The One About Paper

Tia: Hey, Monica

Amber: Hey, Monica

Tia: Welcome to Hey Monika, the podcast that helps you drop the perfectionism to make space for what really matters in your home, in your food, and in your life. I'm Tia, a professional home organizer and founder of Room For Serenity

Amber: And I'm Amber, a weight inclusive licensed nutritionist and founder of Whole You Nutrition and Meal Planning Collective. On today's show, we are talking about paper. we're keeping, what we're throwing, what we're sorting, what we're storing, all things paper. And most importantly, how to avoid those dreaded piles from taking over every flat surface in our homes. But first, Tia, we have confessions. What do you have

Tia: Oh,

Amber: us today?

Tia: this is gonna be a good one. Ironic. I could confess that my desk is cluttered with paper and to-do lists right now, which is so funny because we're talking about paper organizing today. I could also confess that my dining room table is not functional because it has so much stuff on it. I could also confess that my kitchen sink is full of dirty dishes, and they need to be put into the dishwasher. I could also confess that we have laundry sitting on our living room couch that still needs to be folded, folded and put away. But I'm saying all of this because today, instead of confessing all of those things, which I just did, I'm gonna give myself a ton of grace because, our house has just, in the past two weeks, gone through a lot of chaos.

Tia: We had, an emergency room visit, five days spent at the children's hospital. We've had a child return from the hospital with, pain management, and it's almost felt like COVID all over again because it's two working adults with a young child needing to be entertained while we try to get work done. I think, fingers crossed, we are now kind of, going back to normal. But I'm giving myself a lot of grace because this is all temporary. All of this

Amber: Mm-hmm.

Tia: spun out of control when life got a bit chaotic, and in my mind's eye, I'm like, you know what? This is what happens when life gets chaotic, and it is okay. It is temporary. I do have homes for all of these things. I can put them back in their homes when chaos is, when the chaos has cleared. Eventually, things are gonna get back to normal. So my confession is that life isn't perfect, and I've got a crazy, chaotic house, and that, for the time being, is just gonna have to be okay. Everybody is alive, so can I-- I'm gonna be grateful for that.

Amber: you have certainly been through it in the last couple… almost a month now, because I think the flood thing happened around the 4th of July, and we're now in the beginning of August. So

Tia: It did. Yeah. Yeah.

Amber: going on for quite a while.

Tia: yeah

Amber: again, kind of preview for next week, I had this idea before all of the things happened, but we're gonna talk about how to reset next week. So I think it'll be great because, not that I wanted you to have to go through a fresh, like worst week that you need to reset from, you

Tia: No

Amber: talking about, what's happening in real life and not just this like theoretical,

Tia: Yeah.

Amber: perfect, which I

Tia: Yeah.

Amber: will really be able to relate to.

Tia: Yeah

Amber: so sorry you've been dealing with all of these things,

Tia: Mm-hmm.

Amber: it's just an example of what life throws at us that we have to manage.

Tia: Yeah. Yeah, and then how to deal with it when

Tia: Can I say when shit hits the fan? Maybe not. I don't know. Um, yeah. So I'm excited for the next episode too, 'cause it'll really touch on

Amber: You sure can. You sure can.

Tia: lot of these topics of, like, how

Tia: do

Tia: you manage when things go sideways? Mm-hmm

Amber: Yeah, and I think it will really highlight it's not about perfection,

Tia: Mm-hmm.

Amber: which is a good reminder for all of us

Tia: It totally is. All right, so you, what's the confession for you this week?

Amber: Okay, so my confession, this is rooted in hustle culture. You know how no matter what you're doing, you're supposed to somehow figure out a way to monetize it, share it, make it public? Like, everything needs to become a potential business. So a couple of years ago, when I was really getting back into sewing clothes, I decided that it's really important for me to share this journey. Now, I loved sewing both from a creative standpoint, because obviously it is a creative, hobby, it also really helped me understand clothes and my body and figuring out things about sizing and fit and what I like and don't like and how I could change things so that they work better for me and fit in a way that I like.

Amber: So of course, I started a blog. Uh, first I started a Substack, and I hated every second of it, so I immediately shut down the Substack and was like, "I'm gonna go old school blog."

Tia: Mm-hmm.

Amber: I started a blog, and I was pretty consistent with it for not even quite a full year. But a couple of things happened in there. One, I realized I loved making stuff, but all of the prep to write about it, take pictures of it, made the hobby a lot less fun and fulfilling. And two, maintaining a blog, especially if I wanted it to, grow and be something more than just a place where I was keeping notes for myself, required me to produce a lot of items. I couldn't just make one shirt and it was fine. It was like I needed to make something every week or several things in a month so that I would have things to talk about on the blog.

