Stop Procrastinating and Toss These 4 Things From Your Bathroom Today

So-So Products

If you’re like me, you love experimenting with new makeup products or nail polishes and have a tendency to purchase more than you really need. Anyone who’s ever leisurely strolled through the beauty aisles at TJ Maxx must be able to relate. Months later, you may find that you’re not using these finds as often as you’d expected or just aren’t loving their results—it happens.

Streamline your makeup bag or shelf and keep only the top performers while tossing everything else. If you have unopened products on hand that aren’t sparking joy, consider donating them or passing them along to a friend who may appreciate the chance to try something new. Plus, while $3 or $4 purchases may not seem like much here and there, you may realize that it’s the $35 concealer in your cabinet that you value the most, not the cheap mascaras or eyeshadows you’ve picked up on a whim. Make a promise to yourself to be more thoughtful with your beauty purchases moving forward so that you aren’t wasting money—or resources—on pieces that don’t serve you.

On a related note, look closely at product labels when deciding what to keep and what to toss. If you’re committing yourself to using solely “clean” beauty products, now is a good time to take inventory of what you own and determine if it’s something you feel good about slathering on your skin. Say goodbye to anything chemical-filled and open up your Notes app to start making a list of what you need to repurchase in a cleaner format. Then reward yourself post-cleanout with a mini shopping trip.

Expired Medicines

This should be a no-brainer, I know. However, we’ve all gone through our shelves to find pill bottles that should have been discarded months ago or are no longer needed based on our current lifestyles. Toss them in the trash and breathe a sigh of relief.

Next up, tackle any duplicates. I, for one, always seem to locate way too many bottles of ibuprofen in my medicine cabinet. I like to either combine all of the pills into one jar to keep at home—assuming they’re truly all the same—or scatter the bottles throughout various handbags so that I’ll always have Advil on hand when I’m on the go—you’ll thank yourself later, promise.

Now that you have more room on your shelf, place all of your other prescriptions up there as well. If you’re like me and take all of your meds or vitamins at the same time of day, you won’t want to be opening multiple drawers or cabinets as part of your routine.

Items That Make You Feel “Blah”

This right here is an all-encompassing category that covers anything from uncomfortable headbands to BB creams that don’t perfectly match your skin tone to feminine products that don’t carry their weight. The key here is simple: if you don’t enjoy using it, part with it.

You deserve to surround yourself with products that make you feel your best and won’t make your life harder. Again, this may seem obvious, but sometimes we buy things on a whim or on sale and don’t realize that they aren’t, in fact, right for us in the long run.

And on that note, part with anything that no longer serves the current you. Maybe you’ve recently gotten extensions and need to invest in thicker hair ties—go ahead and say goodbye to the flimsy ones. Maybe, like most of us, you’re traveling significantly less than usual these days. Place your airplane-sized toiletries into a cosmetic bag and hide it out of sight rather than letting these items take up precious real estate in your medicine cabinet. Out of sight, out of mind.

Actual Trash

Maybe you’ve held onto packaging from products thinking you’ll need to consult it in the future—hint: you can always take a quick photo instead—or have kept products on your shelf when they’re really 99 percent empty. Use up anything that’s past its prime and toss whatever is truly not serving you any purpose.