Fall seven times, stand up eight. – Japanese Proverb

My dear friend Elizabeth Hagen has written a book called “Confidence: Now is Your Time” and today when I was reading it I read the quote above… and it struck me. Many times people say that they try to get organized and just can’t seem to keep it up.

Being more organized has to do with habits, not containers or labelers. It takes time to develop the habits you desire for a more organized you. Each time you feel like you have “fallen down” on your organizing, just get back to it.

Each time we begin again in our efforts at becoming more organized, we are learning what works and what doesn’t. So if your desk is a mess again, I say that’s okay. You’ve fallen and you can get up! Just keep moving forward.

I’m all about encouraging you so leave a comment and I’ll get back to you soon.

I was helping a client this week who has a beautiful home. Everything seemed to have its place and the home was very warm and inviting. I was asked to help with the home office. The office had a desk piled with papers, bills and receipts as well as boxes of more of the same tucked under the desk. I have seen much worse than this, but my client was struggling to get the home office organized and back into a functioning room. As we began to work, we talked about the reasons for the room’s unorganized state. There is always a reason behind the clutter. I am not saying this so that we can justify the clutter but to help us recognize that there is something behind the physical clutter we see. Here are a few examples of the reasons why people now have clutter when they used to be able to handle it:

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My desk can get out of hand quickly when I have a busy week. The messier it gets, the more frustrated I become. The reason for the frustration is that I cannot focus when there is clutter strewn about in my office. At the end of the day, I allow time to get things back in order.

Yesterday I found this note:

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This month we will focus on your clothes closet.  Let’s get going by looking at 10 reasons you may want (need) to organize your clothes closet.

1. You find yourself wearing the same outfits week after week
2. You can’t shut your closet door(s)
3. You can’t move your clothes hangers , it’s packed so tight in there
4. You can’t find your favorite shirt but you are sure it’s “in there somewhere”
5. Your closet rods are sagging
6. You can’t see the floor of your closet
7. There’s a layer of dust on the shoulders of some outfits
8. You can’t find the other shoe
9. You have clothes now hanging on hooks behind every door
10. You have clothes piled around your bedroom with nowhere to put them

If you can relate to any of these reasons, stay tuned for more closet clearing strategies. In fact, we’ll take a look at my closet (before and after)!

Kids School/Artwork

-        Use a lidded box, color coded per child and label

-        Use large envelopes, labeled by year and child

-        Transfer yearly papers to labeled accordion file keeper

Travel/Sightseeing Memorabilia

-        Have a journal with you to notate date, locations, and events

-        Gather tourist brochures, postcards, etc. in journal

-        Transfer to accordion file keeper, categorized by year

-        Tear pages from journal and include with memorabilia

I haven’t done a Tool Tuesday feature in a while, so here ya go!  I helped a client in her home office last week and introduced this product to her. She is a local realtor and although she had been in business for years, she felt that she needed to get “re-booted” in her office.  She felt it was cluttered, the work process didn’t flow, and her files were a mess (her words, not mine).

While we worked together for a couple of days on all aspects of her office environment, I want to tell you about the tool we used to revamp her filing system.  Based on my clients existing files, personality, and needs I recommended the FreedomFiler®.

FreedomFiler® is best known for being a self-purging file system. This system goes a long way in keeping your files organized and is very user friendly. It uses color coding to categorize odd year versus even year files as well as separating your active and yearly files from your permanent, or archive, files.

So you are determined to be more organized than ever but you don’t live by yourself… There’s your other half, the kids and maybe even a mother in law in the mix! You may be wondering how to get them organized. The answer … you can’t.  It’s like making someone love brussel sprouts (sorry mom). You cannot make someone be organized, and if you could, they certainly would not be organized the way YOU expect them to be.

Got 5 minutes?  Then you can stay organized!

When you hear the word “file”, what do you think of?  What image pops in your head?

There is actually more than one way to file your papers.  The traditional method of file folders and file drawers is only one option. You don’t have to file the way your mother did.  Choose what works for you! Here are just two other options:

1.              PileSmart® – a Pendaflex® product

Remember the Pilot from my other blog post, Three Personality Types of Paper Mania?  Well this is the product for that person.  The PileSmart® Organizer features a clear lucite tray that is open on two side.  There are 6 plastic dividers, with end and side tabs that are easily seen as you stack things vertically. The dividers are very sturdy so you can lift up a stack by the divider tab and retrieve papers when needed.  In addition to allowing you to color code your stacks, the labels on each divider are durable and are “write-and erase”, which means you can use re-use them after a stack is purged. Nifty product, huh?  You can get it online at Amazon.

2.              Binders

Yes, binders!  They are not just for school anymore… You can use binders with dividers to keep categories of paperwork manageable.  Don’t relish the thought of hole punching and/or pinched finger accidents?  That’s okay; use plastic pockets in the binders.  This will enable you to quickly “file” your papers away.  Binders can be stored on shelves, in file drawers, or archived in boxes.  You can also color code your binder, if that’s what you like to do or purchase colors that match your office décor, looking sleek and orderly on a bookcase or credenza.

These are just two options for filing the papers you keep.  Would love to hear how you manage your papers, please leave a comment.

2. Give gift receipts with your gifts and toss the original receipts.

3. Reduce junk mail by registering with DMAChoice.org.

4. Throw away those small-dollar-amount cash receipts before you even get home.

5. Call the charities you no longer support and request to be removed from their mailing list.

6. Put your magazine subscriptions on a diet.

7. Scan your recipes and get rid of the sheets of paper and recipe cards.

8. Shred your medical explanation of benefit statements after you review them.

9. Throw away those investment prospectus reports if you’ve never read them then request online copies only.

10. Eliminate the other language portions of your product manuals.