5 Tips for A Clean Desk in Your Home Office

How do you expect to get any work done with that pigsty you call a desk? Here are five tips to clean up that mess and get your life back.

Keep Things You Need Handy

Try to keep only the things you need on a regular basis on the desk itself. See that stack of newspapers from 1986 that hasn’t moved since 1987? You probably don’t need them sitting there. At least move them to the attic where your grandson will find them after you pass.

Keep Food and Drinks Away

I know, I know. You are a type-A, overachieving machine. You need to eat and drink at your desk so you can keep working. OK, Hustle and Flow, the problem is you are leaving empty plates and cartons all over the side tables and file drawers. Ants are moving in to stage their own rock festivals complete with free massages and new age crystal tents.

Cut Back on Paper

Are you really printing your fantasy football team again? Sure, it’s easier to take notes on game days, but then you throw the pages next to the computer monitor and they pile up higher than your excuses to your wife when you came in late last night smelling like lime juice and gasoline. Get rid of all that paper. The place is going to catch fire and the house will burn down. Then you’ll be sleeping in the back yard with a rock from the garden for a pillow.

Digitize Paperwork

See all those articles, magazine clippings, photos, sticky notes and other junk you “planned to get to.” Well, it’s been three years and you haven’t done anything with that stuff. Scan it or take a picture of it with your phone and upload it to an online archive service. With all the space you free up, you can break out your coin collection and impress no one.

Use a Dry Erase Board

If you really want to keep track of sudden inspirations, get a dry erase board to jot down notes, thoughts, and goals. Be sure to erase it completely from time to time. Take a picture of it if you want to save stuff. Because if you don’t wipe it down completely from time to time, knowing you it will soon be filled with bad jokes, questionable sketches and sayings like, “Living my best life!!!!! As soon as I get out of bed!!!”