There are so many techniques and methods out there to help you declutter your home, but they all have the same goal: downsizing how much junk you have and getting the rest of it organized. Where they differ is methodologies. Some are better suited to larger homes or heavier junk volumes, for instance, while others leave some wiggle room for items you feel sentimental about and are hesitant to part with, and some force you to be a little more objective and decisive when tossing things out. Here are some of my favorite decluttering techniques.

The ski-slope method

Anita Yokota's ski-slope method was born from her experience as a licensed therapist and interior designer and is meant to help you declutter in a way that won't be overwhelming for you mentally. She outlines the method in her book Home Therapy: Interior Design for Increasing Happiness, Boosting Confidence, and Creating Calm, suggesting you imagine your messy room like a ski slope, zig-zagging from section to section instead of working in a straight line, as you would if you were skiing down a hill.

Rather than looking at it as a whole (a huge mess you'll never be able to clean!), start in one corner or section and work from there: Clean, declutter, and organize. Move to the next side or section and do it again. Continue moving through the room, working from side to side. As you finish each section, you can pause for a break if you need to, then pick back up where you left off.

Project 333

Adhere to the TikTok-famous Project 333, which comes from comes from Courtney Carver's Project 333: The Minimalist Fashion Challenge That Proves Less Really Is So Much More, if you want to pare down your wardrobe and create a "capsule wardrobe" of basic, mix-and-matchable pieces over time. Start by selecting only 33 pieces of clothing, jewelry, and accessories (excluding underwear or sentimental, everyday-wear jewelry), then boxing everything else up for three months. At the end of that time, you'll have combined your 33 pieces to make outfits and will have a better sense of what you really need for daily wear and what you own that might be good for donating.

For a similar approach, you can adapt the Pareto principle or 80/20 rule, recognizing that you use about 20% of your stuff 80% of the time, whether that's the clothes you wear every day, the kitchen tools you use to make your most common meals, or anything else that you reach for the majority of the time. Once you start identifying the 80% of things you rarely use, it becomes pretty easy to give them the boot.

The 12-12-12 method

This is one of the longer-term methods on the list and it calls on you to overhaul your lifestyle a bit. When you use the 12-12-12 method, you find 12 things to throw away, 12 things to donate, and 12 things to put away—every day. With 12 in each category every day, you're dealing with a number small enough to work with in an achievable way but big enough to make an impact on your clutter. Of course, you can move that number up or down slightly to accommodate your own needs, but the real idea here is that you get in the habit of identifying what you can get rid of and what needs to be organized and put away every day.

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The Organizational Triangle

Another longer-term, lifestyle-altering approach is the use of the Organizational Triangle, a concept from by pro organizer Andrew Mellen, the man behind The Most Organized Man in America's Guide to Moving and Unstuff Your Life: Kick the Clutter Habit and Completely Organize Your Life for Good. This three-tiered approach provides a simple process for maintaining a clutter-free home:

• Every item needs a home

• Keep like with like

• Use a "something in, something out" approach

By making sure you get into the habit of putting everything where it belongs (and getting rid of things that don't belong anywhere), storing everything with related items, and getting rid of one thing every time you bring something new in, you can not only get organized, but stay organized.

The five-second rule

The five-second rule is a trick you can use when you're decluttering to make fast decisions about what stays and what goes. It's a widely-adaptable technique from organizational coach Mel Robbins, who advocates for it in her books. Basically, you should make major decisions in under five seconds, counting down five, four, three, two, one so your brain senses some urgency. At the end of the countdown, you have to make a choice and when you're decluttering, you'll decide whether to keep something and find a place for it or toss it or donate it. In your heart, you already know which items are useful and need to stick around. Instead of deliberating over the decision, make it fast and keep going so you don't lose momentum.

If you're really stuck after five seconds, there are two questions you can ask yourself to illuminate the right choice: According to organizational gurus the Minimalists, you should ask yourself, "Could I replace this item for less than $20?" and "Could I replace it in less than 20 minutes?" If the answer to both is yes, that thing can go. The space you'll save by tossing it will be worth the $20 you may spend in the unlikely event you ever need it again.

KonMari

Arguably the most famous method on the list, Marie Kondo's KonMari leaves a little room for the items you care about, even if they have fewer practical uses than others. Kondo's method of organizing follows a few simple steps designed to ensure “you will never again relapse to clutter.” Here’s what she calls for: 

1. Commit yourself to tidying up.

2. Imagine your ideal lifestyle.

3. Finish discarding first.

4. Tidy by category and not by location.

5. Follow the right order.

6. Ask yourself if it sparks joy, and get rid of it if it doesn't.

The Peter Walsh method

Walsh method is similar to Kondo's, but a little stricter. Compare her steps with his and spot the differences:

1. Empty your space.

2. Create a vision for the space and set an intention for it.

3. Sort everything you removed into a “vision” pile and an “out-the-door” pile.

4. Get rid of the “out-the-door pile” by donating or throwing everything away.

5. Move everything from the “vision” pile back into the space.

Fully emptying your space is more intense than just organizing it as-is, so choose this technique if you really need an overhaul.

