10 Organizing Tasks You Need to Do Daily

The only way to really control clutter in your life is to do certain organizing tasks on a daily basis.

The theory is simple – when you keep up with decluttering, it doesn’t become a huge chore.

I used to dread spending time in the kitchen – because whenever I needed a dish, it would be in the dishwasher and the dishes would be dirty.

Same with the laundry – it would be stressful when what I wanted to wear was not clean.

Over time, I began to realize that if I did these things every day on a schedule, my home would run like a well oiled machine. My stress levels went down, I felt more in control, and I was able to conquer the overwhelm that happens when there is too much to do.

Complete These 10 Tasks Every Day

What I realized is that these tasks that I do daily are not unique to me – they are common tasks that apply to the majority of the population. So, I put them together in a quick checklist that you can get here. And I also outlined them in the post below.

If you want more in depth ideas on how to get started with organizing, be sure to check out my Beginner’s Guide to Organization here.

1. Manage The Dishwasher

Are your dishes always dirty when you need a clean one?

Or is your sink overflowing with dirty dinnerware because your dishwasher is either too full of dirty dishes or is still full with a clean load that needs to be put away?

It is frustrating, but there is a simple solution.

Run the dishwasher every night and empty it first thing in the morning.

This way your dishwasher has plenty of available space during the day to take on the dishes that your family uses all day long.

2. Control the Laundry

Designate a weekly laundry day or days. The frequency will depend on the size of your family and how much laundry you generate.

Collect dirty laundry from all the hampers in the house the night before laundry day. (If everyday is laundry day in your house, then collect the dirty laundry nightly.)

On the morning of your laundry day, strip the beds if you are washing sheets, and start the wash. Keep up with the loads throughout the day.

Try to fold everything in the room where the clean clothes belong. I fold the clothes on the bed in the rooms where the clothes belong. This way I can stack items together that belong in the same drawer and in turn, this saves me time when putting the clothes away.

It is tempting to multitask and fold clothes while you watch tv but this habit really slows down the process. You end up getting distracted and since the TV might not be in the room where the clothes go, you will have to restack everything in a laundry basket, carry it to the appropriate room and unload the basket there. This adds time to your process.

Instead, consider listening to an audiobook on your headphones or headset while you fold. You can do this in any room and the book stays with you. You can sign up for a free trial with Audible here.

3. Don’t Let the Snail Mail Pile Up

I’ve heard it said that a synonym for snail mail is “recycling”. Despite our best efforts to go paperless, the mail carrier keeps delivering more paper every day.

Don’t let it pile up. Sort your mail as soon as you bring it into the house.

Throw away the junk, and separate the rest into just a few separate piles or inboxes (one for bills, one for filing/scanning, one for shredding etc.)

Invest in a good paper shredder to safely dispose of unwanted documents that contain sensitive information.

Keep two bins under your home office desk, one for trash and one for recycling.

Make it as easy for yourself as possible to deal with the paperwork in a timely manner.

4. Clean Out Your Email Inbox

Once a day, take your email inbox down to “inbox zero” – If you clean it out on a daily basis, you will never accumulate too much.

This is really hard to do because so much email keeps pouring in.

For some quick wins in this area:

• be ruthless and unsubscribe from unwanted sales emails
• create folders in your emal service so you can easily file away and find email that you want to keep
• Clean up your Gmail by creating filters so email gets sorted automatically

If you are really behind on managing your email, this is a much bigger project that you should allocate time for. But at least, on a daily basis going forward, you can make it a point to handle any new email that arrives.

5. Clean Off Your Kitchen Countertops

The kitchen is usually the hub of the house and the counters can get cluttered quickly. The often become a “drop zone” for backpacks, keys, phones, bags, snail mail, and anything else that comes through the door.

Before you know it, you don’t even have space to cook!

I like to start the day with clean counters, so at the end of each day – I do a quick sweep of everything that doesn’t belong.

Grab a big basket and collect things that don’t belong. Take a minute and find them a home. Then wipe down your countertops so they are fresh and clean for the next day.

Beyond the daily maintenance, it is a good idea to do a deep decluttering of your kitchen at regular intervals.

Check out our Kitchen Organization Guide for more in-depth decluttering strategies.

