If you read about the first step of my 3 P’s To Organization in my last blog then you already know that the first “P” stands for Purge. The second “P” stands for Pair. This is very simple to understand, it simply means to pair like items, or items of like purpose, together.
This may seem really obvious if you are reading this and you may be thinking, “Who doesn’t know that?” Well, think about your garage, kitchen, office desk, gift wrapping supplies, basement workshop. Do all of the areas in your home have everything together so when the time comes to use the space you aren’t making trips all over the house to collect the needed supplies?
Does this scenario sound familiar? Do you drop your mail on the kitchen counter, open the mail somewhere else and then leave it there. Then when it comes time to pay the bill, if you can find it, you go to another room to get a pen, then have to find the stamps buried in the junk drawer and you know those return labels are somewhere on the desk but since you can’t find them you will just write out your address yourself. If this sounds like a lot of wasted time, it is! To illustrate how pairing items with a similar purpose helps save time when you are doing bills, having the file for incoming mail, checkbook, stamps, return labels, envelopes and pens all in the same location makes it a snap to get this chore done in a much more efficient manner.
Try looking at other areas of your home to determine how you can make them more efficient by pairing like items, or items of similar purpose, together. You will save yourself more time and aggravation if you take these preventive measures now. Remember though, that any organizing system is only useful if you maintain it. That means putting everything that you use back in its place. Don’t simply put something down when it may only take 2 extra seconds of effort to put it away in its proper home.