Decluttering at the Speed of Life

The Decluttering at the Speed of Life method comes from Dana K. White, who has chronicled her “deslobification” journey on a blog since she began in 2009. She took notes of all her wins and failures as she sought to find a way to declutter without getting overwhelmed, keeping track of what worked and what didn’t—and ultimately published a book, Decluttering at the Speed of Life: Winning Your Never-Ending Battle with Stuff. To utilize her technique, select a small area, and do these five things:

1. Start with trash, like receipts, wrappers, bags, anything that is broken, expired food or products, or anything you simply don’t need or use at all. Throw all that away.

2. Do the easy stuff. Put everything you see out of place back where it belongs.

3. Categorize “duh clutter,” or anything that could be donated. Keep a box on hand and toss anything worthy of donation into it. 

4. Ask yourself one or two decluttering questions. First, “If I needed this item, where would I look for it?” If you can instantly think of an answer, take the item where it belongs. If you can’t think of an answer, ask a follow-up: “If I needed this item, would it occur to me that I already had one?” Get rid of the thing if the answers are no.

5. Finally, make it fit. Only keep what you have space for and organize those.

Throw a packing party

Another intense, room-clearing option is the "packing party," which also comes from the Minimalists. To throw a packing party, invite your friends over and have them help you pack everything in the room into boxes, as if you were moving, and label those boxes. For three weeks after that, live your life as normal, only pulling things out of the boxes if and as you need them. At the end of the three weeks, go through whatever you haven't needed and commit to throwing or donating most of it. This method helps you "move back in" to a cleaner space full of only the things you really need.

365 Less Things

Colleen Madsen's unique 365 Less Things technique is a slow burn. It will take a year to complete, but at the end of that year, you'll be living in a cleaner, more organized space—and will have built up the habits that can keep it that way. All you do is commit to getting rid of one thing every day for a year. The goal here isn't instant progress, but incremental progress that you can learn from. Set a reminder in your phone for every day at a certain time and, when the alarm goes off, find one thing to get rid of. You can donate it, sell it, or throw it away, but it has to go. The beauty of this method is that while it takes time, the time is actually beneficial: Eventually, it'll become second nature to find and get rid of one thing in your home every day. Plus, decluttering so incrementally is a lot less overwhelming than other methods of home cleaning and organization, so it's perfect for if you're feeling too put-upon by the daunting task.

The Before and After technique

Finally, if you're a more visual person, the Before and After approach from Becoming Minimalist is for you. Pick a small section of your home, like a countertop or junk drawer, and snap a picture of it. Then, clean it up. Just focus on the small area you photographed. Once you’re done, take a new picture and compare the two. Do this any time you have a few minutes to dedicate to a minor cleaning task, so the pics are right next to each other in your camera roll. When you can see the difference just by swiping between the two photos, you’ll feel motivated to keep going. Without the pictures, it can be hard to remember what the mess even looked like, so you won’t stay as motivated to clean or keep it clean.

If you need more motivation, here are my favorite tools to use to declutter.

If you've ever stumbled upon a TikTok video or Instagram reel of someone restocking their fridge and pouring all their juice out of its original carton into a clear bottle, putting all their canned beverages in a designated rack instead of the cardboard box they came in, and removing snacks from their container just to rearrange them some other way, you may have thought, "What is the point of all that?" Why do goods come in boxes and containers if not to be stored in them, too? While it might seem like a purely an aesthetic play, there are some good reasons for decanting all your stuff if you're looking to keep your home really organized.

Why decant your goods?

First of all, it just looks nice if you store everything in glass bottles or jars. If your cookies are in a big jar, instead of a package that says "OREOS," or your laundry detergent is in a clear dispenser instead of a big jug that says "GAIN," you get a sleeker, more put-together look. It's good for the planet—to an extent. If your city has refill stations or stores, you can bring your containers in and fill them with laundry soap, dish soap, lotion, shampoo, and all kinds of other materials instead of having to repeatedly buy single-use plastics, which is a good habit to get into. Search "refill store near me" or "zero waste store near me" if you're not sure whether there's one in your area.

Beyond that, decanting and using your own containers is a major win for organizing. You can get vessels that stack easier on top of one another, for instance, which saves more space than if you try to cram all the different sizes and shapes of store-bought containers together in your fridge or cabinet. If you use clear containers, you can quickly see what you're running low on and what you have enough of, stopping you from accidentally buying too much and letting it take up space.

Some good decanting options

You may already be doing a little decanting of your own. Maybe you have a set of accessories for the bathroom that includes a matching soap dispenser, which requires you to pour soap from a large jug into a smaller decorative vessel. Hell, if you use salt and pepper shakers, you're decanting, too. But there are all kinds of opportunities for better storage out there.

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• Try this three-pack of half-gallon glass bottles with pump lids and labels, which you can use for laundry detergent, shampoo, or other high-volume liquids ($29.99).

• These two plastic containers each hold about 50 ounces and are recommended for laundry detergent (and have corresponding laundry labels included), but can be used for anything you need to pour, like milk ($25.59).

• These two 1.25-gallon jugs are multi-use, since you can access dry and scoopable goods from the top or use the spout at the bottom to dispense liquids ($39.59).

• These drink organizers let you store nine soda or beer cans at a time with a much smaller footprint than if you tried to set them in the fridge side by side, but you can also use them to store cups and other round items in the cabinet ($15.16 for four).

