrilled. She was a perfectionist, through and through, and I had created a “perfect” organizing system for her paperwork.
I left her home resigned to the fact that some people really do love the traditional organizing systems and, therefore, there must be two different ways to organize a space; simple or detailed. These two systems were completely dependent on the person’s personality. Traditional “type A” personalities (competitive, highly organized, ambitious, perfectionist) needed traditionally detailed systems, while “type B” personalities (such as myself) needed a more laid-back and easy-to-use organizing solution.
One week later, I was back in her office for a third redesign because she couldn’t, and I quote, “put anything away” with the new system. She had pulled dozens of file folders out of the filing cabinets and spread them out on every surface, including her desk, the sofa, and even the floor. Embarrassment flushed her face as she scanned her messy office and whispered, “This just works best for me, I need to see my papers. I can’t bear to put them in the filing cabinets, I’ll forget I even have them. I’m just a messy person, I guess. Maybe I’m just too lazy to ever be organized.”
This is when realization hit me like a freight train to the face. She wasn’t lazy or messy. This incredible woman standing before me was the opposite of lazy in every way. She had her master’s degree, her law degree, and had even recently opened her own law firm. She loved to cook, sew, and paint in her spare time. Laziness and disorganization were not the reasons her office was drowning in paper clutter. She was not messy, she just organized differently.
I should have realized the difference earlier because, in my own battle with clutter, I had also resigned myself to the idea that I was just a naturally messy person. I had spent the first twenty-eight years of my life believing the lie that I was just not good at cleaning and organizing. In fact, the perception I had of myself as a lazy and unproductive person was so deeply rooted, I always assumed I would fail even before I began a new task. Despite my willingness to change and many attempts to do so, I never really believed it would happen because I had failed so many times in the past.
I had set up a traditional paper filing cabinet in my home, but I just couldn’t seem to find the motivation to put paper back into its appointed category. Mail would come in the door and never make it into the elaborate sorting system my husband had set up. I had organized my bathroom closet with matching stacked plastic containers, carefully sorting my products into micro categories such as “Pain Relievers,” “Allergy,” “Stomach,” and “Bandages.” The truth was, no matter how much I wanted to, I would never take the time to put things away in their proper container when I was done. I simply set the items beside or on top of it, resulting in a messy closet in no time flat.
It wasn’t until I stopped trying to conform to the “traditional” sorted category and micro-organizing style that I finally stopped the madness of endlessly tidying and re-tidying my home. I stopped looking at what I couldn’t keep clean and tidy, and started looking at the spaces I could. Once those spaces were identified, I asked myself one simple question…why?
I could easily put the pain reliever bottle away when I could toss it into a large bin labeled “Medicine” along with all the other bottles of pills. Clean laundry stopped living in laundry baskets on the floor and started getting tossed into open bins labeled “Pants” and “Pajamas” in my closet. Toys, makeup, office supplies, and even food could be chucked from across the room back into the appropriate bin, making putting things away beyond fast and easy. For me, a simple, less-sorted, less-organized system was the secret to success. When I replicated this simple system in every closet, drawer, and storage area throughout my home, I no longer struggled with chaos and clutter. Everything just started finding its way home, like magic. I still struggle with that voice in my head telling me that I’m a hot mess. I certainly don’t organize and clean my home in the traditional sense, but it is clean and organized nonetheless.
When it came to my fabulous yet frustrating lawyer client with the serious paper addiction, I was trying to shove her into the “traditional hidden organization” box. Let’s face it, not only are most organizing solutions detailed, but they also typically involve putting your belongings “away” and “out of sight.” I had never even considered organizing another way. It was at that moment, while staring at her piles of paper clutter covering every surface, that I again asked myself that one simple question…why? Why do these papers all spread out on the floor work better for her brain than stored in the filing cabinet? The answer: She was a visual organizer.
Instead of hiding her paper in filing cabinets or baskets in her closet, I filled an entire wall in her office with vertical paper-filing racks from floor to ceiling. These magazine-rack-style organizers held her sorted and color-coded file folders. Instead of being spread out on her desk and floor, they were visually spread out on her wall. We also installed bulletin boards and memo boards above her desk for important reminders and inspirational quotes. I finished it off with a pegboard to hang her daily-use office supplies.
In the end, almost every inch of her office walls was filled with something: art, inspirational quotes, and visual organizing solutions. It was definitely not my ideal organizing setup; in fact, I found myself anxious, distracted, and completely overwhelmed in the space. But this wasn’t my space; it was hers. Instead of feeling anxious and overwhelmed, her bright and full office made her feel focused, inspired, and energized. We were complete polar opposites in our organizing personalities.
We returned the filing cabinets, and she sold all the “hidden storage” units in her office, opting for open bookcases instead. She had fully embraced her visual organizing style and beamed as she gushed to me about