From Old and Ugly to New and Beautiful

The transformation of my bedroom office continues! Now that I am absolutely ecstatic with the layout of my bedroom and not minding the intrusion of my desk in the room, I figured a little updating was in order.

I have been using a little tiny 4'ft table as my desk. It's short enough to fit inbetween my bed and the window seat, but it is hideously ugly! It had that faux wood finish and it was peeling off everywhere and I just couldn't handle it any more. So today, I ran out to Target and found a beautiful wrapping paper that would look nice with my bed. Then I hopped on over to Staples and grabbed a clear desk protector to place over the wrapping paper. This way it wouldn't get all nasty when I worked at the desk.

A simple cut, some double sided sticky tape and a pretty hat box later I have a beautiful new desk that makes my room look stunning!

Inside of the hat box, which I also picked up at Target, I have my headset for my podcasts, the cord for my camera and iPod and an extra headset for my phone. :o) It is PERFECT! Plus, it is a fantastic extension of my gorgeous bed!

With Organization Comes Reward

Yesterday, I bought myself flowers! Yep, a full dozen of golden roses just for little ol' me! Other than the fact that I deserve to have fresh flowers, the reason behind the glorious beauty is none other than I earned those babies!

This past week and a half has been a busy one! I went out of town with a couple of girlfriends, I bought a new car, I rearranged my bedroom, I organized my new little office space, I cleaned the apartment, the kids had spring break, my son turned 10, we went bowling and to the movies, finalized my trip to Scotland, spoke to an old friend and I still had to find time to help a client out with her Outlook calendar and work! All of that in the last 10 days! I sure as hell deserved the roses!

The main obstacle I set out to complete and one that has been driving me insane, kept me from getting a GREAT nights sleep, and one that nearly disabled my poor organizational empowered brain was my bedroom and the make shift office that has violated my space.

Talk about disabling! My room was no longer a sanctuary instead it was turned into a living nightmare and one that kept me from feeling at peace when I went to bed. I couldn't work at my desk, I couldn't sleep peacefully in my bed, and it was driving me nuts!

So I decided to take a bit of my own advice and reorganize my space. (Hmm, an organizer who organizes? Who would have thunk?) Sunday, the kids were off at their Dad's for Easter and I stayed at home and dug into the mess of my desk.

One of the things that was driving me insane about my bedroom was the fact that instead of looking at the gorgeous bed I have, you saw the nasty desk and computer monitor. Not that it was right in front, it was just dark and depressing and it drew your eye.

I also had an issue with space...I had very little! My bed is ginormous (a word I love to make up and use) and it leaves little for anything else. However, there was a 4 and a half foot space and a window seat that was on the side of the bed in the corner. I decided to squash my desk up against my bed, put the end table lamp on my desk and use the window seat as extra space for my printer.

On the wall that used to house my nightmare of destruction, I put a tall skinny table with my beautiful roses on it!

Sunday night I slept like a dream!

The best part is, now when you walk into my room, my desk is hidden behind all of the big poofy pillows that are on my bed and you don't even notice the computer monitor because your eye is following the nose and the warm scent of roses in bloom!

If you are finding that you are completely overwhelmed, unmotivated, not sleeping, not wanting to even look into the laundry room, take a few hours to yourself and really clean out, rearrange and organize your space. It is amazing what a few hours can do for your emotional well being. Besides, it's a great excuse to buy yourself something nice!

Happy Organizing!

Suzanne Babb

Playing Catch Up

Regardless of whether or not you have just come back from vacation, a long holiday or out being sick as a dog, playing catch up can take a lot of your time and force you to either slow down or drop the ball on important tasks. Me included.

Despite the crazy insanity of life in general, it has been a long holiday weekend complete with my being sick as a dog. There were definitely times where I wished whole heartedly for someone to take me out in the back 40 and put me out of my misery. I bit melodramatic, yes, but still I hate being sick.

So here I am on a Sunday trying to play catch up from the last several weeks, talk about not fun! Thank goodness the kids are at their dad's house and I have a quiet day all by my little lonesome to put things in perspective.

Just what is the best way to get through all of the unread emails, the pilings of to do's and missed deadlines? (Fist, you yawn and then grab your nearest caffeine fix...Route 44 Coke I love you!)

