DETROIT – Stacks of paperwork, piles of toys, closets stuffed to capacity. Does any of that sound familiar?
Clutter is a major problem for lots of people. It causes stress. It costs us time and money, and can even be harmful to our health.
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If you've struggled to get a handle on your family's mess without success, you may need to take the "Clutterbug Test."
The test is the brainchild of Cas Aarssen, a mother of three who's made her personal struggle with clutter into a successful career. (To take the Clutterbug Test, click here.)
"I was a slob my entire life, and I struggled with clutter. I was drowning in clutter," Aarssen said. "I started just slowly getting organized, and I realized how life-changing it was. I started organizing friends and family and through word of mouth it just spread. I started making YouTube videos so I was able to touch hundreds of thousands of families and help them get organized."
From her home just outside Windsor, Ontario, Aarssen produces her "Clutterbug" podcast and videos for her popular YouTube channel.
"I think combined I'm almost at half a million combined subscribers, which, I'm just a stay-at-home mom cleaning my mess," Aarssen said.
A good portion of her organizing advice revolves around an eye-opening discovery Aarssen said she made when she began working as a professional organizer.
"I said to them, 'When I leave, if this doesn't work for you, call me back and I will come back and do it for free,'" Aarssen said. "That quickly turned into me going back to people's homes constantly and making very little money so I had to realize, 'Why is it that it works for me or worked for my last client but not for you?'"
Aarssen said she realized not everyone's clutter style is the same.
"There are four distinct styles, and not everyone organizes the same way," Aarssen said.
Enter the Clutterbug Test. Aarssen said the four types of Clutterbugs need very different types of organizing solutions.
"Just because it works for you or what you see on television works for people, doesn't mean that it's going to work for someone else," she said.
The first Clutterbug is a butterfly -- a visual person who likes to see all of their belongings.
"If your closet is empty, and all your clothes are laid across the dresser, you're probably a butterfly," Aarssen said. "But if you took your closet doors off, you are way more likely to actually hang your things into your closet."
Butterflies need clear or open storage and should avoid very detailed organizing systems.
"They can't use little filing systems where everything is, here's for 'electricity' or here's for 'gas.' They need one just for 'bills,'" Aarssen said.
She says small children are all butterflies, and so are most hoarders.
The next Clutterbug is the ladybug -- a person who likes the look of minimal clutter but is a master of hiding it.
"You're a lady bug if your house looks pretty neat and tidy, but you open a closet, and it's like it's crazy in there and everything's falling on you," Aarssen said.
Aarssen herself is a ladybug and relies on simple organizing solutions.
"I need to be able to open a closet, open a drawer and just toss it in and have it go into a home," Aarssen said. "I cannot use little detailed organizing systems."
The next Clutterbug is the bee. They like to see their items, but want them organized in a detailed way.
"You're also probably a bee if you have a lot of projects on the go," Aarssen said. "Bees tend to be busy bees, and so they have a lot of things they've started, may not have finished and left out a lot of projects. I see a lot of crafters who are bees. Clear bins work for bees, really small, sorted, segregated but clear containers or hooks. Peg board organizers are perfect for a bee."
The last Clutterbug is the cricket. Crickets are organized people who tend to have lots of piles.
"A cricket tends to pile because they're a bit of perfectionist and until they've set up a system that's going to work, they'll set it to the side until they can deal with it 'properly,'" Aarssen said.
Aarssen recommends that crickets try systems that are "good enough" in the meantime.
"Have a file for 'papers to be filed later' instead of having it take away your living space by piling it everywhere," Aarssen said.
Aarssen says most organizing systems are designed with crickets in mind, which is why they don't work for everyone else.
"Once you understand your style and the systems that will finally really work for you, it's life-changing," Aarssen said. "You're not a disorganized person. You're just not using the right organizing tools."
Aarssen has lots of organizing advice for each type of Clutterbug on her website and in her two books and her podcast. You can find all of those links here.
To take the Clutterbug Test, click here.
So what if you're a cricket, but you live with two butterflies? Aarssen said she is sharing her simple trick to help bridge the gap between clutterbugs, and she says it all started with a bottle of ketchup.