If you're reading this, you probably want to rearrange your room and learn to optimize the space you have available. Unfortunately, this post will only show you how to run from your messy habits faster than I run from my fears and regrets. If you can't make it as a minimalist, you can at least convince your friends and family that you're a minimalist in the making. Why waste time throwing away or donating things you no longer want? That sounds like a lot of work.

1. Move Things Around. A Lot.

Your car is a great place to start. Remember the countless pairs of socks that got divorced when one had a hole worn through the toe? Cram those in the glove box, you don't want to see them, but you may find a matching sock one day. Give some away if you ever get pulled over.

If you run out of trunk space for your winter clothes, you can always stuff your clothes under someone else's bed. If you fill up this space, consider using any available kitchen cabinets as a backup. If you ever get caught and confronted for invading the privacy of your roommate, parents, or whoever's bed space you're sharing, let them know that it's more than a semi-secret storage space right in your home. You're also protecting that person from monsters that would be under their bed. If they still press you to take your things back, you may want to consider hiring a scary clown to hide under their bed and show them the value of your storage choices and the consequences of their questioning you.

2. Get Creative With Your Surroundings.

There's a lot of open space in your room that you don't typically think about. If you have a bunch of stray cables and chargers in a junk drawer, get some thumbtacks and hang them up! Your walls have ears, and it's time that you plug them up. All of them. Your books do not need shelves, they need command strips. Your laptop is now a wall-mounted monitor. Congratulations. Your bed has been replaced by a sleeping bag tacked to your door with nails. This is your life now.

3. Your Best Friend, the Trash Can.

The trash can is a wonderful place to put the things you want to reuse. It's more free storage, a place you can keep all the things your mom told you was "junk" or "gross." You need a place to store the craft scraps that you might eventually use, and you can flavor your pretzels with that old hummus you forgot about three weeks ago. Nothing goes to waste when you have student loans, even your Frappuccino receipts might make for a good napkin after you toss it in.

4. Your Closet Will Eat You.

I'm not telling you how to hide your crap this time. I'm warning you to stay away from your closet. Your closet will eat you. It might be a year from now, it could be tomorrow. It has taken all your old stuffed animals, clothes, and loved ones. Do not use your closet. Ever.