1. Start with the voicemails. Listen and log them into the Voicemail Log Book.
2. Since it's Sunday, I am going to respond to the voicemails via email for those I have email addresses for. The others will wait until tomorrow.
3. Tackle the email overload. I NEVER have over 50 emails in my inbox. Today, I have 253. Yikes!
4. I go through and do a quick Flag of the ones that are important and print them, read my little funnies and forward or delete, and then get down to business.
5. For the ones that I can do a quick reply and dump, I do those first. I like the quick and easy when I start my catch up. As soon as I replied to them, I either delete the email or file it away in their respective email folder.
6. Next, I sort my emails by Sender. This allows me to look for the emails from my clients and then if they are action items, which they typically are, I print them. (Yes, I know, I am killing trees...deal with it. No one thinks twice about it when they blow their nose, I am not going to worry about it when it comes to making mula.)
7. Once I have my client emails printed, I file them into their respective files and get them out of my inbox.
8. Pretty much, that leaves me with some misc. emails that I am waiting for response on or need at a later date. I do keep these in my inbox, but that is my preference. If you have another system for monitored emails, by all means use your system of choice.
9. Woo hoo! I am now down to 19 emails in my inbox and a pile of paper in my printer!
10. Personally, I LOVE dealing with things on paper. I go through the printed emails and sort them by priority for each client.
11. I then make a list of what I need to do in my Master To Do List. It's a bit repetitive, but it works for me and I certainly like it that way. This way I have a back up of what I need to do...just in case.
12. Since I have been out of commission for a while, I like to send over a recap to my clients letting them know that I am back in the saddle and here is what I have on the list to do for them and make sure that nothing has changed or anything added. This helps me make sure I am not wasting my time, energy or efforts on a project that doesn't need to be completed any more. Plus, it makes them feel better that I have everything that needs to be done and they don't have to worry about it.

The only thing left to do is the actual "To Do's". It just makes me feel so much better knowing that I have a plan and I know what is actually going on in my little life again. So, for the next 3 hours I am going to shut down the phone, get ready for tomorrow's appointments and try and get all of these to do's done!

*Side Note: Of course, if you use your Outlook Task List, just drag the email to your Task List icon in your email and it will automatically populate the Task for you. You just need to put in the pertinent information. :o)

Distractions and More Distractions

"How in the world can I work when I have a slew of distractions? I can't concentrate, I can't focus, I just don't feel motivation to get things done like I used to."

Of those of you readers who are in the professional organizing field, how often do hear this? Almost every time you walk into a newbie's home when they first start out or make the transition to home office from cubicle?

Or how about those of you in the corporate world who honestly believe that there is no way anyone can be productive working from home. There is laundry to do, Oprah to watch, dishes calling out your name, snackies in the kitchen and oh no, it's time for the holiday shopping to begin as if you are REALLY going to be working.

Well, folks, I have some news for you! Those words above are ME! And I type them as I sit in my OUTSIDE-OF-THE-HOME OFFICE! I think I am border line hating my new digs. It is pretty, it is functional, it is the most uninspiring setting I have ever been in and I have been in quite a few home office situations! I had more fun in the dining room I converted into an office when I first started out then I am right now.

So for those of you who think that being productive and working from home is a bunch of fooey I kindly say, "Go jump off of a bridge because this sucks!" I used to love sitting in front of my window and looking out at our boring front gate, here I have a lovely courtyard to enjoy and I close the blinds because I feel like a fish in an aquarium. I loved blaring my Josh Groban favs as I hurriedly typed out blog posts, proposals, assessements, eBook, podcasts and whatever else I could keep my little fingers busy doing. Callling on the phone and talking to past clients and associates was so much fun! We could laugh and be silly and set up a time to get together for lunch. Now I have to be careful of how loud I get because what if someone comes in? And they do!

As for the whole misleading concept that you will gain weight if you work from home because the kitchen is just down the hall, well, go eat another cookie because I have gained almost 10 pounds since I moved into this joint! AND my Coke intake has been cut in half so go figure that one!

The worst little aspect of working from our new offices that I have found is that I now have to admit that "mom was right". Sorry, Mom, but I'm shuddering uncontrollably and getting creative with my foul explentives at that new found realization.

So what is a girl to do? She does what she tells all of her clients to do!

