A graphic of a room with some boxes labelled donation with some items spilling out with two large plants on the left and right of the room
Episode 182 – Gathering like with like

Episode 329 – 10 ways to avoid overwhelm when decluttering
Episode 328 – How to keep the plates spinning in a busy home with Anna Burns
Gathering similar items together is one of the most critical parts of the decluttering process but it’s not a one time event. In this podcast we are going to talk about why we gather like with like before, during and after decluttering and the reasons why this is going to help you.
Prefer to read rather than listen?
Transcript of this podcast episode
[00:00:00] Ingrid: Gathering like items together is one of the most critical parts of the decluttering process. But it's not a one time event. In this podcast we are going to talk about why we gather like with like before, during, and after decluttering, and the reasons why this is going to help you.

[00:00:20] Now Lesley, we love the term gather like with like, don't we?

[00:00:26] But it sounds so easy. Just put like with like, but it, isn't there? 

[00:00:33] Lesley: Yeah, there is, because actually gathering like with like, I hope everybody knows, does everybody know what that means? I'm sure they do. But actually that happens repeatedly throughout the decluttering process, doesn't it? And that's what we're here to talk about.

[00:00:46] So you don't just gather, gather like with like on a one time basis, you gather like with like. I'm getting tongue tied over gathering like with like now, I can't even say it. Like we use it all the time and now I'm struggling to say it. We gather like with like several times throughout the decluttering process, before decluttering, in the middle of decluttering, and after decluttering.

[00:01:06] And we're going to talk about all that, aren't 

[00:01:08] Ingrid: we? I do think we need to talk about exactly what we mean, though. I think that does make sense. I mean, we know people who've been in our world for a while probably know, but if you're a brand new listener to them, I'd go, what do you mean like with like? Yes.

[00:01:24] Lesley: So what we mean is when you're in the process of decluttering, you gather similar items together so that you get a good feel for what you've got. And so it's really important to have a line of sight over exactly what you've got. And so we gradually gather things together. Now sometimes those things might already be together.

[00:01:42] So if you've got a sock drawer. Your stock draw might already be gathered like with like, so you might be in business there. But if you're talking about something like stationery, paperwork, you might find that that kind of stuff is scattered all around your house or around different rooms. And so it's really important to make sure that you know exactly what you've got.

[00:02:01] And that is why we gather 

[00:02:02] Ingrid: like with like, I think a perfect example is probably the kitchen, Lesley. I mean, that's where you have really kind of defined categories. You've got herbs and spices. You've got Tupperware and plastic containers, you've got pots and pans, you've got cutlery, you've got mugs, you've got glasses.

[00:02:21] And if those items live in several cupboards, it's really hard to find something. So when you're decluttering and organising, you want to gather them together first. So, okay, I want to declutter my plastic containers, let me find them all from all the different cupboards. Gather them together, like we'd like, so they're similar items together, so then you can take the next step.

[00:02:45] Lesley: Yeah, I think it's really, really important to gather like we'd like. Let me give you a couple of examples of when it's been super important. So if you are decluttering a wardrobe, for example. So I am going back to a client next week that I've worked with last week. And her home is a little bit in disarray at the moment.

[00:03:02] There's a lot of laundry that still needs doing, a lot of ironing that needs doing. So I said to her. We need to have a full picture before we can do the right things on your wardrobe. So therefore we need to gather light with light. And what that means is she needs to do all her laundry and ideally all of her ironing.

[00:03:17] So we've got a full picture of how much clothing she's got in her house. When we did a recent reset your home challenge, we asked people to gather light with light. We asked people to gather all their shoes together to have a good feel for how many shoes they've got. And then what that allowed for people to go.

[00:03:33] Wow. Why have I got 75 pairs of shoes? I had no idea. And then I went when I brought my wellies and when I brought my Crocs and I looked at my slippers and I looked at my shoes are on top of the wardrobe and I looked at all these different things. All of a sudden had way more than what I thought that I had.

