How to Kick The Junk Drawers and Clutter Hotspots

You declutter like a maniac, but these clutter hotspots still emerge like roaches.

The dining table that everyone uses as a catchall, the junk drawer in the kitchen, the entryway with piles of shoes –

I could go on! One study showed that 75% of its participants couldn’t park their car in the garage due to heaps of clutter. If this sounds like you, take solace in knowing that you’re not the only one!

But you can eventually take pride in becoming one of the few who have learned to kick these clutter hotspots.

When You Need Less Stuff

Expired Products

In most cases, you don’t need more storage; you need less stuff. If it’s junk, it’s junk!

Throw it out. If the pantry is overflowing, remove expired products and keep discarding items you no longer use – foods from an old diet, the oatmeal that nobody eats, etc.

Put yourself into “expiration mode” and remove all expired products from your home. Food isn’t the only thing that expires –

makeup, bathroom products, cleaning supplies, and medicines also expire.

I share more about working in modes in this 10-point checklist for managing clutter. Focusing on a single mode or task is the most efficient method of decluttering. This is a quick and easy way to get started and see results.

Paper Clutter

paper clutter is one of the most notorious clutter hotspots. There’s something about documents, taxes, and bills that makes us naturally want to avoid handling them.

Digitizing your paper load is the easiest and most effective way of managing paper clutter. Sorting and filing are generally a waste of time and space.

Snap a picture of pages you want rather than piling them on the fridge, and sign up for online billing to decrease your paper load.

Unneeded Stuff

If you start by decluttering the things you don’t need, you’ll clear space to hold better the items you need. This will cut down on the majority of the clutter hotspots organically.

However, some items aren’t junk, but they still build up in aggravating areas. We’ll focus on these clutter hotspots for the rest of this article.

How These Clutter Hotspots Work

Take the entry table that everyone dumps their stuff on as soon as they walk in the door. We drop our backpacks, jackets, papers, mail, and other daily things we carry. You can’t treat this clutter like the usual random house clutter.

You can clean up and put things away for the time being, but that doesn’t keep them from returning.

It may seem impossible in that you have to give in, but it isn’t. You need to understand this type of beast before you can dominate it.

Categories

Categorizing is a natural habit of the human mind. We are drawn to place similar items together and assign them to a group, often without even being aware.

Through this natural process, an object can become associated with an entire category in our minds.

For example, when you look at the jackets dumped onto a table, your mind will immediately link “table” with “jackets,” creating a relationship between them. It applies even to things that we don’t think twice about assigning to a category –

from clothing and furniture to abstract concepts like attitudes and moods. After all, everything has its place in one category or another.

Effort

Also, our brains will automatically attempt to strategize the least effort required to get the desired outcome.

This is a ” min-maxing ” process in the gamer world – getting the greatest results from the fewest actions. Sometimes our brains are naturally good at this … and sometimes, we have to Jedi mind trick them into being more efficient.

Simply put, if setting all of your stuff on the table is the quickest way to get your hands free, then the impulse will remain.

That doesn’t mean you can’t fight the impulse or train your brain to form new habits around clutter hotspots. But it will take some awareness!

However, if you want to slide right past the hard work of forming intentional new habits, you can make your min-maxing strategies.

How To Cure The Clutter Hotspots

Given how these hotspots work, you can use two strategies to work with your brain, rather than against it, in eradicating these trouble areas.

The first is to repurpose, and the second is to rehome.

Repurpose

This first strategy is to make the clutter hotspots less easy by repurposing the hotspot area. 

For example, make the entry table a station (coffee, tea, mail, etc.). Giving the area a new functional purpose will help your brain to recategorize this area.

It doesn’t feel natural to throw your jacket on top of a coffee station or shoe rack. This strategy helps in two ways.

First, it gives a purpose to an area that doesn’t currently have a defined purpose.

Second, it helps you organically break the habit of dropping clutter in that spot.

You can repurpose a dining table or bedside table simply by setting it or placing intentional decor. This will deter people from setting things in that spot.

Rehome

Another method to tackle clutter hotspots is to provide an easier alternative.

This requires intentionally rehoming the clutter. Create a new home for jackets and bags by placing a coat rack or hooks in the entry.

This gives these items a clear category location and an easier access point than the dining table.

Look at the types of items you’re collecting in your clutter hotspots.

If you have many items, rehoming is a wonderful option. Focus on creating a purposeful “home” for those belongings.

Junk Drawer Items

This is even true for smaller items that might be collected in a junk drawer. I’ve implemented this in my own home with pens and batteries.

A stylish pen holder now holds every pen in the house. It’s part of the decor and in a convenient location.

Now everyone knows where to grab a pen and where to put it when they’re done. I gathered them all for batteries in a large bank zipper bag and rehomed them with the tools.

Miscellaneous Items

These 2 methods will work for almost any clutter hotspots where the items aren’t just junked to throw away. However, there will inevitably be some miscellaneous items left over.

A small drawer organizer, sorter, or box should be sufficient. When it comes to organizers, simpler is better.

You can group miscellaneous items together and home them with another category. For example, candle lighters may be miscellaneous, but you can store them in the “tools” home.

I would love to make this post a two-way conversation, so leave a comment now. 

Never give up on becoming the best version of yourself because you deserve amazing peace and clarity. Thanks for reading, and I’ll catch you next time.