Amber: And again, that that required cadence to make the content made the hobby itself less enjoyable. So I technically still have the blog. I think I've written maybe one post in like February or something. I honestly don't even know. But it's, it's a lost cause. I'm not going to add to it because it ruined my h- it's, it didn't ruin my hobby. I'm still doing the hobby, but the backend work of keeping this blog

Tia: Yeah.

Amber: makes the hobby less enjoyable.

Tia: That's not cool

Amber: but I think that's our culture. Like, I was so swept up in, "Oh, I'm doing this thing. It feels so important to me. I should tell the whole world about it."

Tia: Mm-hmm.

Amber: It could probably have just been, like, a newsletter that I shared with

Tia: Hmm.

Amber: people on Whole You Nutrition, and, I could have moved on with my life and continued doing this hobby and not really talked about it anymore. So anyways, that is my confession, that I started this whole thing under pressure of, "Of course you should be sharing. We should be sharing everything," really just burned out. So I want to save the hobby, so I need to stop the blog. and then also related to today's topic, a lot of my paper in this house comes from sewing. So that is one of the areas where to do some sorting and storage,

Tia: That is, it, that's fun. That's an interesting category of paper

Amber: I'm guessing that wasn't one that shows up in

Tia: No, not typically, but it's interesting. So much shows up about people and what they value in what shows up in their paper. today's topic is paper. I'm gonna be covering a five-category paper management system that I love sharing with my clients. I have a downloadable PDF that's gonna be available in the show notes, but I must give credit to Cass from Clutterbug, who invented this brilliant system of organizing pa- paper in the first place. let me just introduce you to Cass. I've been following her for a couple of years now, and I absolutely love her organizing content. She went from what she calls a super slob to a professional organizer and built the whole Clutterbug empire around the idea that she wasn't failing at organizing, she was just using somebody else's system She's got a YouTube channel, a podcast, four books, and a show on HGTV called Hot Mess House.

Tia: So check her out. She's fantastic. and before we get into paper, This seems unrelated, but I'm first gonna ask people to think about what kind of organization style they might prefer first, because all of this falls apart if you don't know your organizing style, and Cass really has a great way to describe that. you might prefer macro-organizing if you like dumping, everything into a big bin, like one big category item into a bin, and you're done. Like one and done. Cool. Good enough. you might be a micro-organizer if you like taking that big bin and micro-organizing it down into smaller categories and smaller bins with little labels and such.

Amber: Okay

Tia: So that's two. And then there's another two of visual versus hidden. So you might be a visual organizer if you like to have everything visually available to see. You can see every category around you readily. Or you might be a hidden organizer if you like to organize things behind doors, in drawers, in cabinets, and have really clean, minimalistic-looking counters and spaces. And then there's the whole blend between the two. So you could be a macro organizer that also is visual, so big bins of things in open spaces that you can see. Or you might be a micro-organizer that has everything hidden behind counters and behind doors and everything.

Tia: And I won't go into all of these details, because Cass has all this information about how people can describe their organizing style But the takeaway is decide for yourself how you prefer to organize and what you'll actually sustain over time so before you start organizing your paper, you actually know where it's gonna go and how it's gonna be stored.

Amber: What is your style? Are you macro, micro? Are you visual, hidden? I think people wanna know what our styles are,

Tia: I'll start with I would prefer things to be hidden.

Amber: Mm, same

Tia: my-- the rest of my house doesn't work that way

Amber: Also same.

Tia: Personally, if I could have, super clean counters and then everything organized into the drawers and in the cabinets and closets and stuff, that would make me so happy. and then beyond that, I would say I prefer micro organizing because I am that detail-oriented of a person. but there are some instances where I would prefer macro organizing, and that's where it would take, just take too much daily time and effort to micro organize something into a small little container. So having it in just a general bin is far more helpful. what about you? What would you-- what's your organizing style?

Amber: I agree with you. Hidden is more my style. I don't think it's my partner's style. He really likes to leave everything out all the time. Can't even put it in a stack. Whatever, it's fine. but I, I'm having a harder time figuring out if I'm macro or micro. I do feel like I might fall kind of in the middle of it in some ways. I might lean a little more macro, but there's certain areas that I up a little bit more. there's my half answer.

Tia: that makes perfect sense. we talked about the macro, micro, visual, and hidden. if you're listening to this podcast, take a little pause and think about maybe which style or preference you might have and what you might wanna keep up on.