This weekend I just may redesign my office. Move my desk around, maybe I'll bring back my L-Shaped desk so I feel nice and cozy and all wrapped up. I have a great headset at home that I use for my podcasts and the sound is incredible, so maybe I'll use those to listen to "Remember" by cutie-patootie Josh Groban. Oh I'll remember you, baby! ;o) And I'll just have myself a little bit of a change of scenery! I think I may even back myself into the corner. I have recently discovered that I do better with a closed in atmosphere at my back. How ironic is that? Especially since I am very claustrophobic. Who knew?!

As for the chit chat...the hell with it. It's my office and I do pay the rent so why shouldn't I have a good time talking on the phone!?

If you find yourself in a similar situation regardless of whether or not you are at home, stuck in a cube, or in an office try making some environmental changes. If don't have the liberty to rearrange furniture, try bringing in a plant, changing out some of your old desk accessories, add some personal touches to your work space, hang a sign that says, "Organizational genius creating organizational perfection, be off the phone when things are rosy"....or something like that!

Home Office Space Suggestions

As a professional organizer who concentrates on organizing home offices, I am always looking for new and creative ways to set up someones home office. A lot of times, location is the biggest concern and can almost be the biggest debilitating factor in getting started.

So when I came across this suggestion in the Lowe's Creative Idea's website I had to jump for joy! Not only is the closet absolutely adorable, they have done step-by-step instructions on how to create it yourself along with the shopping list!

Aside from this being in a closet, I think the feature I was most excited about was the magnetic paint primer they used on the walls. How nifty is that?! Can you imagine just placing a magnet on your wall to hold a paper in place? No more nasty magnetic boards!

There is no way I could do this suggestion justice, so if you are interested in doing something like this for yourself or a client, please check out the website.

If you are in Arizona and you want to try this out, definitely call me! I would love to see how it turns out and I can't wait to find me a guinea pig to try it out on!

Helpful Marketing Tips from Local Expert

Several months ago, I wrote a post about one of my clients and the redesign of his office. Well, Mr. Perry has been kicking butt ever since! I'm sure it's not entirely because his office looks stunning, but more on his creative genius and mountains of drive and determination, but still!

KEANE Creative has switched into KEANEresults and is a wonderful marketing firm for small businesses. I just found his new site and blog today and there was an article that caught my eye regarding marketing budgets. I have been working with a lot of my clients to organize an effective marketing model and this post just SCREAMS logic and good sense.

So, if you are in the midst of planning your budget or growing your business, be sure and check out Russ's marketing tips for the low budget!

Good work, Russ!

A Time to Purge

After a long day of running across town, going to 2 different client homes, hitting up the post office and the bank, I was flat out exhausted when I got back home. All I really wanted to do was catch up with some of my business emails before the end of the day and call it over. My 9-year old, who had been laying around in his boxers all day, playing video games and drinking soda until he pukes (which didn't happen) was all excited about mom being home and wanted to play.

Always up for a good game of Scrabble, I had to regretfully decline the offer. My son, not to be put off for another minute, wanted to help me with my work. After a very large sigh, quick thinking, and a moment of panic I put him on the task of cleaning out my office supplies and refilling my paper and binder clip supplies. =) Instant success!

Garrett's Purging Process

1. Check all pens and throw away any that do not work
2. Refill mom's favorite pencils with lead
3. Refill paper clip holder
4. Throw away paper clip box
5. Refill stapler
6. Combine half empty boxes of paper clips and throw the other box away
7. Make a list of the office supplies I ran out of (he he he, he had to "write")
8. Refill paper and throw away packaging
9. Neatly organize office supplies in drawer
10. Put USB cords in ziploc baggies and label what they go to
11. Check all of the highlighters and make sure they work by drawing pictures on extra paper that won't fit into the paper bin
12. Shred mom's old business cards
13. Put away Post It Flags mom left on her desk when she went to get a new Coke
14. Use the Can of Air to scare the cat...some how I don't think that was part of the purging of the office supplies

All in all, my office supplies look pretty tidy, I have a nice list of things I need to buy, and I only had to give him "the look" 3 or 4 times.

If you haven't purged your office supplies in a while, I challenge you to at least go through your pens. Throw away the ones that don't work, don't keep the pencil with the nasty eraser that only leaves a pink stripe down your paper, and if you have ANYTHING that is chewed on THROW IT AWAY!

