How To Create A Calm Office Space

This coming year will mark my 14th (!) year as an entrepreneur, and over this stretch I have learned two things regarding home work spaces. First, it’s crucial to carve out your own work space, especially if you work full-time at home. We have lived in 3 homes since I left academia and in the first, our guest room/office became Laurel’s nursery, after which point I worked at the dining room table. In our second home, I upgraded to a dedicated work desk but it was in a corner of the dining room, which obviously wasn’t ideal. Finally, when we moved to our current home, my only requirement was that I had my own office space with a door that closed. When Violet was born, I was like, “Nope, not giving up my office. The girls will share a room!”

The second thing I have learned is that it’s harder to work when your office is a dumpster fire. Obviously, this makes sense—a clean space inspires calm—but oftentimes when work gets crazy busy so does my office; it pretty much looks like a dump truck backed up to my window and emptied its contents onto my floor. Case in point (photos below): my office over the holidays. #reallife

While these photos are the opposite of the curated Internet work/lifestyle photography, I decided to document this mess as a way to hold myself accountable to creating a calmer office space—because I have some major things I want to accomplish in 2020 and I know that a clean, calm office space will help my creative juices churn. So today, in partnership with eco-friendly home goods purveyor Full Circle, I wanted to share 7 quick steps to create a calm office. Seriously, my office transformation did not take long and I am so happy!

1. Clear out the clutter

As you may be able to discern from the above photos, there is all manner of clutter, including stuff—like gift wrapping supplies—that doesn’t belong in my office but got shoved in there when we hosted Christmas. There’s also crap like junk mail, clothes that doesn’t belong there, and random empty boxes I hadn’t yet broken down. So, the first high impact step is to clear out the clutter; put things where they belong and toss items into the trash or recycling. Seriously, it took me maybe 10 minutes to clear out most of the mess here.

2. Clean off your desktop

When I originally set up this office, I wanted a nice, big open workspace to invite creativity and when the desk is clean, I feel so happy and calm! And when it’s a mess, it feels the opposite! Get rid of all the unnecessary items on your desktop and then give your desk a good wipedown to remove dust and coffee rings; I use these Full Circle pulp friction dusting cloths; get them a little wet to help pick up dust and dirt then toss them into the laundry!

How to create a calm office space in 7 simple steps

3. Tackle the dust bunnies

Another quick, high impact step to make your office calmer is dusting. I love Full Circle’s dust whisperer to quickly get at the windows and up-high spaces—and it’s also great to get at all of the fake plants in my office!—the clean team dustpan and brush set for the floor, and the tiny team dustpan + brush for harder-to-reach spaces, like around the bases of furniture.

4. Take out the trash and recycling

Now that you have the big clutter and dust under control, take out your trash and recycling. I’m not too proud to say that the above office shots actually looked one step WORSE because they were taken after Jon voluntarily took out my trash. The trash and recycling were both ridiculously overflowing. Yuck.

5. Tame cord clutter

Another simple, high impact office calming tactic is taming cord clutter. Just grab twist ties, ribbon, or rubber bands to get the job done.

6. Clean your keyboard

You know what also gets gross in a hurry in my office? My keyboard. And I spend a lot of time at it, which makes the grossness extra gross. Take a few minutes to spruce up your keyboard with Full Circle’s ctrl alt clean. It’s a 3-in-1 tool with a keyboard brush + detail nib tool that snaps into a microfiber screen cloth. SERIOUSLY LIFE CHANGING.

7. Treat your senses

I don’t believe that essential oils cure [insert any number of conditions...] but they sure do smell good! I have a number of different oils to feed into my diffuser depending on my mood. Flip on the good smells and a nice, calm playlist (I fire up acoustic covers when I’m working) and you will be good to go!

All of these ideas are so simple and quick that you may even feel compelled to declutter that dreaded catch-all junk drawer. Here’s to a 2020 with clean, calm office spaces; here are the “after” pictures!

And if listening/watching is easier for you to process, here’s a companion video to this post!

Disclosure: This post reflects a compensated editorial partnership with Full Circle, purveyor of amazing eco-friendly home care products. I fell in love with their products last year and have been an avid user ever since!