STYLE Savvy: Do You Really Want to do That?

Lisa Hess rethinks the wisdom of the status quo, especially where home safety is concerned.

It started with a garden-variety, run-of-the-mill white plastic bin from Target. I’d managed to cram quite a lot of notebooks into it and, it was only when I reached up to pull it down from the shelf (which was literally over my head) that I realized how easy it would be for all those notebooks to come tumbling down on me.

There’s nothing quite like coming face to face with a glaring example of something that might not be such a great idea to inspire change.

So, I dug in, seeking a better solution.

Honesty is the Best Policy

When it comes to organizing, we need to be honest with ourselves. Will we really go through all the steps necessary to put an item in that out-of-the-way home we’ve designated for it, or do we need a simpler solution? Is that organizer that keeps surfacing in our social media feed, promising to “fix” all our organizing woes really a good fit for our styles, or is it an attractively packaged waste of money? Will we actually access that step stool to get to the high shelf, or will we simply take our chances because standing on tiptoe will save us ten seconds and isn’t really likely to backfire?

Being honest with ourselves about what we will and won’t do (and ditching the guilt when the truthful answer is that we won’t) is what helps us to identify and embrace our styles and create solutions that are workable, sustainable, and safe.

Same Styles, Different Execution

Which brings me back to those notebooks. Was that overstuffed, slightly too heavy bin really the best way to store them?

Not really. Although the bin’s open top fit my drop and run organizational style and the lattice pattern and label on the side worked for my I need to see it personal style, the bin itself was a solution that made sense for a younger me. (Ouch!) For current me, it makes much more sense to split those notebooks up and put them into smaller, more manageable containers.

The good news is that this wasn’t really a concession to age — it was just a better choice. Why fish through the whole bin for a spiral-bound book when I could simply store all the spiral-bound notebooks in one container and all the bound notebooks in another? (Yes, I have a lot of notebooks. In fact, I decided that I’m cut off. No more notebooks for a very long time.)

Now, in that same space in my cabinet, two smaller, labeled boxes have replaced the white bin. And I really don’t need the step stool to access them.

What Does This Have to Do with STYLE?

So, what does all this have to do with STYLE? While changing up our plans connects to the “S” (start with successes) and the “Y” (yes, it has a home) of the acronym, its best connection is to the ultimate goal of organizing by STYLE: Easy upkeep. If we have to drag things out from the depths of a high (or low) cabinet, crawl through a crawlspace to access them, or risk a concussion to get a notebook, that’s decidedly not easy upkeep.

Most of us have multiple goals when it comes to organizing: being able to find what we need when we need it and creating clear spaces are two of the more common ones. Implicit in all our plans, though, is the need to keep ourselves safe and sane whether we’re putting something away or retrieving it.

And sometimes, that means looking at things in a new way.

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Copyright 2026 Lisa Hess
Images: Canva