You might be surprised how much paper clutter you have in your home. It wasn’t until my youngest finished high school, did I realise that I have kept all her high school books. She isn’t going to need them and at the end of the day no one is going to read them again, they have become a large pile of paper clutter that I need to destroy.

Whilst sorting through my desk, I have kept many pieces of paper, with the thought of the hard work that went into producing the work; whether it is notes from my university courses or notes from articles I have written, the paperwork is mounting and at some point I need to tame this clutter.

Removing the paper clutter

It is important that you guard against identity theft; you might always hear about it happening to other people, but it can happen to you. I have witnessed at first-hand, the horror of someone realising that someone else was using their address.

It takes time to clear up these thefts and in the meantime you have to live, this isn’t as easy as it might sound. By doing all that you can to protect your identity is important; this includes destroying mail that comes into your home, not just placing in the bin.

You must at the very least be ripping up the details; ideally, a shredder will do this job for you ensuring that any potential threat from an identity theft is kept at bay. I go one-step further and make paper blocks for my fire from all the junk mail and paper clutter that I have around my home.

These are simple to make and just require shredded or ripped up paper that has been soaking for a week and placing this into a block press. You need to compress as much liquid from each block and then allowing them to dry naturally before burning. The drying process is obviously slower if you make these in the winter, but in the summer they can dry out pretty quickly and I save them up for winter burning.

This method reduces the amount of material that I would need to buy to use on my fire, saving me money in the long-term. So for me, when I see junk mail come through the door I know that I will recycle it and save myself money too.

It is surprising how much paper clutter you can collect; proper storage of this will ensure that you are keeping it under control, but when it does become a burden make sure that you take the necessary steps that can combat the situation before it becomes overwhelming.

There is a need to ensure that any paper coming into the home has a place, it is only when it is in the correct place should you ever put it down. Well, that is the theory but seldom works, so keeping an eye on the paper clutter will help to reduce it before it becomes overwhelming.