It’s easy for messes to pile up while you’re stressed about classes, clubs, studying, and trying to fit in extra social time with your friends. Balancing a busy college schedule is hard enough, but when you add in the growing mess in your bedroom? Believe it or not, it might be easier to keep things neat than you think. There are some simple steps you can take to keep your college apartment or dorm clean while balancing that busy college schedule of yours.
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Establish a Routine
First, you need to establish a routine that you can fit into your busy schedule. There are many different ways you can fashion your new routine. This can be once a week if, for example, you have Tuesday evenings completely free. Dedicate some of that time to cleaning your apartment or even just a part of it. Maybe one week it’s the kitchen, the next it is the bedroom, and the next it’s the bathroom. Do however much is manageable within that time frame, but do not push yourself into becoming burnt out. However, you should keep in mind that the more often you clean, the less the mess grows. If you stick to this routine every week, your work will be much smaller in the following weeks.
If once a week is too much, you can clean every two weeks or even once a month. Everyone’s messes grow differently, but your apartment will keep much cleaner the more often you do this, plus it’s easier to get in the habit of something if you stick with it often, whereas a month may go by and you forget.
Prioritize Tasks Over Others
A good rule to help you keep your apartment clean is to prioritize certain cleaning tasks over others. If you’re too busy for a big, deep clean, clean the messes that could easily turn into something worse. If you have dirty dishes in the sink, take care of those first before the smells permeate every corner of your apartment or mold grows on them, while you leave vacuuming for another day.
You can list out every chore that you need to do around your apartment to keep it clean and rank them from the most important to the least important. The most important can also include tasks you need to do in order to keep you happy and focused as you do your school work, such as cleaning your desk, as minimal as that might be.
Always Take an Item
Next, a simple task you can do is always take something with you when you stand up and move around your apartment. Say you were eating at your desk, which now has dirty dishes on it. When you stand up for any reason, bring your dishes to the kitchen sink. You do not have to clean them right at this moment, but put them where they belong before they pile up and your dirty stack of plates grows too big on your desk. Use paper plates? Instead, take it to the trash can. This is just one example, but you can always grab at least one thing to place it elsewhere.
Whenever you can, take something with you and put it where it goes. This helps tasks stay to a minimum since you take care of the problem as you go along.
Give Items a Home
Speaking of putting items where they belong, you need to actually give them a space to belong! It can be more difficult to clean and keep organized when you have items floating around and do not recall the last place you put them. Instead, dedicate a home to these items, and it shouldn’t be a junk drawer! Consider the family the item belongs to or where you use it. This way, when you’re cleaning, you have a designated spot for every item, keeping your place clean!
Use a Reward System
Lastly, reward yourself! It may sound silly, but I know it can be very difficult to stay motivated to clean your place, especially when your bed is calling you! You should reward yourself each time you successfully finish a goal you’ve set for yourself. If it’s a deep clean, just one room, or finally taking the trash out, find something to motivate you.
This can be something that forces you to clean, such as inviting friends over so the place needs to look good before a specific time and then you get the reward of seeing your friends or taking the trash out and buying your favorite candy since you’re already outside now! By setting these goals, you’ll be more likely to follow through and clean while you start to get in the habit.
By following these simple steps and creating new habits, it will be much easier to keep your apartment clean, even with your busy college schedule.
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