• You can get all kinds of things to hold and dispense various sauces. I have these restaurant-style squeeze bottles for my condiments ($7.82 for two) but you can grab this glass bottle that both pours and spritzes olive oil ($16.99) and this precision-pouring soy sauce dispenser ($14.99), too.

• And don't forget a toiler paper holder, like this one that stores six rolls will making a seventh convenient for grabbing when you need it ($39.99)

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With all the decluttering methods out there, you have options for how you are going to go about battling all the junk in your home. But they do all have basic tenets and requirements in common. Whether you move through the space in bursts, store items you might want to hold onto but aren't sure about, or follow rules governing how you determine whether to toss or keep things, there are a few things you'll need: Here's what to pick up before you start.

You need boxes for decluttering

No matter what technique you're following, you need boxes. You need at least three, maybe four: One for things you'll keep, one for things you'll throw, one for things you'll donate, and maybe one for things you'll sell. You can get big ones or small ones, depending on the volume of items you have to go through or whether you're working on small areas one at a time. Try these:

• Four foldable fabric boxes with lids, $39.99

• Four stackable plastic boxes, $34.99

You need labels for decluttering

Those boxes and the spaces you're organizing could benefit from some labels. You need to be able to easily recognize what is for keeping, what is for donating, and where the things you've decided to keep should be stored. Try these:

• Six reusable dry erase sticky notes with two pens, $14.90

• 120 chalkboard labels with a chalk pen, $8.99

Reusable ones are best for the actual decluttering process, as you can write notes or make specific designations, then change them when new needs arise. For labeling the storage of things you keep, you need something a little nicer. Try the chalkboard labels above, which still reusable but look sharp on containers.

You could also try a label maker, which produces labels that aren't as retro as you're imagining. With most label-makers these days, you can get decorative label paper and some even print in color, so you can customize your labels to look exactly how you want.

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You need trash bags to declutter

You'll be throwing away and recycling a lot, so buy your trash bags in bulk and make sure you have the ones that are appropriate for your city's waste disposal. In general, try to use opaque ones when possible, so you can have a sense of finality when you make the decision to toss something out and can't see it anymore once it goes into the void. You can get 56 30-gallon black bags from Hefty for $15.41.

Other potential decluttering needs

Consider your space and plans before you start. Are there high cabinets? You might need a step stool. Are some spots not only disorganized and cluttered, but actually dirty? You might need rubber gloves. Do you plan to sell some of what you're getting rid of online? You might need a simple background. (I use a faux fur rug for all my Poshmark sales.)

Taking notes on the needs of your specific project and making sure you get it all in advance will stop you from running into barriers or holdups, which can derail motivation and stall your progress altogether. Plus, once you have everything you'll need, you'll likely feel a little more of a push to get started, so stocking up before you begin is a win-win.

A lot of decluttering methods are intimidatingly objective, prompting you to make split-second decisions about what stays and what goes and not allowing yourself to get too sentimental about anything, but to focus on each item's usefulness in your life. Some methods, like KonMari, leave a little space for things that only bring you joy, but for the most part, you're just supposed to part with things that don't serve you.

The problem is, it's hard to quantify how a sentimental or emotionally meaningful item serves you at all. Letting go of your kids' old art projects or mementos, for instance, is pretty emotional, even though you're probably never really going to use (or even look at) that macaroni art from 1997 again. In my family, we tackle this problem by holding "remembrance nights" before parting with these sorts of items. Giving them a formal sendoff recognizes the value they hold, and gives you a chance to reflect before you part with them. Here's how it works.

How to hold a remembrance night for sentimental objects you need to get rid of

The last time I was home visiting my mother, she greeted me with a tower of storage boxes full of items from my childhood: old school assignments and art projects, tons of photos, and trophies and plaques of all kinds. She told me she wanted to get them out of the house, but wanted to give me one more chance to look at them and take a little trip down memory lane before she nuked them. She said I could hold on to anything really important, but for the most part, all of it would be tossed or donated the next day.

We sat for hours on the living room floor, digging through yarn-bound construction-paper journals from first grade, pictures of our family in front of Mount Rushmore and at Disney World, and the school assignments and mementos that provided physical proof that I have always been a huge nerd.

In the end, I held on to very little from those boxes—a trophy I won when I beat a specific rival in an extracurricular event in 11th grade, two cards from my late father, and a few pictures I wanted to frame. I took pictures of a few funny things (like a childhood journal entry where I opined that it should be illegal to hurt someone's feelings) in case I wanted to revisit them later. We also set aside some photos to digitize, with the mutual vow to throw them away once they were safely in the cloud.

Beyond that, the simple act of seeing everything one last time was fulfilling—a finite way to revisit my memories without burdening myself with a storage unit's worth of stuff that would look like old junk to anyone but me. I found it eased the pain of parting with this symbolic representations of the past, and it can help you too.

Why this works

As sad as it was to get rid of the tangible evidence of my childhood, in my heart I understood that I don't really need it anymore, and neither does my mom. It's all just stuff. It doesn't bring my childhood back. It just takes up space. And, as my mom says, "What's the point of holding onto the past?"

Keeping items closed away in boxes isn't meaningful. Looking through those boxes together was fun. We laughed and cried, revisited our memories, rediscovered ones we'd forgotten, and made new ones, and to say goodbye. We were also able to do a final sweep for anything we might not be ready to part with, like rare photographs. It all made untethering ourselves from the junk a lot easier.