[00:03:48] Stationery is a fantastic example of that, Ingrid, isn't it? Because it gets scattered. We use a pen, we take it into a different room. It's dropped where it lands. And then we need to gather all the pens together, all the stationary together so we can have one stationary drawer. So that's exactly the kind of thing we need.

[00:04:04] Have you got any examples of a gathering like with like episode, 

[00:04:07] Ingrid: Ingrid? Oh, yes, absolutely. I mean, it can be even, you know, seasonal items like in the winter, you want to gather all of your heads, gloves and scarves together to kind of get a picture. Okay, what are we wearing? What fits? Do I still like the color?

[00:04:24] Is there a glove missing? You can only do that when you gather all your items together. When you're doing paperwork, you don't want to, you want to first kind of go, okay, these are my clothes. Okay. Household bills. And this is my bank statements. And this is a pile with paperwork from my, about my health.

[00:04:40] And then of course you probably can create subcategories below that, but you first want to get the main category sorted. Uh, it can be with coats, you know, let's get all the coats together and then you can go, well, it's winter now let's do all the winter coats or it's summer. Let's do all the summer coats.

[00:04:57] And that is what we mean with gathering like with like, it can be in a garage, a Oh, it's a very messy garage. Let's put all the paints together and all the stuff that we use to do the garden and let's put all the garden furniture items together. That is what we mean with gathering the same items together because you get a much better overview.

[00:05:19] especially of how much there is. Yes. Yeah, exactly. And I think 

[00:05:26] Lesley: we're not going to lie here. Sometimes gathering like with like is easier said than done, isn't it? Yeah. So there are some instances where it's very difficult and that might be a phased approach. And so you might not be able to gather. all of your paperwork from all over the house, because that might be too big of a job.

[00:05:44] If you're in a room of doom, as we like to call them, where you've got a completely chaotic room where everything's kind of just chucked in, like a sort of dumping ground spare bedroom, or maybe like an understairs cupboard, somewhere where there's complete chaos. Sometimes it's difficult to gather light with light, because we need to do the whole job before we can find what's buried underneath.

[00:06:04] So it's not always that easy, is it? 

[00:06:06] Ingrid: Definitely not. Definitely not. It will become easier the more you declutter your house, but especially in the beginning, you might think, okay, uh, I'm listening to Ingrid and Lesley. I'm gathering like with like, but you might go, but I know that on five other places in my house, I've got the same item.

[00:06:26] Well, what you then need to do is kind of go, okay, where would this item live? Where would I look for it and place it in that room? And every time you then find that same type of item, Put it there and then you can go and take the next steps. But if your house is very full or if you've got several very full rooms.

[00:06:44] The gathering like with like is something that's not going to be easy. So you need to do very rough categories in the beginning and kind of go, I need to work with what I haven't. But we're going to talk about that some more, don't we, Lesley? 

[00:06:56] Lesley: Okay. So we've given a couple of examples, Ingrid, of the types of things that we would do before we were decluttering.

[00:07:01] We've talked about gathering all our paperwork together. Now, actually, when we're gathering paperwork together, it's with a view to leaving it till later. So what we don't want to do is declutter a room and then. Deal with that kind of stuff. As we see it, if we see something that definitely we know there is more off somewhere in a house, then what we need to do then is put it all in a box and come back to it later.

[00:07:22] Yeah. Yeah. We've talked about clothing. Now I'm preempting what's going on with my client in a couple of weeks by saying, you need to prepare this, that we've got a full picture and we talked about stationary and things like that. And we're finding that as we go. Now, what I want to talk about is the. Mid decluttering.

[00:07:38] So as we are in the process of decluttering, as we are actually decision making, what do we do then? When do we then gather light with like, and why is it important at that stage? 

[00:07:48] Ingrid: So what I do a lot of times, Lesley, mid decluttering. So for, let me give you an example. I think that's easier. When I do a wardrobe with a client, I do a lot of sorting when I take items out of the wardrobe and I go right.

