How to Actually Start Packing

I was out to dinner with a friend last week when she shared a familiar problem: She was moving in five days and she just couldn’t bring herself to start packing. As someone who has moved almost once a year for the past decade, I get it. Packing is a big task. There is absolutely nothing easy about taking everything single thing that you own and putting it safely into boxes. Packing is also deceiving—it always seems like it’s going to take way less time than it really does.

All of this is to say that if you are having trouble getting yourself to start packing, you are not alone. Many of us struggle with motivation when it comes to jumping over that first hurdle, which in this case is building that first box, opening that first drawer, and just diving in to an ultimately unavoidable project. And since your move is happening whether you give yourself two days to pack or two weeks, you may as well save yourself as much stress as possible and get started sooner rather than later.

There’s no magic bullet to getting the ball rolling on packing (if there was, you better bet I would tell you), but there are things that you can do to spur yourself on. Here are some of the biggest ones.

Figure out how much time you’re really going to need

Gather your supplies

Start with the smaller tasks

Do a little bit at a time

Get rid of stuff

Know when you’re out of time to procrastinate

You’re going to have to start packing eventually. Give yourself time to drag your feet, but when the time comes, be ready to hit the ground running. It might not be a fun task, but it still has to get done. Take a deep breath, grab that first box, and get to work. You’ll get it done!