Amber: I also really love that Cass, and I know you as well just from talking to you and doing this podcast with you, recognize that one style of organization does not work for everyone, that people have different needs and different preferences, and that knowing that about yourself and figuring out what those needs and preferences are is a really, really important part

Tia: Mm-hmm.

Amber: able to have an organized space

Tia: Yeah. It is super helpful. And a lot of times when I'm working with clients, I might not ask them about the macro/micro, visual or hidden, but I'll take cues based on what I see around their house,

Amber: Mm-hmm.

Tia: also ask them as I go along with the organizing process, "If I were to organize it this way, is this a system that you would be willing to maintain day after day? There's no right or wrong answer, so I'm constantly trying to reassess, like, would this work or would that work? And usually they know pretty quickly. So let's get into this. How do you actually tackle paper organizing? It can feel like such a monumental task, but it really doesn't have to be. And I hope that by the end of this episode, you realize that we make a huge, big deal out of our paper, and it really isn't. It's not that big of a deal.

Tia: It really isn't. And it can be categorized into five simple categories, bare minimum. But if you wanna go further and micro organize it into smaller subcategories, you absolutely can to your heart's desire, but not until you've done this one thing first, right? So gather all the paper from your house or from wherever, wherever your biggest pain point is. So if it's just your desk for today, that's fine. I'll give you permission to do that. If it's just your bedroom for today, it's fine. I give you permission to do that. But gather all your paper in one spot. it sounded like you wanted to ask a question

Amber: I feel like a lot of us do have all of our papers in one spot because it's the spot that we put the papers, and

Tia: Yes

Amber: know what to do with them. So grab that pile. You know what pile I'm talking about.

Tia: Yes. Grab the pile.

Amber: Start there.

Tia: Yes. And then have five bins, this is supposed to be like a, dump into each bin sort of activity. Don't even think too hard about it. You're not filing anything right now, you're not reading, you're not making phone calls, you are just sorting and dumping. Don't start to categorize anything inside of those five categories at all until you have your entire paper stack organized into your five bins. Do that first. Get that done first before you get tempted to start to micro organize. Now, if you're the type of person that prefers to macro organize, then y- you're not even gonna struggle with that at all.

Tia: You're gonna be like, "I've got my five categories done, and I am good to go.

Amber: Moving

Tia: am, I'm moving on with my life. This is sweet." but for those of us who would strongly prefer to have those micro categories done, do not do that activity until your entire stack is at least in those five bins, because we all know how life can be. Sometimes you have the best of intentions to get something done, start it, finish it, be done with it, and then something interrupts you, and you never get back to it, and you're like, "Wait, where did I leave off?"

Amber: Yeah

Tia: That's, that's why I'm saying this first, because you wanna at least have everything into those five bins before you get interrupted by something and have to move on to something else. So

Amber: much sense. what are these five bins? What are these five macro categories that we're sorting into?

Tia: Yes, that is a great question. All right, so it's, long term, short term, reference, memory, and action. I'm gonna go into each category in detail, but I wanna just start with one hot tip no matter which category you're going through. If you can find that piece of paper online super easily, if you can find that user manual online by just googling it, if you can download that go-to article about such and such by finding it on Google, you do not need it taking up physical space in your house at all, and you can recycle it or shred it right away. as you touch each piece of paper, that would be the one, like, decluttering tip I would have for your paper is if you can find it online easily or it's in your Google Drive or like on your desktop, you don't need a physical version of it

Amber: Can I throw a question at you that I don't know if you want it yet?

Tia: It's okay

Amber: Where in this proce- so if I'm going through this stack of papers and I'm realizing, oh, I'm getting a bunch of like monthly statements from somewhere that I know I could go paperless on, when in the process, where do I put the paper that's like I don't need to keep this, but I need to go online and check the box so that I get paperless or email delivery instead of paper where do we make that to-do list piece? Is that that action category you were talking about or does that mean something else?

Tia: you know, I didn't have that as a talking point, but I'm so glad that you brought it up because, I, I want people to stay focused on the task at hand and not to stop and, get distracted and go and be like, "Oh, now I need to log online and ask for paperless," and then not get back to the five category things. So if you don't wanna forget the fact that you need to go paperless on XYZ, then yes, definitely have, like, a little pad or paper or a Post-it next to you that you can write down, things to do after you're done sorting these five categories.