[00:08:03] This is a top. This is a jacket. This is a trouser. This is a t shirt. This is pajamas. This is gym wear So I start to kind of create different categories and I gather like with likes So every time I get an item out of the wardrobe I go What other like item do I have that already for example is on the bed and I can put this with the other item So every time I find a trouser it goes on the trouser pile and every time I find a top A top or a jacket, it goes on that pile.

[00:08:35] So I start to gather like with like. Now, of course, if I, mid declutter, take out something from the wardrobe, and the client already says, Oh, that's so old, I don't like that at all. It doesn't even go to my pile on the bed anymore to look at. It goes immediately in the charity bag to go away after the session.

[00:08:55] But, Most of it I try to kind of group items together because it gives you again that really good Quantity to kind of for people to go. I had no idea. I had 26 pairs of black trousers I had no idea and that's what can happens when you gather like with like and then it's much easier to go Do you actually want to keep this one or do you want to let it go or does it need to repair or what?

[00:09:22] What needs to happen with this item? but the gathering like with like is a Crucial part of the decluttering and organising success and I think what a lot of people do they think okay I'm just going to Do my wardrobe. They whip everything out of the wardrobe onto one massive pile again. And then still it's really tricky to see what's what.

[00:09:42] So I really like a little bit of like with like gathering while I'm kind of emptying a cupboard or when I'm in a kitchen and I open a cupboard. I try to go, ah, okay, right. There's some mugs here. Let me put it. Let me make a little mug area here. Oh, this is some Tupperware or some plastic containers. Oh, i'm going to put them here So I try to have a little bit of space on a flat surface somewhere Where I can start to group things together because it then becomes much clearer how much there is and It starts also become clear when the client then says, Oh, that is amazing.

[00:10:19] I love that. And then you can go, Oh, that's, that's a keeper. That's a keeper. That's, that's a good one to, to, to hold on to. So I've in my head, it really helps with untangling a cluttered mind into actually, I'm ready to let's go some of the items because I now see how much I have. 

[00:10:40] Lesley: Yeah, it almost allows you an opportunity to look at those volumes and to start to rank them a little bit.

[00:10:45] So if you've got the kind of 10 pairs of black trousers, for example, and you think, actually, I don't really need any more than five, realistically, then you can rank them and say, well, I prefer that one. And then that one and that one. the ones that are number six to 10. I'm not really, I don't care about too much.

[00:11:00] And so, but it was useful for me to see those. Now, not everybody needs that. And what we call a number scale, it's not about, well, I'm going to keep five and lose five, but it does allow you to have a rational kind of look at what you've got. And, and. Identify the volumes that you have and whether or not that seems excessive.

[00:11:18] I mean, really what we're talking about here is categorization, but I think in general, when people talk about categorization, people think about that more in the organising process than the decluttering one. So we're saying. You constantly need to be gathering light with light throughout the decluttering process because there are several points along the way when that's going to be useful for you to be able to make decisions.

[00:11:39] Right, I want to give you a scenario, Ingrid, about what we love to call the sweep banks, okay? So what a sweep is, is that scenario where someone says, I'm going to be with you in 20 minutes. And you're like, Oh no, this is an absolute nightmare. So you grab a bag, you grab a box and you whip all the clutter off a work surface into one bag or box.

[00:11:59] And then it's all a big jumble of stuff altogether. So. What do we do when we're gathering like with like out of a sweep box Ingrid? 

[00:12:08] Ingrid: Well for me I think it's really crucial to find a flat surface somewhere and then get that sweep box or bag or laundry basket or whatever it is out and almost like Emptied out completely on that flat surface and go, right, what is going on here?

[00:12:26] What kind of items and what you see normally is always the same kind of categories. There's also always some paperwork. So you start putting the paperwork together. There's always some coins and money and kind of. Uh, stamps and, and, and those kinds of bits. This, so I put them in one kind of category.

[00:12:44] There's always stationary, a paper clip, a pen, a notebook, something like that. So even when you're trying to deal with a sweep back, the, instead of going, taking one item out the back and go, okay, where does this belong? You're probably going to be walking back and forth about 150 times from one sweep back.

