7 Products That Helped Me Get My Shit Together, And Might Help You Too

For anyone who wants to feel like slightly less of a mess.

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Hi, I’m Jasmin! I’m very into being organised but often better at thinking about getting my life together than you know, actually doing it. At the start of this year I wanted to make a more concerted effort to feel like a put-together person, and there’s a bunch of stuff that helped me along the way. Here are some of the things that I now swear by for feeling like less of a mess and more of a functioning adult.

1. A sunlight-simulating alarm clock to make early mornings more bearable.

Amazon / Via amazon.co.uk

Anyone who speaks to me for more than ten minutes will have heard about my Lumie alarm clock, that I refer affectionately to as an old friend instead of a non-sentient gadget with a light bulb in it. I could wax lyrical about the magic of Lumie all day long, but all you really need to know is that it gradually wakes you up with light in the morning, and seriously changed my sleeping habits. Part of the reason I (and probably you) have your phone by your bed is because it doubles up as your alarm clock – even if it’s counterproductive to sleep because you spend an hour in bed on an infinite scroll through Twitter. Not only does it help eliminate that habit, but waking up to a light filled room makes you feel much more awake in the morning, and just better than if you were squinting at your phone in a dark room. It made me actually get up out of bed and reformed my constantly-pressing-snooze ways. As well as helping me break up from my phone, it doubles up as a lamp and encouraged me to read or write (pretty much anything not involving screens) before bed. Plus, having used it every night for ages it took six whole months for the bulb to run out, and the replacement ones are readily available on Amazon.

Get the Lumie on Amazon here for £50.

2. An electric toothbrush for truly clean teeth.

Amazon / Via amazon.co.uk

After a year and a half of straightening my teeth with Invisalign aligners, I became pretty invested in taking good care of my teeth, and knew it was probably best to make the change from a manual to an electric toothbrush. Listen, I know people who talk about how you’ll never want to use a regular toothbrush after trying electric ones are annoying but you know what? They’re RIGHT. And while ones that cost the earth are all well and good, if you're like me and feel like its too much money to spend on teeth cleaning,you can easily get cheaper ones that do the same thing. Electric toothbrushes make you feel like an actual adult, and so very smug when you go to the dentist and they have very little to criticise about your dental hygiene. It also can't be rushed so you’re pretty much forced to stand there until the job is fully done, and to me nothing says “I have my shit together” more than people who floss every single day and actually know they've brushed their teeth for two full minutes rather than guesstimating. I opted for the Oral-B Vitality Plus Cross Action, which is £39.99 usually but I got it half price in a sale for £19.99. It comes with a brush head refill, and is a reasonable price while also powerful enough to really stop that plaque buildup at the back of your teeth.

Get the toothbrush here from Amazon for £23.16 down from £40.

3. Matching pyjamas to really separate work time and relaxation time.

Natalya Lobanova / BuzzFeed

I’ve written before about the magic of matching pyjamas and stand by it. You might be thinking but why bother, I can sleep in literally anything and you’d be right, but there’s something different about a nice set of matching pyjamas. Much like when people say “dress for the job you want”, dressing at home like a put-together person kind of automatically makes me feel like a put-together person. Plus, because they actually feel and look nice, you want to take care of them more. Wearing a baggy T-shirt and eating pasta before rocking the stained shirt to the shops is something I admittedly still do sometimes, but you can’t help but want to act a lil’ fancy when you’re wearing a flannel suit in your own home. I buy mine from the department store John Lewis – they wash well, have a good range of patterns that are nice without feeling **too much**, and feel cosy rather than scratchy.

You can get an extremely cute pair here from ASOS for £28.

4. A mini vacuum cleaner to encourage you to tidy up after yourself more.

Amazon / Via amazon.co.uk

I can’t think of these without imagining that scene from Friends where Monica vacuums her vacuum. It just felt kind of excessive to have an expensive, smaller version of a thing I already own. But as a dog owner, it turns out these are pretty much mandatory, and also great for people who just insist on eating food in bed, or are kind of messy. It gives the ~feeling~ of doing cleaning up without very much cleaning involved, and actually means I clean stuff up immediately rather than wait because I’m too lazy to go through the hassle of getting the vacuum cleaner out. And trust me, this shit is powerful. Like, seriously powerful. I’m pretty sure if i spilled a whole box of cereal it would work a charm. I use it on the sofa, the coffee table, and my jacket when my dog has decided to sit on it. If you’re simultaneously very into cleanliness but devastatingly lazy around the house, feeling a little bit in control of mess and getting rid of it on the spot makes a big difference. I went with the VAX handheld after reading reviews, and although it's pricey, it also means my sofa is (mostly) dog-hair free.

Get the vacuum cleaner here from Amazon for £38.28.

5. The Wunderlist app for getting shit done

iTunes / Wunderlist / Via itunes.apple.com

I’m a sucker for bullet journaling and nice stationery. But as much as I enjoy my many coloured highlighters, washi tape, and collection of pastel pens, the thing that actually helps me get shit done is this app. Pen and paper are great for some, and I enjoy getting my thoughts and ideas down, but realistically I’m like a lot of people who spend more time on their phone than they would looking through a journal. Wunderlist is probably one of the more straightforward to-do apps and super simple to use - set up lists under categories like “grocery” “personal” “work" etc and get a satisfying little “ping” when you cross it off. If you’re someone who has had to face the harsh reality that you don’t check your planner as much as you should, this means you at least to get to be ~productive~.

Get the app free here from iTunes or here from Google Play.

6. Digital weighing scales to help you stop accidentally making ten portions of rice.

Amazon / Via amazon.co.uk

Yes this is incredibly boring but it turns out that, unsurprisingly, knowing how much pasta you're cooking stops you accidentally making enough to feed a family of twelve when you want one portion! While with cooking I’m generally of the tried and tested “throw the stuff in, add some spices and it’ll taste good” approach, I suck at working out portion sizes. If you handed me a bucket of rice I’d probably say “yeah, seems like a good amount for one person!” and have little to no concept of serving sizes or what 100g of something looks like. While I definitely don't think measuring every single component of every single meal makes sense, it’s been a helpful tool in actually figuring out portions. Seeing as I’m usually cooking for two people at the very most, it helps stop the freezer getting filled with leftovers that may or may not ever be defrosted.

Get the weighing scales here from Amazon for £14.99.

7. The Forest app to encourage you to enjoy some sweet, screen-free time.

iTunes / Via itunes.apple.com

I’ll admit it does seem slightly counterproductive to use your phone as a way to um, stop using your phone, but I highly endorse the Forest app to pretty much everyone. In terms of being actually productive and getting shit done, my biggest time-suck is refreshing the same three apps over and over again on my phone expecting them to be different than they were twelve seconds ago. While I think having a bit of scrolling time is a good way to kill the wait at a dentist appointment or waiting for a bus, sometimes you want to feel ~present~, and if you've already tried turning off push notifications only to to find it made little difference, this is much more effective. Plant a little tree, set a time for how long you can use your phone for, and get on with whatever you're meant to be doing or else your adorable plant will die! If you sometimes feel the creeping horror of accidentally spending half an hour reading a Facebook argument between people you went to school with, it helps to actually make you stick to what you want to do, and reclaim a bit of your time. At the very least, it’ll mean you’re not that person compulsively checking their phone when they’re out.

Get the Forest app for £1.99 here from iTunes or here from Google Play.