How to prepare yourself to get rid of sentimental items

If you're having a hard time letting go of old, sentimental stuff, start by putting all of it into a box and leaving it alone for a while. (If it has all been sitting in boxes for years already, congratulations: You're halfway there.) Next, gather your friends or family (or go it solo) and hold your remembrance night. Take the time you need to go through, touch, read, look at, laugh at, or cry over every item in the box, one by one. As you do, sort each thing into one of three boxes: one for things to throw away, one for things to donate, and one for the few items you still want to keep.

Donating is especially helpful in a sentimental situation like this: It's nice to know the things that you valued are going to be valued by someone else too. My mom took all my trophies and plaques to a memorial shop in town, for instance, where they will be turned into new trophies and plaques for other little nerds (or, perhaps, athletes). I don't know who will get them, but I do hope they'll be as excited about them as I was in the 11th grade.

Cleaning, decluttering, and organizing can get overwhelming if you try to tackle everything at once, and getting demoralized will only keep you from doing a good job (or doing it at all).

If this sounds like you, you need a plan of attack that will not only help you stay on task, but keep you feeling positive and motivated—so consider the so-called "ski slope method," which aims to keep your morale up by keeping your tasks discrete and manageable.  

What is the ski slope method? 

This technique comes from Anita Yokota, a licensed therapist who approaches organizing from a perspective informed by her expertise in mental health. She outlines the method in her book Home Therapy: Interior Design for Increasing Happiness, Boosting Confidence, and Creating Calm. 

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Yokota sees a connection between disarray in someone’s life and disarray in their home—and how those two things can exacerbate each other. So she suggests acknowledging that cleaning is “a mental marathon,” something that happens over time (and continuously) instead of all at once.

Yokota's method prompts you to imagine your messy room is like a ski slope. If you try to go straight down (that is, tackle the entire task at once), it can feel overwhelming, but if you zig-zag (clean in stages), you can get down the mountain while experiencing far less stress.

So, consider the room you're aiming to clean. Rather than looking at it as a whole (a huge mess you'll never be able to clean!), start in one corner or section and work from there: clean, declutter, and organize. Move to the next side or section and do it again.. Continue moving through the room, working from side to side. As you finish each section, you can pause for a break if you need to, then pick back up where you left off.

Why the ski slope method works

The ski slope method helps you break your work into chunks that you can clearly visualize. Jumping from one corner or section to another farther away, you’re moving in bursts instead of starting in one spot and continually cleaning from there. As individual sections become tidy, you can see results, which can help you stay motivated. At the same time, the step-by-step approach gives you ample opportunities to take breaks, improving your chances of making it to the bottom of the mountain with your sanity intact.

The Dyson Airwrap is the beloved haircare accessory of the moment, but it's also a pretty pricey one, so if you've made one a part of your daily routine, you probably want it to last a long time. If so, you should definitely be cleaning your Airwrap’s filter regularly.

Why is there a blinking white light on your Dyson Airwrap?

You're excused if you didn't know you had to do this, because it isn't entirely obvious. Unless you closely examined the box your hair tool came in, you even may have missed the tiny circular cleaning brush hidden in the back compartment. But you definitely have to do it: If you leave it uncleaned for too long, the first thing that will happen as a result is a blinking white warning light. The second thing that will happen is your device shutting down out of nowhere, mid-use, and refusing to turn back on for 10 to 15 minutes, and leaving you with a head of hair that's half dry and curled, and half just wet.

Avoid that fate by cleaning your filter the right way.

How to clean your Dyson Airwrap’s filter

This process is pretty simple, but you need to do it at least a few hours before you want to use the machine, so the parts have time to soak and dry. 

1. First, remove the filter cover. That's the small, dotted cage at the bottom of the handle, just above where the electrical cord connects. Grip it firmly and rotate it counter-clockwise as you pull down and away from the Airwrap. A magnetic seam in the back will release, at which point it should come off easily. 

The Airwrap filter cover in soapy water Credit: Lindsey Ellefson

1. Run the filter under a stream of warm water, then plop it into a container of warm, soapy water to soak for about half an hour.

2. Grab the filter cleaning brush from the box your machine came in. (It should be in a smaller box hidden somewhere in the larger container.) Slip the power cord through the hole in the brush, slide the brush to the spot where the filter cover usually clamps on, and move it in circular and up and down motions to remove anything caught in there. (If you don’t have this brush, you can try a stiff bristled brush like an old toothbrush, but you should never use anything wet on the body of the device.)

This is what the brush looks like. Credit: Lindsey Ellefson

1. After half an hour, remove the filter from the soapy water and let it air dry. Don’t reattach it until it’s fully dry. 

If cleaning doesn't stop the white light from blinking

If you’ve cleaned the filter and the LED light is still blinking, you may need to replace the filter cover. Dyson sells them for $19.99, but if they’re out of stock, which they are from time to time, Amazon offers third-party filter covers for as low as $13.68 (and they come with replacement cleaning brushes, too). 

So much of the advice out there for decluttering calls on you to make instantaneous decisions about what stays and what goes—and expects you to put a lot of stuff in that “goes” category. There is certainly a good reason to try to do this with speed: The less time you spend considering something’s fate, the less time you have to get sentimental or start worrying about the unlikely event you’ll need it in the future. That said, some possessions really do pose a bit of a conundrum, and you need to take some additional time to think over what you should do with them. That’s where your “maybe box” comes in. 