Amber: Got

Tia: have a running little list of things to do later, and then yes, you can put that in your action pile,

Amber: I remember when I used to do a lot, I don't know, when paper bills in the mail was a more normal thing. I would write on them notes like, "Oh, this is the date that I paid it," or whatever. So today I'm thinking this is when I would write, online and cancel this paper mail" on the piece of paper and put that in the action box so that

Tia: Oh, yeah

Amber: action later, it'll be like, "Oh, this one means stop getting this piece of paper."

Tia: Yeah. that's a great idea. I love that. Okay, so let's talk about these different categories. long term, it's smaller than most people would expect, but it would include things like birth certificates, adoption papers, death certificates, Social Security cards, passports, marriage certificates, divorce decrees, custody paperwork, vehicle titles, property deeds, wills, trusts, green cards, citizenship documents, military discharge papers, and tax returns, which I learned that, I typically had in my mind keep your tax returns for seven years.

Amber: Yeah, that's what I always heard too

Tia: apparently the IRS standard is three years,

Amber: Oh,

Tia: but, you might wanna keep it roughly seven years if you wanna be super cautious. I'll just go ahead and say that I am not a CPA. I'm not giving any sort of tax advice here. I'm only giving organizing advice. So check with your CPA if you wanna double-check, what you should be doing. But for our house and for myself personally, I think now I'm just gonna be keeping three years and calling it done, 'cause

Amber: I might do five. That feels like a nice happy medium. But here's the

Tia: Yeah.

Amber: I think most of us are filing electronically these days, and we don't have a piece of paper anyway.

Tia: and your CPA could probably provide it for you if you work with a CPA. I have all of mine online, and they're encrypted in a lovely safe spot.

Amber: it sounds like long-term is really legal document types of things that you might need to show as proof of something

Tia: That pretty much covers most of it. That's long-term. Short-term is for this year only. It's for real records that have an expiration date behind them, like your monthly bills, your statements, anything that you might need for this fiscal year's taxes, you would put in short-term

Amber: Okay, that makes sense. I do, I have a system of that. Like, I have one folder at the front of our little file cabinet where I just tuck everything that comes in for the year that I know I'm going to have to pull out when tax time comes around.

Tia: Yeah

Amber: But a lot of this stuff, I, and I'm guessing our listeners, have electronic versions of. I don't know how many

Tia: Yeah

Amber: their electric bill in the mail anymore.

Tia: Exactly. I think the short-term one is probably gonna be the, the smallest file for most people, for the things that you actually wanna keep a paper record of.

Amber: Yeah, that makes sense. You hinted at this one before

Tia: Yes, I did

Amber: of a stickier place that

Tia: This,

Amber: be a little cautious when we're

Tia: yeah,

Amber: into it

Tia: reference is your maybe someday bucket. So these are not records at all. It's an optional bucket for, maybe aspirational stuff that you're not quite ready to recycle or let go of yet. Nobody is probably gonna come ask you for what's ever in that folder. It's probably things like coupons, catalogs, magazine clippings, takeout menus, flyers for classes or community events, local services, or just any random thing that doesn't belong in any of the other five buckets, and you don't know where to put it, but you think you might need it

Amber: definitely have this bucket in existence in my life. I can give more details later, but I've, I feel… This is, I feel like, the source of most of my papers these days,

Tia: Yeah. And this

Amber: is electronic, but this category is not.

Tia: Yes, and it, this one can get a bit overwhelming because people get confused about how to sub-categorize it if they're a micro organizer, or how long to hold onto some of this stuff if it's kind of ambiguous. So this one can be a little tricky, but here's what I say as far as managing this, this bin. decide how big of a bin or how big of a folder you wanna dedicate to anything that you wanna use as reference or place in that category, and then that is your container size, and that is your container limit. So once that bin or folder gets full, that's your trigger to go through it and maybe purge some of the stuff that you haven't looked at in years.

Tia: Other than that, don't overthink it. Do not overthink it

Amber: Uh, Bed Bath & Beyond doesn't exist anymore, so you can throw away all of those 20% off coupons.

Tia: Yes, you can. I remember those. Oh my gosh, yes. Or this would also be a great thing for… I just got in the mail a thing from Ikea saying save $20 off a purchase of $100 or more. I typically, if I didn't have a paper organizing system, I'd be like, "Where do I put this? Do I keep this in my purse? Do I keep this like, where… I want

Amber: go on the fridge?

Tia: Does

Tia: it go on the fridge?" A lot of times those things get put on the fridge, but here's, here's where the stuff from the fridge can go. If you wanna reference something, and you want an easy place to store it, but you don't want it to take up visual space on your fridge, you can put it in the reference folder

Amber: I have a reference folder. actually the same place that we put the mail when we first pull it into the house, because honestly, most of the

Tia: Yeah.

