Our lives tend to accumulate clutter in every corner: on our desks, in our drawers, on our shelves at home, in our closets, on our computer — you name it, and clutter finds a way to fill every available space.

But having a simple, uncluttered life is possible, with some very simple methods.

Devote a little of your time to tossing clutter from your life, and keeping things relatively clutter-free, and you’ll be rewarded with much more pleasing living spaces, with a less stressful life, and with better organization and productivity. Clutter weighs us down, distracts us, brings chaos into our lives.
Let’s look at some ways to kick it out … for good.

1. Your desk
   If your desk is covered in paper and other clutter, clear it off to create a pleasing work environment. the steps here are the basic decluttering steps we’ll follow for many of the other steps below: 
   • Clear everything off: Take everything off your desk and put it in a pile on the floor. Clear out the drawers too, if you have time. The only things that should be on your desk now are the computer, phone and other similar equipment.
   • clean: Wipe down your desk, and clean your drawers if you’re decluttering them too. It’s good to start with clean surfaces.
   • Sort: OK, here’s the meat of the process: sort through your stuff, one pile at a time. Toss out or route as much as possible, so that what you’re left with is a relatively small amount of stuff. If you won’t be using it again in the near future, or if you can access it on the computer, toss it out.
   • Designate homes: Now you get to place everything back in your desk. Set up a simple alphabetical filing system, with one folder for each project or client. Have drawers for your office supplies and other stuff. With less stuff to organize, it shouldn’t be too hard. Be sure to have a place designated for everything, and keep things in those places. Sometimes it helps to label, so you don’t forget.
   • Leave flat surfaces clear: Don’t put stuff on top of your desk. Have an inbox for all incoming papers, and then sort them each day and either toss, delegate, do them immediately, or file all documents, so nothing remains on top of your desk. The only thing that should be on your desk is your computer, phone, inbox, perhaps a family photo, and the documents you’re working on right now.
2. Files
   If you decluttered your files in the above step, you can skip this, although you should declutter not only your work files but your home files as well. Keep a simple alphabetical system, and try to fit everything in one drawer. It’s good to take out all your files, and purge what you don’t need. Many times that can be half of your files or more. Get rid of as much as possible — most times, we keep copies of stuff we’ll never need again. When you’re done purging, you should have a minimum of files, and it shouldn’t be hard to keep organized.
3. information
   In today’s digital world, there are tons of ways that information comes into our lives — and it can be overwhelming. It’s information clutter — we get too much of it. Instead, set certain times of the day when you check email, your RSS feeds, Facebook, or various forums or other things you read daily. Reduce the number of things you read each day — purge anything that doesn’t give you value, reduce your consumption of news and television, get rid of magazine subscriptions. Keep information to a bare minimum, and only check it at certain times of the day instead of letting it rule your life.
4. Computer
   Purge your computer files, getting rid of stuff you don’t need. Clear your desktop of icons — they slow your computer down, create visual clutter, and are an inefficient way to access files, programs or folders. Set up hotkeys with AutoHotKey or similar programs. With online search tools (such as that in Gmail) and programs such as Google Desktop, you don’t need to keep your files in a complex array of directories and subdirectories — just archive, and search later. Purge old, unneeded files at least every month or two.
5. Closets
   Use the same method for your closets as you did with your desk: clear everything out, clean it out, sort (and toss or donate as much as possible), and designate homes for what you decided to keep. Keep only what you love and use often. I recommend keeping your closet floor clear — it makes everything look nicer. If tackling the entire closet is too intimidating, it can be helpful to just tackle one area of your closet a day, until it’s done. It’s also useful to go through your wardrobe, and donate everything you haven’t worn in 6 months — it greatly simplifies your closet.
6. Rooms
   Are the rooms in your house too cluttered? A few rules about simplifying a room: first, start with anything that’s stacked on the floors; then work to the flat surfaces (tables, shelves, countertops, the tops of dressers, etc.) and clear them completely if possible; then do the larger stuff like furniture and other things that clutter the room; and finally tackle drawers and cabinets and closets. As much as possible, keep floors clear and all flat surfaces. Sort through everything in piles as in the first step above, tossing and donating as much as possible. Organize everything else in drawers and closets and cabinets, out of sight but still neat and uncluttered. Tackle one room at a time, going for a clean, uncluttered, simple, minimalist look in all cases. It can be helpful to continually edit a room once you’re done decluttering — you can always find little ways to make a room simpler.
7. Drawers
   The way to declutter a drawer is the same as outlined above: empty everything out, clean the drawer, sort through the pile of stuff from the drawer (purging as much as possible) and organizing the few things left. Keep like things together — a drawer for office supplies should only be for office supplies. Avoid having a junk drawer — everything should have a designated place. Go through one drawer at a time — don’t jump from one drawer to another.
8. Commitments
   Aside from physical clutter, our lives are often way too cluttered by the things we need to do — at work, at home, in our civic or religious lives, with our hobbies, with friends and family, etc. Go through each area of your life, and write down every commitment you have — from things you’ve volunteered or agreed to do on a regular basis, to meetings and sports games and other things you do every month or week. It can be overwhelming. 