What is a "maybe box"?

While all the different organizing and decluttering methods out there have their own protocols, they have something in common: You’re sorting your stuff into three piles—keep, donate, toss—and occasionally a fourth, which is sell. Typically, you do this with boxes of some kind, to make everything easier and clear the space you’re working on right away. 

Next time, add one more box: Adding a “maybe keep” box gives you an opportunity to put a few items in a kind-of purgatory while you reflect on their fate, but still clears the space you’re working on and doesn’t hold you up from continuing your decluttering work. 

How to use your maybe box

When you’re decluttering, you should always be working in small sections, focusing on a shelf, a drawer, or a specific space in a room so you don’t get overwhelmed. Doing that, you’re placing items into their corresponding boxes, usually deciding whether to keep, throw, or donate them. When you pick up something you end up deliberating about, though, it slows you way down as you ponder it, its potential future uses, and its personal meaning to you. Instead of doing that, toss it into the maybe box, which you’ll revisit later, so you can stay focused and keep grinding on the space in front of you. 

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Set a period of time—like a month—where you won’t open the box or even acknowledge it. Only open the box if there is a specific item you actually need during that time (which will be proof the thing was actually necessary and shouldn’t get tossed). At the end of the time period, go back to the box and reconsider everything in there, asking yourself if you found yourself needing it, missing it, or forgetting about it entirely. Whatever you forgot can be gotten rid of and you can do that with a little more confidence after proving to yourself you didn’t really need it or care about it that much at all. As long as they have a designated spot to be stored, you can hold onto anything you found yourself missing badly. 

Doing a little experiment like this will help with indecision and guilt related to getting rid of certain things, but will also keep the space you’re working on clear of junk in the interim, so you don’t sacrifice immediate results while you figure it all out. Just try to select an opaque box so you can’t see the items inside—being reminded of their existence will bias you a little. Instead, find something you can’t see through and can stash somewhere out of the way.

If you have a ton of clothes, you may occasionally contemplate downsizing to create a "capsule wardrobe," comprised of basic pieces—like cardigans, plain shirts, and jeans—that can be mixed and matched to create multiple outfits. But actually doing it is a lot harder than imagining what it might be like to have a pared-down closet. What if you get rid of an item that would be just perfect for some future outfit? What if you then have to go buy a new one to replace it?

That’s where Project 333 comes in. This technique can help you figure out what really belongs in your collection, without forcing you to give anything up right off the bat.

What is Project 333?

Project 333 comes from Courtney Carver, who published Project 333: The Minimalist Fashion Challenge That Proves Less Really Is So Much More in 2020. Since then, the idea has blown up across social media, and particularly on TikTok, where users employ it to scale down their closets, to impressive effect.  

The general idea behind Project 33 is that you need far fewer articles of clothing than you think you do, and should be able to create plenty of appropriate outfits with just 33 different pieces.

How does Project 333 work?

When you start a round of Project 333, you set aside 33 pieces of clothing and box everything else up, removing it from your closets and drawers. The 33 pieces you choose to keep don’t include underwear or sentimental, everyday-wear jewelry; instead, they’re pants, sweaters, shirts, dresses, statement jewelry items, and similar.

Everything you don’t select for this round gets put somewhere else, like in storage, an attic, or a cabinet far from your wardrobe. Then, you only wear outfits mixed and matched from those 33 pieces, and you aim to do this for three whole months. 

When the three months are over, you can return to the boxed-up articles and look at them them with new eyes. Did you end up needing anything in there? Was there an article of clothing you were particularly itching to get back to? Anything you found you could easily do without, you can simply consider donating it or tossing it out. You already proved you don’t actually need it to create great outfits. 

Project 333 doesn't need to be all or nothing

Project 333 can work in cycles. You don’t have to toss or donate everything after you do it one time. It’s fine to get rid of just a few things, then try again with another 33 pieces for another three months, or work seasonally. In the end, your goal is to create a capsule wardrobe full of staples that you can consistently wear and use, but refining your overloaded closet to that degree can take time.

How to get started

As you set off on your streamlining journey, choose versatile items that can be worn multiple ways and times, like cardigan and undershirt combinations, utilitarian jeans, and no-frills dresses that can work with a variety of outerwear. In general, these mix-and-match pieces have more long-term value and deserve more space in your closet than the finicky things that you can only wear at certain times and in certain pairings.

The nice thing about Project 333 is that it can allow you to leave room for some of those froofier things—but you'll also have opportunity to reflect on which ones you really like (and missed) while they were boxed away. 

When it comes to robot vacuums, Roborock has been innovating and creating some impressive cleaning devices. One of their upper mid-tier robot vacuums, the Roborock Q7 Max+, is seeing its best discount since its release after a 47% discount from Amazon. The Q7 Max+ is now $459.99 (originally $869.99), the lowest price it has been, according to price-checking tools. This is my favorite Amazon deal of the day.

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The Roborock Q7 Max+ robot can mop with its single brush, but it doesn't scrub your floors like the higher-tier Roborock S8 does. It will still be able to clean surface-level stains, though. The Q7 Max+ has a LIDAR system that it uses to map out your home. If you have rugs or carpets in certain areas, you can designate no-mop areas or zones to avoid getting them wet. If there are objects in the way, it will remember them and can maneuver around them to avoid accidents.