Happy Organizing!

What Makes an Organized Office

What Makes An Organized Office?

Is it the View?

Is it the lay out?

Is it the setting?

The only person who can honestly answer that question is you. We all live and work in different types of environments and depending on how you love to live and how you function the best is going to determine your office.

I have two very similar clients, both are women, both have little people under foot for 90% of their day, both work extensively from home, both are on the phone a lot, and both are extremely successful at what they do. One of them feels very in control of herself, her career, her family and her life. The other...not so much.

What makes them different other than their hair color?

Tippy* (obviously not her real name) has drawn clear lines with her children and her husband when she is working. Her son does not come upstairs while she is working, when she is on the phone her other son takes the youngest outside to play or to the park, and she has a defined work day. In essence, she and her family are on a very laid our routine. No toys in the office, no sippy cups under the desk, no distractions from her goals at hand. The amazing part is Tippy's office is in an open loft area of her home. There is no door!

Katie*, on the other hand, has screaming children in her office AND when she is on the phone. She will calmly tell her son that she is on the phone, but quite frankly, he doesn't care. There are toys that fall behind her computer that her children constantly feel the need to go and get, her products are oftentime played with by the kids, and she feels overwhelmed from the time she wakes up until the time she goes to bed. Katie's office has a door and is away from the kids' play area, but is not respected.

Visually, both offices are "organized", but when it comes down to it, none of it makes a pea picking bit of difference. Being "organized" is more than just a color coded filing system and if you give me one F.I.L.E. or K.I.S.S I'm going to spit. Not only is organization about setting up routines that work for you, your business and your family it's about having respect for yourself, your work, and those around you. The circumstances of your space, living arrangements or screaming children mean absolutely nothing unless you allow them to cause you disruption, distraction and disorganization.

When I first started my business, I was a single mom of a 5-year old and a 9-year old and we were living in a two bedroom apartment. Instead of locking myself away in my bedroom, I left my office in the dining room, moved the table into the living room and got rid of our TV. It was the best year of our lives! Not only did the kids learn to have respect for the rules of the "office", they played outside, they learned to have a set routine, and they had their mom around even when they wish they didn't! :o) It was a bit difficult for my 5-year old to comprehend at first, but after 2 days of consistent "Ok, guys, mom is going to be on the phone and you need to be quiet", but they got it and they did it. Shoot, they still do it and there is NEVER a little people drink near my computer!

Bottomline, before you go out and spend hundreds of dollars on setting up your home office, determine your atmosphere and prepare your family. If you work well in constant screaming chaos then by all means have at it. If, however, the very thought of being mortified by your wailing 4-year when you are on the phone with a client is traumatizing you, organize your family first. You'll be better off in the end.

Happy "Organizing"!

Suzanne McLoone

Small Business Week - When the house won't do

You have decided to work from home and sluff around in your jammies all day! Woo hoo, how fun is that? Until summertime hits and the kids are home all day, the TV is blaring, friends are over screaming through the house, and your significant other would like to know why you haven't finished laundry yet. Hmmm, last time you looked you were busting your butt to get work done, not babysit a house full of screaming 9-year olds.

Sometimes the home office just doesn't work. Now, I have seen so many different scenarios with home-based families and I actually come from one. My parents have always worked from home so we learned from an early age that we do not scream in the house, we don't even breathe if Mom or Dad are on the phone and we knew that we would all end up filing at least one day a week. So it can work, but you must have discipline especially when it comes to the kids. If you honestly feel that demanding the kids be quiet when you are trying to work is some sort of henious torture then you may want to rethink your decision or find an alternative.

I, for one, just like the idea of my next home office suggestion and I think it's going to go on my Christmas list for Frank!

Isn't the little house absolutely adorable! Guess what? You can order it from Costco for approx. $3000. You can catch all of the details from their website. Details

Realistically, if you went through the decision making of starting your own business and decided to work from home, yet you find yourself not being able to due to the little fam, consider having an outdoor structure and apply RULES! No kids, no dogs, no toys, no nothin'. Mom/Dad is working...go away.

It sounds harsh, but what is worse, hurting little feelings for point two seconds or losing a client because of screaming children in the background?

I have two kids of my own and when I went full time in the home they were 6 and 10. My son, who was 6, had a tough time adjusting at first but now he is amazing. He is definitely my little organizer and the kids have learned respect, consideration, and how to file!

