When you are working, you are busy, and it’s especially important for your tasks and activities to run as smoothly and efficiently as possible. This means setting yourself up for success at work and at home by proactively getting the things that serve you into tip-top shape.

Start with Improving your Home

Improving your home life literally starts with improving the state of your home.

Does your home environment give you stress and strife or comfort and relaxation? Is it easy for you to access the things you require to get your day started well and does it support you to function at your maximum capacity?

The Family Room

The family room is one of the most common areas of the home. Being a common space means it caters a lot of the family’s activities and attention. This room is basically where family members spend large amounts of time doing various activities such as watching television, playing games, doing family traditions and making memories.

Families gather here to relax and retreat, but if the room is a cluttered mess, that goal will not be achieved.

What’s Not Working in the Family Room?

To discover if the family room is working out for the family, try a simple assessment of the room and identify what’s out of order.

Questions to ask yourself:
• Are there papers everywhere?
• Are items easily accessible?
• Is there too much in the room that doesn’t belong there?
• Is the furniture placed correctly and is it functional?
• Is there another furniture piece needed to get items off the floor/tabletops (e.g., magazine holder)?

How to Improve the Family Room

There are ways to keep this room neat and orderly so that it can act as its primary function – to provide the family with a comfortable life.

Establish Goals for the Family Room

#1 – Declutter the Space
Here are some tips to decluttering the family room space
• Throw out any unused items, items that don’t work, or items that have outgrown their usefulness. (Do you still need that CD rack in the corner if all of your music is now stored on an electronic device?)
• Remove all items that don’t belong there (e.g., clothes, bookbags, purses).
• Get rid of any trash by promptly tossing it out.
• Group all like items together so you have a sense of what you have in the room? (Is there one remote control on the sofa and another on the coffee table? Put these like items together to pull the room together and make it look neater.) Commit to not having everything spread out all over the family room. Family room items need to be centered, meaning they are in a specific location of the room and are all organized.
#2 – Establish effective storage for the items that belong in the family room.
Examples of these include:
• Current Periodicals (magazines / books / newspapers)
• Electronics. (Only those that apply to the family room like the karaoke machine, not everyone’s phones and media players.)
• Remote Controls.
• Take daily vitamins.
• DVDs/Games/Controllers
• Toys
#3 – Make sure furniture doesn’t act as clutter holders.
When you have items like TV consoles, end tables, coffee tables, and bookshelves around, their original use and purpose could easily be taken for granted and instead become clutter magnets.

Scattered items like clothes, trash, books, and toys could turn the family room from a relaxation area into the family’s chaos center that breeds stress.

Clear out those little potential pockets of clutter by making sure you can see the tops of furniture surfaces and you can navigate safely around the floor.

Determine Your Tidying Routine

Decide how often a tidying routine is required. Will you do an assessment and take appropriate actions once a month and then make daily efforts to maintain, or will these steps be necessary every other week? And make it a family effort. A disorderly family room undoubtedly took a group effort to attain, and likewise, everyone should pitch in to maintain its order.

Other Uses for the Family Room

There could be a center located in the family room where everyone places their items the night before so getting out of the house won’t be chaotic when morning comes. If the family room will serve as the chief place where backpacks, briefcases, laptop bags, etc. will be stored for easy access, make sure there’s a dedicated area in the family room that will neatly hold these items. And make sure every family member knows this is a temporary spot for their items and that they are expected to pick their items up in the morning. It is their responsibility to place the items there and to remove them.

Benefits of Improving the Family Room

• You have an inviting area to rest and relax and enjoy your loved ones instead of fighting for a clear space to do activities.
• Avoiding potential trip hazards when miscellaneous items are picked up off of the floor.
• Family room can continue to function to uplift the family’s comfort and relaxation.
• Family members won’t be stressed out when visitors arrive by trying to scramble at the last minute to make the room look presentable.

A functional family room can take you a long way in helping your peak performance inside and outside of the home. And establishing routines and processes to keep your home functional will keep you less stressed, more energized and efficient to be all that you can be.