   Now examine each one, and decide if it truly gives you joy and value in your life, and whether it’s worth the time you commit to it. It can be useful to just choose a few of the commitments that your really love doing. Get rid of all the rest. Just call people and tell them your schedule is too busy, and you have to decline. Learn to say no! One by one, eliminate the commitments in your life that don’t give you value, and you’ll have more time to do the stuff that’s really important to you — stuff for yourself, or your loved ones.

9. Routines
   It is extremely useful to examine your daily and weekly routines. Often, we don’t have any set routines, and we tackle our chores, regular tasks, and obligations haphazardly. This leads to chaotic days and weeks, and often a drop in productivity. It’s better to batch like tasks together — do all your errands at once, for example, or all your laundry at once instead of throughout the week. Write down all of your weekly and daily obligations, chores, tasks, etc. and plan out a weekly and daily routine. Post it up where you can see it and try to follow it, at least for a week. It could bring some calmness and simplicity to your life that hadn’t been there before. Be sure to schedule time for decluttering in your weekly routine!
10. Systems
    Once you’ve purged clutter from your life, it will inevitably start to creep back in. To keep from having a cluttered life again, you need to set up systems that will keep the clutter to a minimum. Examine how you do things, how things come into your life, and see if you can create a simple system for everything: chores, laundry, paperwork, email, RSS feeds, yardwork, errands, work projects, filing. And then write down your systems, step by step, and try to follow them. If your systems are set up right, you will continually purge clutter you don’t need. For example, a system for paperwork might look like this: 
    • All incoming papers go in inbox.
    • At the end of each day, inbox is processed.
    • Rules for processing: toss, route, file, do, or write on to-do list to do later and put it in “action file”.
    • Process to empty, leaving no papers in inbox or on desk. Clear desk of any working paper

Source: DumbLittleMan

Don’t try to hide your addiction to singing in the shower — embrace it with the Kohler Moxie speaker Showerhead ($200). This clever piece of bathroom hardware embeds a speaker in the middle of a full-spray showerhead. and not just any speaker — a Bluetooth-compatible speaker that lets you recharge it on the counter, snap it back into the showerhead using the embedded magnets, and play music wirelessly from your phone or tablet. Just don’t forget to clean yourself up while you’re at it. Source:Kohler Moxie Speaker Showerhead

Hurricane Sandy hits Manhattan and hits it hard!

Gone are the days of lying around in a haze listening to vinyl. In the future, some of us may rock out with robots to enjoy Music.

by Christopher MacManus

June 27, 2012 7:12 AM PDT

at first glance, Shimi appears to be a spiritual successor to Rolly, Sony’s egg-shaped musical robot from 2008.

(Credit: Georgia Tech)

The soundsmiths at Georgia Tech’s Center for Music Technology this week revealed Shimi, a 1-foot-tall musical robot that aims to serve as a musical assistant.

Created by center director Gil Weinberg, Shimi’s dual-speaker visage bobs its “head” and taps its hand/foot to the beat of a song while a range of features become available after docking anAndroid smartphone. Weinberg co-developed Shimi in collaboration with the Media Innovation Lab at IDC Herzliya, led by professor Guy Hoffmann.

For example, the pint-size Shimi utilizes facial recognition through the front-facing camera of an Android phone to position its speakers toward the listener for optimal sound. A summary of the device from Georgia Tech mentions a unique song selection method: “If the user taps or claps a beat, Shimi analyzes it, scans the phone’s musical library and immediately plays the song that best matches the suggestion.”

Other compelling features coming to Shimi include gesture recognition for playback/volume control and the ability to recommend music based on the active song.

Related stories

• Google says California legislators could drive away robotic cars
• Geeking out on hardware is not just about robots anymore
• Robot cranks out 2,500 sushi pieces per hour

New start-up robotic toy company Tovbotannounced plans to sell Shimi to consumers in 2013 for an undisclosed price. We spotteda conceptual image of the commercial version of Shimi on the Tovbot Web site. Attendees of the Google I/O conference in San Francisco can check out Shimi during the after-hours party at Moscone Center tonight.

Take a peek at Weinberg’s previous robot named Shimon, an “autonomous, marimba-playing, octopus-armed hipster,” according to fellow CNET writer Tim Hornyak.