What more could an organizing mom ask for?

Happy Organizing!

Suzanne McLoone

Small Business Week - A Time to Shred

I can't preach too much about shredders, because I still don't have one. Yikes! I am, however, going down to Staples tomorrow and I'm going to pick this guy up. Shredders are a wonderful tool to have in your office, especially since Identity Theft is on the rise. A good rule of thumb is if it has your name, company name, address, account information, credit card information, social security number...shred it! Don't recycle, don't throw it in with the dirty diapers, shred them. I personally, take my items to Staples and dump my sensitive information into their industrial shredder. It's free and I practically live there, but I think I'm going to get with the times and get one for the office.

The cost of shredders can run anywhere between $19.99 and $2000, realistically, a nice home office size shredder will cost about $70.

If you already have a shredder, today would be the perfect day to shred the paper! (Andrea!) If you feel like you don't have time, have your older children shred the papers for you while you have a little "me" time

Small Business Week

April 22 - 28 is Small Business Week!

So, what exactly does that mean?

A couple of things, actually. It is the perfect time to spruce up your office and clean out your To Do Pile, do the 30-Second Tidy Up, redesign your entire office, or finally take the plunge and start your own Home Based Business! If you are planning on doing the latter at any point in time, you must go and visit Pam Slim's Escape from Cubicle Nation blog.

Regardless of your office situation, let's see if we can't come up with some quick solutions for your office to spruce it up a bit.

Office Spruce Ups

White Board: If you are going back and forth on purchasing a white board to help you with your To Do List, Client List, or Business Dashboard I would most definitely stop by Home Depot and grab one there. I picked up a 2' x 4' white board for $3.96. It does not have a finished frame around it, but with a little bit of crown molding around the edges, it looks stunning! The White Board can definitely help you organize your thoughts, but it can also give you a very visual reminder of what your client situation is like. Don't overwhelm yourself, but also a nice unobtrusive way to kick yourself in the back end to get some more customers.

Since it doesn't come with a ledge for the markers and the eraser, I picked up an adorable basket at Target for $1 and placed all of my white board goodies inside of it.

Project Folders: I LOVE these little guys. They are very similar to the Pile File Jackets, but they are not as long on the end so they fit nicely in your stacking racks. They are also wonderful to use for receipts, bills to pay, magazine clippings, and if you like to hang your active projects on the wall, it works great for that as well. I used some for our family board to hold the kids' school papers they bring home.

If you are limited on space in your home office, think outside the box. What takes up the most space in any office environment? The filing cabinet. It's big, it's bulky, it's heavy, and by looking at the state of the piles on your desk do you really like to file? Of course not! So, ask yourself, do you really need a filing cabinet?

Accordion File: Sure, you may have some client files, vendor folders, and you probably need a home for bills, but is there is something else out there you can use? The accordion file can be stored away in a closet, slid under your desk, or placed on a bookshelf. You can take it with you if you need to and the best part, it doesn't take up a ton of room! I use them for my receipts and I love it! I have it nicely tucked under my desk so I can grab it easily.

Bottomline, if you do decide that your office needs a make over, take a look at what you love about your office, what you despise, and how you want it to be. Take into consideration your organizing style and enjoy yourself! If you still have issues, you can always shoot me an email and we can see what we can do! Suzanne@organizationalempowerment.com

Happy Organizing!

Magnetic Letter Holders

A magnetic letter holder can be one of the most functional, yet most unappealing organizational tools in your repertoire. It's great for hanging on the side of filing cabinets or refrigerators to hold incoming mail, things to be filed, menus, or projects you are working on. But do they need to be so blah?

Nope! Today's project was sprucing up a rather blah, black magnetic letter holder for a client. Now, I can't wrap to save my life, so I graciously enlisted the help of my daughters' best friend, Miss Ashley!

I picked up some very pretty wrapping paper at the store along with some double-sided sticky tape. Thankfully, the wrapping paper I bought had the guide lines on the back side, which made measuring and cutting so much easier! We then very carefully began the wrapping process.

Now, I could tell you that an expert present wrapper could probably whip these babies out in no time flat, but for us amateurs it took us almost an hour to do 3 of them.

