There’s a million books out there professing the perfect approach to organizing your home. You can decide which items in your life bring joy and toss the others. You can work on a zone each day, beating down the clutter before it accumulates. Or you can be like me, and use the pile method of organization.
My piles work…until they don’t. For the most part, I know exactly what is where–as long as no one else touches my piles. In lots of ways they are quite geological, sediment building up over time. The oldest layers are on the bottom, providing the strong foundation for the newer layers. Some piles are piles of reading material: books and articles that I want to read…but cannot get to quite yet. Others are piles of reading I have read, but know I want to refer to or want to share with someone. Some piles need to make their way back to my classroom, some need to be filed away with important papers…
But at some point, the piles reach maximum efficiency and need to be culled. That’s the point where I have to make the hard decisions and either find a permanent place for the item or discard it. I’m at that inflection point right now. It’s time to dismantle the piles, sort them, and get them under control.
Conveniently, yesterday I happened by IKEA–you know the place, where you build your own furniture according to picture-based directions that those of us who are spatially challenged can manage to assemble upside down and backwards. Lucky for me, Geoff is great at reading these blueprints (rightside up) and getting them built in record time! Anyway, while strolling through IKEA yesterday, I decided that a three-tiered rolling cart would be the perfect solution to the teetering piles I need to wrangle. I am limiting myself to keeping only what will fit reasonably in the cart.
Now, I just need to find a bit of time to get started! And find a home for the cart itself! Be sure to ask me about my progress. It always helps to be held accountable.
What’s your organizational style? Does it work for you?
Thinking Through My Lens 
Love those IKEA three tiered carts. I’ve never owned one, but my daughter and dil both use them in the kids’ rooms. I would get excited about having one for my piles, but I’d have to find a place for it in an already overfull room. “The oldest layers are on the bottom” made me chuckle. I think it’s time for some excavation/dismantling/culling of my own piles. As soon as I get home . . . company coming right away . . . after the company leaves!
“In lots of ways they are quite geological, sediment building up over time.” A great description of my piles as well! So many piles. Each year: “this is the year I get organized!”
“the piles reach maximum efficiency and need to be culled” – I so appreciate this description, and I’m also a pile-er, but we call them “stacks” in my house. We love far from an Ikea, but closer to The Container Store, and every time I go, I dream of being organized. It’s going to mean discarding, so I’m joining you at the inflection point and wishing us both well on our spring cleaning commitments.
I’m a pile person too. I try to sort the piles each weekend. The pile of books on my bedside table seems to only grow rather than reduce. We don’t have an IKEA store anywhere near us. I’m glad I don’t have that temptation.
I admire the weekly pile sorting! I wish I was that committed to keeping the piles under control. Our IKEA is not too close, which probably saves me!