Amber: from the mail anyway. So we just have a little thing that's on the wall that we can tuck things in.

Tia: Mm-hmm

Amber: and it has enough space that stuff can stay in there for a while, and then every once in a while I just flip through everything and recycle whatever is either out of date or feel like I don't need anymore. it's nice to just have a place that you can kind of leave it

Tia: Yeah.

Amber: to look for it

Tia: Yeah

Amber: want the, pizza place coupon that gives you the free appetizer or whatever, you know where it is.

Tia: That's a great reference location. I like that.

Amber: Yeah, right by the front door

Tia: by their front door. Or maybe for some people it could just be, like, a magnetic file thing on the side of their fridge.

Amber: Yep. Perfect.

Tia: For me, it's gonna be in my file cabinet 'cause I like things hidden. Can't tell by my fridge, but I do. Um, okay, so reference is your maybe someday bucket. Do not overthink it. Just create a limit to how much stuff you're gonna keep, and then get rid of it when it's too full. Memory. This is also one that can be a bit tricky because how long do we hold onto our kids' artwork, or how long do we hold on to that lovely handwritten birthday card from, a grandma or grandpa that passed away? It's hard.

Amber: This is also the category where I come across sounding like a dead inside, unemotional person 'cause I'm a let's just throw it away. And I can answer

Tia: Oh my gosh

Amber: how long do you hang onto projects from your kids? You hang onto them until you give them a box in their own house, and they're like, "I never wanted this in the first place." And then the kid throws it away,

Tia: Oh gosh

Amber: you've been saving for 20 years. I know

Tia: Oh my gosh.

Amber: people are

Tia: Yeah.

Amber: about physical items than I am. I still have a bin with, with memory stuff in it. That does include a fair number of papers, but, um,

Tia: I think you and I are pretty similar.

Amber: I

Tia: Yeah.

Amber: card saving thing before. I don't know if it's made it into a podcast episode yet, but both of us are kinda like, "Thank you. I appreciate the thought. Your

Tia: Now I'm gonna recycle it immediately.

Amber: the end of Christmas, and then it's

Tia: And then it's gone.

Amber: the recycling bin."

Tia: Yes, I know. I didn't used to be that way, but then once I started moving from, one apartment to the next and, I had this big paper bin of stuff, I said, "I don't need to be holding on to…" The paper is actually quite heavy I don't wanna move that around from one place to the next. let's set a pretty low bar here. Let's not overthink it. Let's not get too… Let's not spend too much time on this one because that can be for another day. For today, it's just putting things into five categories, okay? So-

Amber: Right. And this is just paper memory too.

Tia: Yes,

Amber: memories in the

Tia: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Just paper stuff

Amber: need to sort and organize, but we're just talking about paper. So

Tia: Yep. I might even include, like, loose photographs in this one,

Amber: Sure.

Tia: because where do you put those? if you don't have a photo album that they're already in, or you don't know where to, like… Yeah, loose photographs maybe even too. So one, one lidded bin. I would say make sure that it's waterproof in case you're putting it in your basement and maybe it gets flooded. and then put it up, up high so that if it is something that you do actually want to keep and retain, it's not damaged by any sort of flooding situation. don't sort it. Don't put things into chronological order, at least not at this time. this is where perfectionism kills this category so fast. it's about really just putting everything into one catch-all bin and having it as a valid long-term solution.

Tia: That's your huge permission slip for this category, is if you wanna go down memory lane, you will have that one bin to go to. Or maybe if you have multiple kids, you can have one bin for each kid, for example, or one bin for each family member. But then just leave it to that, that bin and be done with it, right? So that's where the memory stuff goes. the last category is action. This one needs to have a home where you can see it and make action on it on a daily or weekly basis. these are the things like the bills that need to get paid, the forms that need to get signed, the permission slips for school, the things that need to get mailed, the homework that needs to get completed.

Tia: This needs to be in some sort of like basket, wall pocket, tray on the desk, maybe I would have one for myself, one for my husband, one for each kid, and it's essentially like, "You must take action on this this week," that's where the things that need to get done go. it needs to be in a visual spot where like maybe if there's a command station at your house or an office desk at your house or something like that, that's where it goes. This is where I would place the exception where if you're a visual versus hidden person comes into play

Amber: I was just thinking that because I know we both said we're hidden people, but

Tia: Yeah, but the

Amber: place that I put this is like literally on top of my keyboard on my desk 'cause I have

Tia: Yeah.

