One of the biggest lessons I carried with me from the classroom into my organizing work is this: people are far more successful when they have ownership over the ideas and the process. When I was teaching, I saw this play out every day. If a child helped come up with their own strategy to learn math facts or spelling words, they were much more likely to remember and use it. If we did it the way I thought was best, it might work for a while, but it rarely stuck. The same was true with social...

As a professional organizer, I take donations at the end of many of my sessions. Sometimes it’s a single bag. Sometimes it’s an entire car full. And sometimes, there’s nothing to donate at all. One thing I often reassure clients about is there is no “right” place to donate. Donating anywhere is worthwhile. What matters most is that the item leaves your home and has the opportunity to be used again. People often get stuck because they want their items to go to the perfect place. They worry...

We all have them and if you're short like me even more shelves fall in the hard to reach category. They are great in theory (extra storage!) but in reality, this space is inconvenient and underused. As a professional organizer, I see this all the time and with the holidays coming up, it’s the perfect moment to put that space to good use. 1. Store once-a-year holiday items. Those upper cabinets are prime real estate for things you only need seasonally, Thanksgiving serving platters,...