The Q7 Max+ has a self-emptying dock station, and it can hold up to seven weeks of debris with its 2.5-liter bags. The suction power is 4,200 pascals, which is good for its current price point, but not nearly as good as the high-end tier robot vacuums that can get you from 5,000 to 11,000 pascals. The battery will last three hours or up to 3,229 square feet, which should be enough to vacuum most homes. If you want to schedule a routine cleaning while you're not home, you can do so by setting up a scheduled cleaning. It also has voice control and is compatible with smart speakers like Google, Alexa, or smartphones.

There are two things to keep in mind with this vacuum: You will be making purchases on the mop pads as you use them up as well as the bags on the self-emptying dock.

If you have a lot of bags, you need to be strategic about how you organize them. But even if you only have one bag, you need to organize its contents, and for that, you'll need an interior organizer. There are some great options out there, and the one you choose will depend on your needs and what kind of bag you favor. Here are some of my favorite options.

The best organizer for a tote bag

Totes are a go-to bag for work, commuting, the gym, the beach, or just running errands. The issue is that they usually lack any kind of interior pockets, favoring a single compartment with a lot of space where stuff can get jumbled together, making it tough to find what you're looking for. So pick an organizer that can give it some structure.

OMYSTYLE Purse Organizer Insert for Handbags

$8.99

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$8.99

The OMYSTYLE organizer comes in various sizes from mini to extra large, is tall enough to give flimsy bags more shape, and features a bunch of pockets of different sizes so you can keep makeup, pens, or even tech gadgets separated and easy to find. This one is highly recommended across TikTok, too—check it out in action here.

The best organizer for frequent bag-switching

Real bagheads know that needs change from day to day, and sometimes multiple times per day, depending on where you're going, what you're wearing, and what you're toting around. Not every organizer will fit in every bag, so it's worth grabbing some mesh zipper bags that can keep your stuff separated no matter what size carrier you're using. Try these:

HRX Package Nylon Mesh Cosmetic Zipper Bags, 6PCS

$8.99

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$8.99

The best standalone bag organizer

This organizer from BTSKY has a handle and is available in a neutral beige color, meaning you can take it out of your bag and bring it around with you if you need to—a bag within a bag. It's a great option for when you get to work and don't feel like bringing your whole handbag into a meeting, or when you want to leave your expensive or unwieldy bag in a locker or at coat check after you've made your entrance, but you still need to carry around a few things. With 13 pockets and nearly a 12-inch width, it can handle most tech, along with whatever small items you want to stuff into it.

BTSKY Printing Handbag Organizers Inside Purse Insert

$10.99

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The best bag organizer for a classy look

If the style of your bag is just as important (or, if you're me, more important) than its function, you probably don't want a utilitarian organizer in there throwing off your aesthetic. The prettiest one I found is this simple black and gold winner from DailyPlus, which comes in six sizes from small to extra large and features 10 pockets, a wallet zipper pocket, and a place to attach your keys.

DailyPlus Felt Purse Organizer Insert with Zipper and Key Chain

$9.99

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$9.99

The best organizers for a suitcase

Suitcases are just big bags —arguably, the bags most likely to get jumbled up when full of stuff. To complete your bag-organizing journey, don't forget to pick up something to make your travels a little less chaotic.

8 Set Packing Cubes for Suitcases, kingdalux Travel Luggage Packing Organizers

$9.99

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$9.99

This set comes with structured mesh bags, drawstring bags, and pouches so you can separate laundry, intimates, makeup, swimsuits, or whatever else you're traveling with.

The best organizer for a gym or diaper bag

Finally, if you're carrying around a big bag of heavy stuff—think a gym bag with sneakers or a diaper bag with baby supplies—you need something sturdy to keep it all separated. A bigger organizer, like this one from Comicfs, can keep dirty clothes and shoes separate from clean ones, bottles and diapers separate from blankets, or any other bigger items away from each other.

Comicfs Baby Diaper Bag Insert Organizer

$19.88

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$19.88

When you’re cleaning your kitchen sink, or deep cleaning your bathroom, there’s an often-overlooked place you might be forgetting. Your kitchen and bathroom faucets can become a breeding ground for mold, bacteria, and damaging mineral build-up.

How often you should clean your faucet head

The faucet head on your sink should be cleaned once to twice a year. If you have hard water, you can clean it as often as once every three months to prevent mineral build-up. The goal is to prevent damage, so giving your faucet a good once-over as soon as you notice any reduced water pressure or irregular flow pattern will help keep your fixture in good working order and extend its life.

Soak your faucet head in vinegar

Using a plastic bag of a 50/50 mix of vinegar and water, submerge your faucet head in the solution and then hold it in place with a rubber band. You can then leave most faucets submerged for about a half hour to an hour, but take care not to leave delicate finishes like chrome, matte finish colored metal, or burnished brass in the bag for more than a half hour to avoid causing damage. Once your faucet is done soaking, use a neutral multipurpose cleanser or some soapy water and a small cleaning brush or a toothbrush to scrub away any dirt, build-up, or debris that’s left. Once you’re done cleaning, make sure to rinse the faucet head by running warm water through it for a minute to wash away any soap or vinegar residue.