[00:13:04] That's what you don't want to do. You want to empty it on a table. Put it in the categories, immediately go right, I don't need that anymore. That can be either recycled or thrown away or donated. And then per group, per category, you can decide where is this now live. This is not live here. Ah, my paperwork lives on my desk.

[00:13:25] In my living room or in my home office, these are pens and pencils and notebooks. I have a cupboard somewhere or a shelf somewhere where I've got the similar type of thing. I'm going to put them there all together. So with the decluttering itself, you're gathering like with like, but then mid declutter, when you're kind of starting to decide where am I going to put this stuff, you're doing the same again.

[00:13:48] And that's where the place for everything and everything in its place. That's where you're going to put I'm going to put it with a similar category of stuff. It might not be decluttered perfectly. It might not be organised perfectly. But if I then need to find a pen or a notebook, that's a shelf somewhere in that cupboard where that stuff is.

[00:14:08] And the more you get organised and the more you get on top of your sweet bags and, and your decluttering, it's, it becomes easier and easier to decide what the perfect place is for something. 

[00:14:21] Lesley: You made such a valid point there, Ingrid, with sweet bags as well and it's exactly the same and even if it's not a sweet bag, if it's a room, if you find something while you're decluttering that doesn't belong in that room, the gathering like with like might be something as broad as that doesn't belong in this room, it belongs in the kitchen, or it belongs in my son's bedroom or whatever, so the like with like might not be all stationary together or all notebooks together, it might be All Nathan's stuff for his bedroom together.

[00:14:50] Do you know what I mean? And so, because we can't get waylaid, we have to gather things together, it broadly, and then we move them to where they need to be. And then we deal with them and get down to the nitty gritty later. It's so important to gather light with light. And it's so important not to get distracted by things, isn't it as well.

[00:15:06] Ingrid: Yeah, I think so too. I think that's one of the mistakes that we see a lot of people make in their preparation when they're just starting out. It's like the butterfly effect or the, the, the, the, the kind of flitting from one area to the next, Oh, there's some stuff here that doesn't need to be in this room.

[00:15:21] It needs to be somewhere else. Let's bring it now. And off they go. And they completely get sidetracked by everything else that's happening in their house. And 45 minutes later, Oh! I was actually decluttering in my bedroom and I've now ended up hanging up laundry on my laundry rack! What happened here? So you need to make sure that if you find something in the area that you're decluttering that doesn't belong there and it belongs somewhere else you put it in a box and at the end of your, your tidying up session or your decluttering session you go right now I'm going to walk around with my box around my house to put all the items in the area where they should go with their friends, with their like items 

[00:15:59] Lesley: Yes, we like to call them their friends, don't we?

[00:16:02] Yeah. They're friends, yeah. So, we've talked about pre decluttering, gathering light with light. We've talked about mid decluttering, light with light. And we're going to come back in a minute and talk about post decluttering, gathering light with light.

[00:16:16] So we have decluttered.

[00:16:18] We've made decisions. We've gathered light with light. We're doing the declutching process. We've not talked about all the other things that you need to do in the middle. We're just. Talk about that and gathering bits of it. We'll just skate over the rest of it. Shall we? And with all the hard work that you've done.

[00:16:30] So we've now got to a stage where we have decluttered everything and we have a box of things that need to go away. Now you've already talked about a place for everything and everything in this place. One thing that we didn't talk about is something that's quite a long way round on our cycle of success that we use at the declutter hub.

[00:16:47] Which is storage, one of the huge benefits of gathering light with light is that when it comes to storage, when it comes to assigning a place for everything and deciding whether or not you need to containerize the item, buy a new box, buy some new storage is that you can then see exactly the type of storage that is going to work 

[00:17:05] Ingrid: for you.

[00:17:07] Yeah, I think so as well. And I think it's important to realize that sometimes storage can be a certain shelf. It can be a cupboard. It can be the perfect, you know, the perfect box for you. It can be a little tray. It can even be an empty shoe box. It doesn't really matter what kind of storage it is. It's really important that you put similar items together so you know where to look for items when you need them.