Amber: that are

Tia: Mm-hmm

Amber: action required things. So when I do have something, it's like I need it to be in the place where I'm going to sit down and work and I'm going to see it. So it's like on top of my keyboard 'cause it's the first thing I'll see when I sit down at my desk

Tia: Exactly. If it's hidden away, it's not gonna get done. So the action category is the one where no matter if you like things hidden or visual, it needs to be in a visual spot.

Amber: You need to see it

Tia: Yep. And then once it's been taken care of, once you have taken action on it, then you can shred it, you can recycle it, or if for any reason you might need to reference it later, you just shove it in that reference spot, right?

Amber: favorite bill ever that you wanna save. Like, I don't know,

Tia: You put it in the memory bucket.

Amber: or something, your student loan. You're like, "I wanna save this."

Tia: Put it in the memory bucket, yeah. That's so funny.

Tia: Yep, yep. Okay, so here's where the real system comes into play. It's when you actually go to these files, these bins, and how you maintain it over time. here's the cadence. For action, I would say absolutely at least once a week go through that, because you don't wanna miss a deadline for a bill getting paid. You don't wanna miss a deadline for, uh, a signature to go on a piece of paper, et cetera. that's where things need to get done. Then for short term, that's only supposed to be for one year anyway, and for memory, I would say go through it once a year. I might even say for memory, once every two to five years,

Amber: Sure. That makes sense. Yeah

Tia: also depends on, like, how quickly things accumulate in that memory bin. So if you're a family with kids and there ends up being a lot of artwork, then yes, once a year is definitely appropriate, because otherwise that bin's gonna explode. It's gonna be overloaded with stuff. So maybe before school begins, refresh that category a bit. for reference, that one, like I said earlier, you've already set how big of a folder or how big of a space you wanna have for reference materials. As soon as that gets full, that's your trigger to go ahead and start purging things that you no longer really need. So the coupons that are expired, get rid of 'em.

Tia: The takeout menu you thought you were gonna use regularly, but you end up just searching on your phone anyway, get rid of it, right? So, and it's, it's also where you can give yourself a lot of grace because you know that you're gonna be going through that reference bin once it's full, so you do not have to overthink what goes in there. You can put whatever you want in there to your heart's desire until it gets full, and then you're like, "Oh,

Amber: stick it there for now, and then you'll revisit it again soon

Tia: for long term, I would say hold onto that for about a decade. or when some major life event has happened. Like you got married, yes, you need to put your marriage certificates in there. When maybe your citizenship status has changed, then you need to update that, those documents. Maybe when you've updated your will or when you've updated your trust, then you need to trade out the old documents for the new, so that you don't have the two in there and you only have the most relevant signed pieces of paper in there that you actually need. the point being, with all of these five categories, there's only one of the five categories that asks anything of you on a regular basis, and that is your action pile.

Tia: That's it. Everything else just has a space to live. And once again, we can go back to what I said at the very beginning. Now that you've had a chance to put your entire stack of papers into all of those five separate categories, now if you are a macro organizer and you don't care if it gets sub-categorized, You are done. You are good to go. You don't have to do anything else. And you, now you know when paper comes into your house exactly where it goes, one of those five categories. And if you are a micro organizer, this is where you can either continue on with the activity today or you can, pause and sub-categorize at a later date when you have more space, time, energy, but only if you're actually gonna keep up with those subcategories.

Tia: That's the caveat, right? The, a lot of us are aspirationally wanting to be micro organizers, but in reality, that's not how life works, so it ends up being a pile. If that's you, just be okay with the five buckets, okay? do whatever is gonna long term work for you in your life. It doesn't have to be picture perfect. It doesn't have to be Pinterest perfect. It doesn't have to be something that you can post on Instagram.

Amber: Yeah,

Tia: This is for your peace of mind and for your lifestyle and for what works for you uniquely.

Amber: Okay, so I have a question for you. This goes back to an earlier episode when we talked about Easter baskets

Amber: And if I remember correctly, the challenge with the Easter basket is it was hard to get to the bin in which the Easter baskets are stored,

Tia: Yes.

Amber: didn't get put away.

Tia: Yes

Amber: I'm guessing it would be helpful if we spent a little bit of time thinking how often we need to access these things.

Tia: Mm-hmm

Amber: long-term storage stuff feels like it could be stored in the back of a drawer, in a closet, you

Tia: Mm-hmm

Amber: that action for sure needs to be someplace you can get to easily and see. short-term even feels like it could be tucked away a little bit more because, again, just for the year and how many of those things are actually paper anymore versus an electronic thing. But I'm guessing memory and reference need to be relatively accessible depending on your lifestyle. Like, if you have kids, I think memory needs to be pretty accessible in order to put stuff in there and not create the new pile in place of

Tia: Gosh.

