Any time you drop by my house, it’s visitor ready. Most people want to stop reading right here, and say that I’m crazy, obsessed, or abnormal. I get it. But I also have learned a few tips and tricks over the years, and if you read further, you’ll see it’s not as hard as it looks.

I live with less. That’s the bottom line. In the morning, because I have a place for almost everything in my house, it’s easy for me to identify what needs to be put away. I do the laundry, fold it, and put it away. It’s quick because I wash regularly and don’t wait for piles of clothing to build up. Granted, some people think I wash too much. That’s okay, it’s their prerogative. Another thing I do is group things. I wash all the sheets and pillowcases in the house weekly and at the same time, and immediately put them back on the bed. Nothing stays out. The same is true for dishes. I do them after dinner with the help of my husband, run the dishwasher, and put everything away first thing in the morning. It literally takes five minutes.

So, what are my tricks? I have less, so there is less to maintain, fewer things to declutter and organize, and everything stays in place. Do I live a vacant life? I don’t think so. Living with less provides me the opportunity to stay on top of my life, send a physical birthday card to the people I love, mail a hand-written thank you note, and run my life with little distraction. Granted, my children are grown, but I lived like this when they were young. I always have. In the morning before everyone wakes up, all my chores for the day are finished except for the few that I leave until later in the day, like grocery shopping. All this, and I work a good ten hours a day.

Here are a few of my tricks:

I constantly offload clutter.

Get rid of anything that stands in the way of your home organization and your sanity. Sanity is way more important than any tchotchke you can’t let go. If I don’t love something, or it is just excess, I take it straightaway to the donation center. The people at the donation center know my car and name, and this makes me feel good. It makes me feel good to give things away.

I keep things in their place and don’t put things down, I put them away.

Use the scissors. Finished. Put it away in the drawer in my kitchen where I know it should be. Finish the laundry, put it away. Have paperwork that needs to be read? Read it. Have toys out for my grandson? Put them back after he leaves and make clean-up a game that we do together. Need to refill the cat’s food? Refill it when his feeder runs low. Put the bag back when I’m finished refilling the airtight container and order a new bag as it gets close to the bottom. Running low on coffee? Order so we don’t panic the night before. All these little things make life less stressful and easier to manage.

I tidy up before bed.

Before I go to bed, I do the same thing I did in the morning. A few minutes of tidying up, wash out my cat’s bowl so the next morning it’s clean, refill his water bowl for the night, wipe down the countertops (that’s my favorite thing to do), put any loose papers away, and empty trash that’s in the small trash cans. Maybe I take a few extra things to the recycle bin. When it’s all done, and everything is put away, I set the alarm to my house and my day is over. I am not stressed. I am not up all night. I can sleep calmly and peacefully, and my day is finished. The next morning, I empty the dishwasher, feed the cat and my day starts again. Little to do because there is little excess to tend to before I start my day.

I clean as I cook.

I hate dirty dishes left out overnight. True story. Once, many years ago, I had company and was too tired after they left to put everything in the dishwasher. Instead, I did the best that I could, and left something out that attracted ants. Not a few. I mean an entire army. They came from outside, inside (although I’m still not sure where), and everywhere in between. A trail. And not a little one. The trail was so dense, it looked like someone had drawn a black line on my carpet from the living room to the kitchen sink. Talk about revolting!

That was a good lesson in cleaning as I cooked. And loading the dishwasher before I went to bed. And turning it on. For some reason, something attracted these ants, and the thought of them has never left me. That’s why I clean up as I cook, and then make sure the trash can is either covered or the plastic liner replaced before I go to bed. I wipe the counters down, making sure that nothing from the evening’s dinner waits until the morning. I’ve seen what can happen, and I make cleaning up as I cook a priority every night when I’m finished with dinner.

I do a deep clean if I’m not comfortable in my home.

Sometimes I can feel when there is excess clutter in a room, a closet, or when it’s time to revisit an area and purge. It’s just a vibe I get. What it feels like is that I’m having an energy shift. I know that things need to go. Some of them. Maybe all of them. An area is holding me back and I need to look at what I had previously chosen to keep. Maybe it’s a sixth sense, I’m not sure. But I know that when I do this, I feel my energy change. I pay attention to how I feel and what feels like it’s weighing me down. I begin to feel lighter after I’ve decluttered. I’ve been doing clutter-clearing for a long time, and I’m sensitive to the feeling of heaviness from clutter.

By living with less, I experience more: more time, more patience because I’m not stressed from excess clutter, more happiness in my day. I manage the hours in my days better, and I can shift my energy easily throughout my day instead of feeling “stuck.” I appreciate the vantage point this feeling gives me, and the way I feel when I go to sleep at night.

Try a few of these things to see how you feel.

These are just a few tips, but they’re a good starting place. Own less, so you manage less. Don’t procrastinate, do things immediately following the “only touch things once” rule, or “don’t put it down, put it away” rule. However you want to say it, don’t make extra work for yourself. Do the laundry, both the washing and drying cycles, don’t let the clothes stay in the machine for long, and put everything away. Clean up as you go, declutter regularly, and pay attention to areas in your house that weigh you down. They are telling you something about your energy.