Steam your faucet head

You can loosen up mineral build-up as well as take care of dirt on your faucet with steam. Bring water to a boil in your kettle and then aim the steam from the kettle towards your faucet head. Hold it there for a few minutes, allowing the steam to heat up the surface of the faucet. Once the steam has had the chance to work, you can use a toothbrush or small cleaning brush to scrub build-up off of your faucet head. Finally, run warm water through the faucet to rinse it.

Clean your aerator

For this step, you should remove your faucet head. First, turn off the water at the shut-off valves under the sink. Then, twist the head of your faucet counter-clockwise to release it from your tap. You might have a nut that holds the faucet head in place, so if the head doesn’t attach directly to the tap, look for a nut that holds it in place and turn that counter clockwise. Once the head of the faucet is free, you should be able to see the aerator. It will look like a screen with a rubber gasket on the tap side to seal it. This is also a great opportunity to check your rubber o-ring to see if it’s worn and replace it with a new one if it is. Check the aerator for mineral deposits, mold, and debris. You can soak the parts of your faucet head in a 50/50 vinegar solution or use warm soapy water to clean it and then replace the parts, making sure that the faucet head is screwed in snugly and properly seated before turning the water to your sink back on. Run some warm water through the tap for a minute to rinse the aerator and faucet head.

Important tips for cleaning your faucet

Make sure to check manufacturer recommendations when choosing a cleanser for your faucet to avoid damaging the finish. Since some metals can be sensitive to acids or to particular chemicals, you should take care to protect the finish of your fixture when cleaning. Also, it’s a good idea to avoid using harsh cleansers on your faucet—not only to protect the finish, but to avoid damaging the rubber o-rings, valves, or other delicate parts that might not hold up to abrasives or highly acidic substances.

When you finally decide to declutter and organize your home, the initial clearing out and restructuring is important (and so satisfying), but keeping things in order going forward will pose a greater challenge. To lead a more organized and decluttered life over the long haul, focus on three pillars that form the Organizational Triangle.

What is the organizational triangle?

The Organizational Triangle was conceptualized by pro organizer Andrew Mellen, the man behind The Most Organized Man in America's Guide to Moving and Unstuff Your Life: Kick the Clutter Habit and Completely Organize Your Life for Good. While Mellen writes and speaks about all manner of organization and decluttering, he describes the Organizational Triangle as "the foundation" of all of his work. This three-tiered approach provides a simple process for maintaining a clutter-free home:

• Every item needs a home

• Keep like with like

• Use a something in, something out approach

Keep these three tenets in mind during your initial decluttering, and going forward as well, so your place stays neat and won’t require another big clean in a year or so. Here's a deeper look at what each step involves.

Step 1: Every item needs a home

This step is crucial when you’re first starting out. No matter which of the many available cleaning techniques you choose to follow, you’ll almost certainly end up categorizing your possessions by whether you want to keep, throw out, donate, or sell them. When aligning your clearing out with the tenants of the Organizational Triangle, you’ll need to closely assess anything you decide you want to keep. 

That's because every item in your home should have its designated space, whether that’s a certain drawer, cabinet, basket, or shelf. If you can’t think of a permanent home for something, you either need to make one or get rid of that thing. Nothing should be floating around, moving from space to space, or otherwise homeless within your home. The reason for this is simple: Anything you want to access should be somewhere you'll know to look for it. It should only ever be in one of two places: in its designated spot, or in your hands. Decluttering is useless if the items that remain end up piled on a table or aren’t easy to find when you actually need them. 

Kootek 16 Pack Drawer Organizer

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Step 2: Keep like with like

The second step is to reorganize your space to keep alike things together, always. For instance, don’t keep some screwdrivers in the garage and others in the kitchen, even though it seems intuitive to imagine that when you need a screwdriver while doing an indoor task, it will be handier to have one closer to you. Don’t keep a basket of batteries in each room; put them all together. Etc. 

If you have AA batteries in a drawer in your living room in case you need them for the remote, but all your other batteries in a basket in a kitchen cabinet, you might not remember where to find those AA batteries when the remote for the fan in your bedroom goes out. You’ll go to search the kitchen basket, find nothing, and buy AA batteries from the store, wasting money. Meanwhile, the batteries in the living room will be yet more clutter. 

M.C. Squares Reusable, Erasable Container and Bin Labels | 48-Pack

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Step 3: Something in, something out

Something in, something out is a tried-and-true organizational method you should only employ once you have finished an initial round of decluttering and are moving forward into a more organized lifestyle. But it's pretty basic: When you get something new, get rid of something old to make space for it. If you’re following the Organizational Triangle’s rules, you know there needs to be a spot for everything, but space is finite. Don’t cram too much into your shelves and drawers or else they’ll end up cluttered, too. 

If a lot of items fit into a space, that’s great, but in most cases, you need to be strategic about how much stuff you accumulate. If you can only use one of a thing at a time and you’re committed to following the above rules about putting every item back in its place when you’re done using it, there's no point in having more than one. Accumulating multiples of objects only makes it easier for you to slack on the rule about putting things back where they belong after use. Following a something in, something out rule can also act as a check on your impulse buying habit, since you'll know that buying something new means getting rid of something old.