Amber: up.

Tia: Yeah.

Amber: you need to be able to, access it so you can put stuff in there and take stuff out easily. Otherwise, you're just going to end up with another pile. So even,

Tia: Yeah

Amber: where we keep these categories within the larger ecosystem of our space

Tia: Yeah.

Amber: too

Tia: And your daily flow, I would add that too, because think about where your paper trail usually starts. It's either from where you grab the mail and where you bring the mail in, and where it lands, or again, with a kid situation, where do their backpacks go? Are there permission slips and, homework assignments in their backpack that need to be extracted and then easily placed somewhere? So, this is where you see a lot of times, if you've got the beautiful mudroom situation where each kid can have their own backpack hook and then their own space to put their homework slot and their to-do list, like, that's, that's an ideal way to organize it.

Tia: I don't have something like that in my house. I've got a split level, and so the landing is just enough for a coat closet, and that's it. So, I'm gonna need to have a different system in my house, and in that case, that's at the top of the stairs where we have a separate coat rack, where we have hooks for backpacks, coats, and such. And then we've got baskets underneath where, to this day, we've had mittens and hats and stuff inside of there. But I think I'm gonna need to update it with more of, a command center style where I can have, paperwork for homework and assignments and stuff now that, now that we're gonna have two kids in school, not just one.

Tia: 'Cause it's been very manageable with just one backpack, but now that we're gonna have two backpacks and things like that, it's gonna be a little bit more of, a this is the go-to station for all of your paper.

Amber: the main, of command center for paper in our house, as I mentioned, we have a little, wooden box thing that is attached to the wall close to the front door. And so when we bring mail in, that's where we drop it. That also is the place that I keep my reference stuff. So those coupons, those, the monthly Costco flyer, the bean subscription newsletter with recipe ideas. all of those live in that same box, and I go through it… I tend to go through it the night before recycling, which is every two weeks, to just get rid of… Often it's my partner's mail, like credit card offers that he never looks at, so then I will shred those.

Amber: but that's when I also look at, oh, are there coupons in here that have expired or events that have passed? That kind of thing. I guess I don't think I have a memory need for paper because I'm heartless and throw everything away.

Amber: So it's probably the same bin 'cause everything just comes in, goes there, and then at some point I'm like, "I don't need that anymore." I mean, holiday cards I, put up so I can see them until the end of the holiday, but…

Tia: Yeah

Amber: And yeah, birthday cards, that sort of thing too. But still,

Tia: Mm-hmm.

Amber: I do think that where you put it… if you're finding that you're throwing stuff in a particular spot,

Tia: Mm-hmm.

Amber: and that's your habit, there a way to put something there that contains it

Tia: Absolutely.

Amber: like

Tia: Yeah

Amber: stuff inside of a little basket

Tia: Mm-hmm

Amber: can make it look so much nicer than a pile of just loose paper. So it's not like you necessarily even need to change where you're putting it, but maybe just give it a little, some borders

Tia: Yeah

Amber: doesn't continue to get t- taller and wider at the same time. But go with your tendencies. If that's where you're gonna drop the mail, creating a new system across the house is not going to help if the paper never gets to that place.

Tia: Yeah. Yeah, and I would caution against making that basket your action basket,

Amber: Agree

Tia: a lot of times people- the paper clutter comes from not sub-categorizing the stuff into the, these five categories or something similar to these five categories as soon as your paper comes in your house. So what I do, and this has changed over time, but now what I do is I take the stuff from the mail, I immediately put stuff into recycling before I even get into the house if I know I'm not gonna want it, need it, care about it. And then we have, two different bins. one of them is for my husband 'cause he wants to organize his own stuff, which is totally fine, so I put… He has his own bin, and he goes through that separately however he wants.

Tia: And then there's mine, but if, if I just put stuff into that bin and don't even look at it, then I don't know what is actionable and what is not, what needs to be put into it. So I do my very best 'cause it's usually only, like, three to five pieces of mail a day, right?

Amber: Oh, I don't even get that much mail most days.

Tia: oh my gosh, like, I would say that's max. And that's between the both of us. So maybe it's, like, two decisions a day of do I, do I recycle this? Do I shred this? Do I put this in my action pile? Or do I put this in my reference thing? And then I'm done with it, and then I don't have to go through this big stack of stuff at the end of the month like, "Wait, w- where does all this stuff go? And is it important? Did I, did I miss a bill? Did I not…" So if you get in that habit on a daily basis and, and if you have these five categories of things, it's gonna be so easy to just be like, "Nope, that goes here.