6. Make Time for Planning

One thing that people don’t do enough of is planning. But, as the saying goes, failing to plan is planning to fail.

Every evening review your calendar and to do list for the next day. It should only take a few minutes but the benefits are priceless.

Review what you have done today. If there are any really important items that you did not get done – make them a priority for tomorrow.

Jot down any new “to do” items that have not yet made it to your list.

Look over your schedule so you have upcoming deadlines and appointments fresh inyour mind.

Prioritize your top three tasks for the next day. And plan your meals for the next day.

Visit our Personal Productivity Guide for a deeper dive into getting things done.

7. Organize Your Handbag or Wallet

Another way to stay organized is to clean out your handbag, wallet, backpack, briefcase, or other bag that you carry around every day.

Clutter builds up in the strangest places and this is one of those.

Every evening, empty out the receipts, wrappers, and other odds and ends that you have collected throughout the day.

Remove things that you won’t need for the following day, so you aren’t carrying around additional weight. And in a similar fashion, add items that you will need so you don’t forget them.

For example, some days I need a portable battery or a phone charger if I am going to be away for a long period of time. But on other days when I am moving about locally, I don’t need these items and it is not necessary for me to carry around this bulk.

By doing this daily, you will keep your bag clutter free and by keeping track of your receipts or cash on hand, you even gain a better handle on your budget.

If you find that your purse is always a big black hole – use these tips to help you organize your handbag.

8. Maintain Your Lists

I am a big advocate of using lists to stay organized – and these lists require daily maintenance.

My lists include:

• running grocery lists for the stores that I shop at most,
• errand lists,
• lists for calls that I need to make,
• a “keep in touch” list for friends and acquaintances that are far away,
• a master to do list,
• project lists,
• and so much more.

On a daily basis, it helps me to review my master to do list, and other active lists that I am working on currently.

It helps me with my daily planning and keeps me from forgetting things that might end up on the back burner.

If you are not using lists yet or need ideas to use them more effectively – here are some ideas that you can use to get started with list making.

9. Clean Off your Computer Desktop

When we talk about getting organized, we can’t forget about digital organization.

Now that everything is going paperless, the clutter has simply moved from our home office, (our actual physical desk) to our computers and cloud drives (our computer desktops).

Think of your computer desktop as your active workspace and move any files and folders that you are not currently working on into your documents folder or another folder that you use as a virtual file cabinet.

If you don’t yet have a system for organizing your digital life, start with these tips to help you organize your computer desktop in 5 minutes or less.

And while you are it, this is how to organize your desk at home or at work, too.

10. Don’t Forget to Read

Whether you are an avid reader or not – creating a reading habit has many benefits.

Be sure to build some time into each day to catch up on reading.

I have a small “to read” pile of actual books and many titles on my Amazon Kindle that I have not read yet.

But here’s the thing, the pile of what I want to read is always growing and if I don’t make the time to actually read them, then I become overwhelmed by the sheer volume of what I want to read.

So, build some time into your daily routine to read.

And, like everything else, keeping track of your books (both digital and physical) is important to staying organized.

I do this in two different ways.

First, I use Goodreads to maintain lists of what I already read, what I am currently reading, and what I want to read. Goodreads also has a social component to it – so if you are also on Goodreads, then please follow me here.

The second part is organizing the books on my Kindle. If you have Amazon Prime (which includes Amazon First Reads) and/or Kindle Unlimited, the number of books on your Kindle will start to grow quickly. Pretty soon, you will forget that you even have certain books on your device.

To manage all the books on my Kindle, I use the Collections feature to divide all my books into groups that make sense. Setting this up is a long project, but once you have it going, you can move any new books you acquire into the appropriate collection on a daily or weekly basis.

What Organizing Tasks Do You Tackle Daily?

I start my day by emptying the dishwasher and end the day by turning the dishwasher on.

In between I find time to manage the laundry, process my email, my snail mail, and my computer desktop. I clean off my kitchen countertops, plan my time, organize my purse, review my active lists, and take a little time out to catch up on reading.

These tasks are what is important to me – but your list of daily tasks may look a little different.

The important thing is to make a list of the tasks that you need to do daily to keep your life running like a well oiled machine.