HOMZ Heavy Duty 31 Quart Modular Plastic Stackable Toy Organizer Bins

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Once you decide on a decluttering method to clean out your home, the real work begins. Almost every popular technique out there requires you to group your items into three or four categories: Keep, throw, donate, and possibly, sell. Putting each item in its correct pile is not as easy as the step-by-step rules make it seem, but there’s a trick called the five-second rule that you can use to keep the process efficient. 

What is the five-second rule?

The five-second rule is a widely-adaptable technique from organizational coach Mel Robbins, who advocates for it in her books. According to Robbins, you should make major decisions in under five seconds, actually counting down five, four, three, two, one. Your brain will know that at the end of that countdown, it has to make a choice; there’s a sense of urgency to it. This will push you to make quick, efficient decisions. I do this all the time, like when I have to rip off a bandage or open one of those popping cans of biscuits (which really freaks me out). There’s just something about the countdown that amps you up to do the thing you don’t want to do or are deliberating about. 

How does the five-second rule apply in decluttering?

Adapting the five-second rule for decluttering is a big tip that floats around minimalist spaces online. You can use it to spur yourself to start cleaning if you’re feeling overwhelmed, but most often, it’s applied to the moments you spend debating internally about whether or not something should be kept or tossed out. 

The less time you give yourself to make the choice, the better off you’ll be. You can rationalize keeping anything if you give yourself long enough to do it, but the goal of decluttering is to minimize the amount of stuff you have and organize the stuff that’s leftover, not make a bunch of excuses for why you can’t downsize. When you pick something up in the process of decluttering, you usually know instinctively if you really need it. Holding it and considering it for too long doesn’t take away from what you already know to be true so much as it gives you time to come up with reasons the thing should be kept. Commit to sorting everything you touch into a keep or get-rid-of pile as soon as you pick it up and in no more than five seconds, employing the countdown if you have to in a tough moment. 

For anything that really makes you struggle and can’t be so easily sorted in five seconds, follow the Minimalists’ 20/20 rule, asking yourself whether the thing you’re debating keeping could be replaced for under $20 and in under 20 minutes in the unlikely event you ever need it again. If you answer those questions with a yes, throw it out.

Training yourself to be quick and decisive in these instances will help you build the habit of parting with things easily and not assigning false sentimentality or need to items that simply have no business sticking around. 

When it comes to high-end robot vacuums, there are a few brands that stand out from the rest. Yeedi and Ecovacs, for example: These companies are consistently innovating new features, increasing battery life and suction power, and improving their companion apps. Here are the best high-end robot vacuum deals available right now.

The Ecovacs Deebot T10 Omni is 50% off

Ecovacs Deebot T10 Omni

$599.99 at Amazon

$1,199.99 Save $600.00

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$599.99 at Amazon

$1,199.99 Save $600.00

Like all the devices here, the Deebot T10 Omni is a vacuum and mop robot vacuum with a self-emptying home base that also charges the robot. It has a decent suction power of 5,000 Pa and mops with cold water. There is no auto-mop lifting feature, so you'll have to designate no-mop zones on your app if you don't want your carpet getting wet. The T10 has a camera with AI technology that it uses to avoid and recognize obstacles. You can also use the camera to monitor where the vacuum goes on a live video stream that also has two-way audio. You can get the Deebot T10 Omni for $599.99 (originally $1,199.99), the lowest price yet according to price-checking tools.

The Ecovacs Deebot X2 Omni is $500 off

ECOVACS DEEBOT X2 Omni

8000Pa Suction, 15mm Lift, Omni Station with Hot Water Mop Washing, Self-Emptying, Hot Air Drying.

$999.99 at Amazon

$1,499.00 Save $499.01

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$999.99 at Amazon

$1,499.00 Save $499.01

When the Ecovacs Deebot X2 Omni Robot Vacuum came out, the 8,000 Pa suction power was top of the line. This one works with carpets since the mop has a clearance of 15mm. The long rubber brushes for mopping leave my floors looking fresh, and it has yet to run out of battery mid-job with a long 200 minutes of run time. I've yet to take the debris out of the 90-day self-emptying home base (I don't use it every day). The mopping is done with two powerful brushes and hot water. The X2 will also dry your floors with hot air. You can get this cleaning machine for $999.99 (originally $1,499.99) after a 33% discount.

The Yeedi M12 PRO+ is $300 off

Yeedi M12 PRO+ with $100 on-page coupon

11000Pa Strong Suction, ZeroTangle Technology, TruEdge Deep Mopping, Auto Mop Washing/Drying.

$799.00 at Amazon

$1,099.00 Save $300.00

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$799.00 at Amazon

$1,099.00 Save $300.00

The newest high-end robot vacuum from Yeedi is impressive on paper, and it is already $300 off. The Yeedi M12 PRO+ has a powerful 11,000 Pa suction power, which is the highest suction I've seen in a robot vacuum. It also has a self-emptying dustbin, hot water mopping, self-washing extending mop pads, a tangle-free V-shaped roller brush, and a spot-cleaning feature in case you make a mess in one specific spot of the house. The M12 PRO+ has obstacle avoidance, but it may still try to clean objects it should probably avoid, like food wrappers or napkins. The auto-lift of 9mm means if you have a thicker carpet, you might want to tell your vacuum to work around it, or it will likely get wet. The fact that you can get a robot vacuum of this quality for $799.99 (originally $1,099) after using the $100 on-page coupon is impressive.