Tia: Nope, that goes here," and then be done with it. And then truly you don't have a stack just living there and growing over time.

Amber: M- my aim in life is to eliminate most paper. So I feel like part of my system is to stop it before it comes in the house. Kind of like what we've talked about in previous episodes, like knowing what you need and where things go, and if there isn't a home for it and not a need for it, it doesn't even get to come into the house at all. I feel like that's my take with paper a lot of times too, is like, how do I just avoid more paper coming into the house? And so I'm really on top of if I can get it as an electronic statement or bill, that I'm making sure that that's happening. I will sometimes take the effort… I've gone through, if I was getting a ridiculous number of credit card offers from one particular company, there's usually a place somewhere on the back of the stuff that they send you where you can opt out.

Amber: So I've even gone in and opt out of, promotional marketing for different things. I'm like, "I don't want it." It's a waste of resources on every level, from environmental to even the company. Like, not that I think a credit card company needs to make more money,

Tia: Yeah

Amber: don't waste your money printing and shipping, sending something to me, because it's, it's not, it's not going to move me.

Tia: Yeah.

Amber: deal with it. Keep

Tia: Yeah. Mm-hmm

Amber: so I do feel like I have done a lot to eliminate paper. You can never eliminate all of it, but if there are those places that you can, 'cause if it's not there, you don't have to organize it

Tia: I think that covers everything, at least from

Amber: too.

Tia: paper category.

Amber: I think we have five actionable categories to divide our papers into. We have a rough idea of how frequently we need to look at them, where we should put them so we can access them on those kind of intervals that we need.

Tia: Mm-hmm.

Amber: I think this is a great place for everyone to start. So let's switch to talking about what's working now.

Tia: Yes.

Amber: working now?

Tia: no surprise this has to do with medication because that is just our life right now. But, I love writing expiration dates in big, bold letters on any medication that we have in our house because it's so easy to have, this medicine cabinet that's chock-full of all this amazing stuff. But then you go to grab something that you really need in the moment, and you look at the package, and it's expired, and you're like, "Shoot. I wish I would've known that. I would've gone to Target and purchased that ahead of time," so that's what's working for me right now, everything in my medicine cabinet having big, bold expiration dates written on them.

Tia: Y- of course, you can use a label maker if you want to, but a Sharpie works just fine for us,

Amber: Plus, you could just keep the Sharpie right there in the medicine cabinet so it's available where you're putting the medication away. You can do it right away.

Tia: What a brilliant idea. I love that

Amber: my what's working now is half-assed cleaning.

Amber: I… Okay, so this is an example from this past weekend. I made a point of kind of delaying a grocery store trip for a little extra time just to try and use up a bunch of stuff in the refrigerator. So we ate some kinda weird random things for a while. in that process, I really emptied out the produce drawer. There was not much left in there. And so I took that opportunity take that drawer out and clean it and clean underneath. And can I tell you the horrors that I saw underneath that drawer in the refrigerator? I don't know what these substances were or where they came from, or how long they've been there, but it's probably been a couple of years since I pulled the drawers out to clean underneath.

Amber: Uh, but it just felt really good. I did not clean the rest of the refrigerator. There are other shelves in there that could still use a wipe down, but it just felt good to do this half-assed one small project. I got so much satisfaction and joy from just the drawer. I didn't need to do the whole big thing, and I think that was just a really important reminder for me that if I don't have enough time to do a deep clean or a big project, there is still satisfaction in doing the one drawer, one closet, that sort of thing.

Tia: that is all for today. If you liked today's episode, you can support the show by telling your friends or leaving us a five-star review on Apple Podcast or Spotify

Amber: If you have any questions about the show or suggestions for future episodes, you can send us an email at heymonicapodcast@gmail.com. All show notes and links are available at heymonicapodcast.com

Tia: Amber supports individuals exhausted by dieting who want to improve their relationship with food and body. You can learn more and book a free connection call at wholeyounutrition.com. Amber also hosts a virtual community and co-working space dedicated to planning realistic, satisfying, and nourishing meals that actually taste good. Find more and join the collective at mealplanningcollective.com.

Amber: Tia helps busy professionals with kids who have amazing systems at work, but no energy left to create organized systems at home. Book a free consultation at roomforserenity.com or get organizing tips and tricks from her on Instagram. Her Instagram handle is room_for, that's F-O-R, _serenity

Tia: Bye, Monica

Amber: Bye