 

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Karanvir Singh:Stretching the potential of the material and manufacturing processes to the extreme, a young British designer greatly influenced by automotive Design from an early age, Jules Sturgess, has launched a range of luxury carbon fiber composite furniture. The designer has pushed the already extraordinary properties of carbon fiber, resulting in bespoke furniture pieces that seemingly defies the laws of physics and has been influenced by the structural design and advanced materials and manufacturing processes used in the world of racing and supercars. Interestingly, the limited edition, handcrafted, carbon furniture items, including the Marea, Amaca, Monolito Megalito, to name a few, has been created through the combination of ultramodern design practices and materials, with traditional handcrafting skills. However, it’s not new to see the furniture crafted out of carbon fiber, as we have earlier seen the contemporary carbon furniture by Mast 3.0 and the carbon fiber chair by Timothy Schreiber.

 

carbon fibre furniture from British Designer Jules Sturgess

 

 

Available at a price of $23,380, Marea is the first furniture piece in the carbon-fiber collection, which has been inspired by the idea of the human form in suspension and the single motion of a brush stroke.

 

carbon fibre furniture from British Designer Jules Sturgess

To best describe, it’s a sleek chaise lounge that strikes a perfect blend of fluid beauty and innate strength. Though, it’s just 4mm thick at its edge, but it possesses the capability to sustain great weight.

 

carbon fibre furniture from British Designer Jules Sturgess

Built up of two separate carbon sections that are anchored together at the critical strain point by a central titanium hub, Marea, weighing 17kg, is almost invisible when viewed from the side, taking the traditional form of three chaise lounge to a cantilevered extreme, both from an aesthetic and functional point of view.

 

carbon fibre furniture from British Designer Jules Sturgess

And, for those who wish to personalize further, designer Jules Sturgess also offers full bespoke finishing. But, this chaise lounge is only limited to 50 individual pieces, and each piece is carefully crafted by hand from 22 layers of three different weaves of carbon fiber layered at 45 degree angles to build in both longitudinal and transverse flexural strength.

 

carbon fibre furniture from British Designer Jules Sturgess

Notably, the furniture piece is only made to order, and no two will ever be the same.

 

carbon fibre furniture from British Designer Jules Sturgess

Another piece of furniture is Monolito and Megalito; dramatically cantilevered and spanning three and a half meters, it also appear to defy the laws of physics, and is just 5 mm thick at their tips. With production limited to just 25 individually numbered examples, a full customization service is also provided.

 

Monolito and Megalito

Inspired by the hammock, another furniture piece, the Amaca chaise is inherently very comfortable as it only has one hard point (under the legs) the rest of the body is suspended in a reclined sling that conforms perfectly to the body’s shape.

 

Amaca

Via: JulesSturgess

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mobile devices have changed the day-to-day workplace routine for many people. However, that doesn’t mean we’ve completely removed paper from the equation. This is where the clipboard+ accessory comes in, a new Kickstarter project whose creators are now looking for funding.

Created by a team of Penn State students, Clipboard+ came about because of the frustrations associated with using smartphone technology to aid in doing work on paper. The result is an all-in-one solution that works simultaneously with mobile technology and the traditional pen, paper, and clipboard.

Clipboard+ is available in two varieties: iPad and Smartphone.

The first, which works with both the iPad 2 and new iPad, is made of lightweight anodized aluminum and includes a cushioning foam liner.

Clipboard+ iPad

Clipboard+ iPad features include:

• With a simple flip, Clipboard+ iPad allows for an effortless transition between working with paper on the clipboard side to working with your iPad on the backside.
• Paper and iPad together in one package means that you never have to carry both again.
• Sleek design encourages easy storage and transportation
• Holes at the top of the clipboard allow for attachment of a shoulder strap for maximum portability and use of both hands.

The Clipboard+ Smartphone, meanwhile, fits any smartphone or case with a flat, non-porous rear surface. It includes an industrial strength suction cup that maintains a firm grip on the device. Additionally, the phone can be oriented both horizontally and vertically.

Clipboard+ Smartphone

According to Clipboard+ founder, Kevin Merlini:

After a lot of hard work, mistakes, and learning experiences along the way we were able to nail down the design and manufacturing processes for Clipboard+.

You can get your hands on a Clipboard+ Smartphone accessory with a pledge of $20. For $40, you’ll receive a Clipboard + iPad. Additional levels of support are also available.

The Clipboard+ team hopes to raise $10,000 by July 18 in order to get the project into production.

Take a look:

Popout

The Clipboard+ looks like a functional, yet inexpensive solution for anyone that needs an iDevice and a clipboard to get their job done.

For more information on Clipboard+ be sure to visit their Kickstarter page or their official site.

The Clipboard+ Accessory Launches On Kickstarter is a story by AppAdvice.com

AppAdvice – iPhone, iPad, iPod, App Reviews + News

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