Moving usually goes like this: the initial excitement of finding the perfect place, the planning, packing and exploring. Then, the inevitable decline, moving starts to become a burden - your on a time crunch, you have more things than anticipated and so you are desperately gathering suitcases and bin liners. Moving not fun anymore, its stressful and infuriating. Then is Moving Day, a long, gruelling day full of heavy-lifting and being anxious. Your hoping that everything goes to plan and tossing your fingers that nothing breaks. In the end, when all is said and done, you are sitting down in you new home, reminiscing on the past few weeks or months, or even years. Then you come back to reality, you need to settle into your new abode, you need to deal with jobs, pets, kids, forwarding mail, all this while the broadband provider says they can’t get you internet for another week.
With all this, it is not hard to understand why moving is stressful or most people. It’s either you stressed about your move or someone else is.
With that said, moving is not all doom and misery. In many ways, its quite exiting and certain personality types may even love the moving experience - the planning and the change. Moving is not all that bad and shouldn’t be looked at as a horrible experience if done well. But, if you are overwhelmed by the stress of moving, or even if you just want to better your experience, follow these tips.
1 - Stay Organised, Organisation is Key.
Basic organisation such as sorting and labelling your boxes may seem obvious, but doing this from the start and prioritising it can save you from a headache in the long run.
2 - Get some Sleep, Don’t overwork Yourself!
When there is so much to do and so little time to do it, it’s very easy to overworks yourself and forget how important sleep is. One thing you have to consciously note to yourself is that depriving yourself of sleep is a direct contributor to stress. Prioritise sleep as moving is quite mentally and physically tasking and sleep can help you reset and make your hours awake a little more worthwhile. Allow yourself the privilege of a good night’s sleep and you’ll find that you will be a lot less stressed and a lot more resourceful.
3 - Start small, Don’t Overwhelm Yourself!
Start small, start with the little things like the clothes you don’t wear and items on your shelves. Books on your bookshelf, the items in a kitchen drawer, just to make some progress. This will help you get into the loop of it and just start packing. Focus on the small things and build up to dismantling furniture and booking a moving service..
4 - Throw away clutter.
Clutter will only stress you out, luring you into disarray and perpetuating the illusion of chaos, making you ultimately feel anxious and uneasy. For many people, CD’s, books they will never read, paperwork they don’t need to keep and things like old bedsheets that need replacing make up a lot of what they are packing. This can contribute to you feeling overwhelmed for something that is not worth getting stressed over. Sell things you don’t want to keep but still have value; throw things away if you can’t donate or sell them and donate things you won’t sell or throw away.
5 - Don’t be hard on yourself, Be Kind to Yourself!
Take breaks, spend time with family and friends, go for a walk, eat out, treat yourself. Moving shouldn’t hinder you from doing the things that you love, the things that make you happy. Anxiety is prevalent in new homeowners, things often don’t go to plan and run as smoothly as they hope. Enjoying your life as normal does help alleviate some of that anxiety and pressure.
6 - Plan Ahead, Book the services you need in Advance!
Storage facilities, man and van services, furniture recycling, packing services, book these services in advance and order things such as packing boxes, various containers, anything you will need to buy during the moving process, order it in advance. There is no harm booking services in advance, all it means is that you put less stress on your later self and avoid scrambling at the last second for a _______ company with a slot available. Ordering supplies in advance helps you be sure what you ordered is sufficient for your move - you ordered 20 boxes but you find out you need 30 - you have time to order more and so there is no need for short-notice improvisation.