[00:17:32] Lesley: Yeah, and you need the right size box, don't you? You need the right size box for the stuff. You know, you don't want to put pens in a huge box because you never, you know, you need those in a smaller box that's containerized appropriately. So it's at that stage that we start to think about what kind of container do I need for the items?

[00:17:48] I have gathered like 

[00:17:50] Ingrid: with like. Yeah. And sometimes what you see, Lesley, if a box is larger, you can sometimes what, what we do, what I do a lot is, and then put a smaller box in for the smaller items. So they don't get lost in the bigger items. What works really well is for example, drawers in a desk, when you've got a home office or you've got a desk in your living room, you've got some drawers is really helpful.

[00:18:14] If you put smaller boxes. inside those drawers so it doesn't all rattle around and gets lost again. 

[00:18:22] Lesley: Yeah, no, good point. Good point. A box within a box, a container within a container. We love a bit of containerization, don't we, Ingrid? Yeah. So the last thing that I wanted to talk about when it comes to gathering like with like, we've done pre decluttering, mid decluttering, post decluttering, and now we get to the donation stage and we still need to do more gathering like with like even at the donation stage, Ingrid, because we need to make sure.

[00:18:45] That the stuff that is going to leave our house is all collected like with like, don't we? We need all the charity shop stuff together. If we're sending stuff to several charities, we need several different charity bags. We need all the paper recycling together. We need all the bottle and tin recycling together.

[00:19:01] We need the stuff together that we're going to give to our sister or our mom. All those things need to be gathered so you've got a good feel for what's going where so you don't lose control of the stuff that's leaving your house as well. 

[00:19:13] Ingrid: I think that's very true, and I think, actually, I think it was somebody in our Facebook group who said that, and it's like, I've got a whole donation area, but now, I've got so many different places things need to go, because some of it I want to put in the food bank, some of it I want to put on Olio, some of it I want to put on FreeCycle, some of it needs to go to the tip, some of it needs to go back to my, my, my neighbor.

[00:19:35] I now need to feel that I need to sort my donation station. It's like, yes, indeed. You need to gather like in like, even in that last step before it leaves the house. And that's why it's so important to really Don't overcomplicate. Don't create too many different areas. If you're just at the beginning of your decluttering journey, find one charity, one goodwill, one place where a lot of your stuff can go.

[00:20:02] The more you get organised, the more you can go, Oh, wow, I've got a specific item here that could go to a specific charity. But the last thing you want is to overcomplicate it in the beginning when you don't have a lot of room to work with yet. So Ingrid, we have 

[00:20:18] Lesley: done all of our gathering, like with like, is there any more like with like gathering action to be had here?

[00:20:25] Ingrid: Well, I think I, I, I really don't know, actually, I think it's really important, you know, that I think it's the same with, you know, it's with everything. It's with books, it's with children's artwork, it's with sentimental items, it's with photographs, it's with shoes from your cupboard. Everything, this principle works.

[00:20:46] Every decluttering item in your home, and I think it really helps you crystallize far more when you gather like with like for you to get clarity on what is important, what you use, what you love and what you want to keep and actually what is not useful for you at all and what can be decluttered from your life.

[00:21:06] So I think it really helps with the decision making as well when you have similar items grouped together. Yes, well 

[00:21:14] Lesley: summarized Ingrid. So what is coming up next week on the podcast talking about Charity shops actually. Yes. 

[00:21:21] Ingrid: Yeah, I know it's like perfect, isn't it? I am going to talk to Michelle from the Charitable Cancer Trust She's going to tell me all about the charity donations that they accept in their shops and what do they accept and what don't they accept.

[00:21:36] It's an amazing charity. It is local here in England, but I think the whole idea and the concepts of how they reuse, how they recycle, how they sell off items will be. Interesting for anybody worldwide listening. So I'm really looking forward to sharing this podcast with you. So thanks so much for listening in this week and we'll see you next week.
Subscribe now so you don't miss an episode
Listen on
Apple Podcasts
Listen on
Amazon Music
Listen on
Spotify
Watch on
YouTube
Prefer to watch rather than listen? Watch on YouTube