We were careful not to cover the magnetic strips on the back, which led to some tricky cutting and folding maneuvers. We also had a couple near fatalities where the double-sided sticky tape was concerned, but overall we came away unscathed.

Ashley's technique was to actually cut the side corners off before folding the paper around the outside edges. This brought a very nice and uniform look. I, however, can't cut straight to save my life so I did the ol' fold over and flip up. It may not look as clean as Ashley's, but for me it was the best I could do.

Did I mention I'm a present in a gift bag sort of gal?

The trickiest part of the whole project was doing the inside and trying to figure out if we were going to wrap around the front swoop. Not one for doing needless tasks and wasting time fretting over them, I decided to do away with the swoop altogether.

You will notice the swoop on the original letter holder in the middle and as you will also notice is the lack of one on our finished product.

Just for a bit of flair and contrast, we added a pretty lavender ribbon to the top edge. Not only does it look nice, it also double duties as a small amount of reinforcement when it comes to the empty swoop!

All in all, it turned out quite well and I think the ladies at Bright will be pleased!

Until our next project!

Happy Organizing,

Suzanne Babb-McLoone

Over-the-Door Shoe Organizer

Another one of the tools we used to help organize the endless overstock of office supplies is a $5 shoe organizer I picked up at Target. Talk about WONDERFUL! I freed up so much space in our office supply closet and I have a visual view of just how many ink cartridges I have left. (I need to get another black ink cartridge!)

We also had a tendency of leaving the house with a fresh stock of business cards, now we have them hanging in the shoe rack and we always see them before we leave. It's a great visual reminder that we need to make sure we have our cards with us.

The kids have also been remembered in our new office organizer. I can't tell you how many times they would come in and ask for a new pencil or more index cards. Now I don't have to stop what I'm doing and find one for them. They know where they are and they can get it themselves. It's wondeful!

Did I mention it was only $5 at Target? They had some prettier ones that were anywhere from $12 to $20, but I didn't really need one in a floral pattern. (Didn't think Frank would appreciate that.) The clear one works out just fine for us.

If you would like more ideas on how you can use an Over-the-Door Shoe Organizer, check us out at: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Suzanne_Babb

Look under: $5 Shoe Rack = Priceless Organization

Happy Organizing!

Suzanne McLoone

Microsoft 2007 & Vista

Today I spent my morning down at the Phoenix Civic Plaza attending the Microsoft Launch Tour for Microsoft Office 2007 and Microsoft Vista, Wow! Right off the bat I'm going to tell you that I am not in any way IT savvy so a lot of what they were talking about regarding servers and other make-my-mind-wander topics I zoned out on, so if I get something incorrect I apologize.

What I do know is that it will save you a TON of time! For example, Microsoft Vista and Office 2007 not only have some sexy new additions, but they also came up with new features to save you time and possibly save you from having a car accident!

The 3-D viewer for open files is the coolest thing since Mac's window viewer. Your files fly through your screen as you flip through to see which ones you want, you can even have your wallpaper be a stunning virtual waterfall! Talk about soothing! But the thing that excited me most was their unified communication tool!

Imagine having your voicemails sent directly to your email! Now imagine hearing your voicemail in the email and being able to add a few notes from said voicemail! Not only does it eliminate you from having a voicemail log, it also enables you to search for that voicemail with their enhanced search capability.

On top of that, you can set up policies on emails that you send out so that the recipient can't forward or delete the email. This is set up mostly for security measures, but it is still a nifty feature.

They also did a demo for an option to actually CALL in to hear your emails, tasks, and calendar items AND you can even cancel, change, or update meetings during the phone call! So if you are driving, you don't have to worry about "reading" your emails, you can listen to them! It was fascinating!

Aside from the functionalities, the new ribbon tool bar is nice. I have had the Beta for 2007 for a while and although it took a bit of getting used to, it is a lot easier to visually see all of my options. The new graph layouts in Excel are gorgeous and you don't have to worry about making sure your colors work with one another, they have a slew of color palettes to choose from.

All in all, I had a splendid time and I'm quite excited about the new operating system and Windows Office. The only negative experience I had was the fact there were two men sitting next to me during one of the breakout sessions who wouldn't shut up. They spoke through the entire presentation and it wasn't even like they were discussing things relevent to the topic at hand. It was very annoying and quite distracting, but what can you do?

Let's Talk Organizing!

What exactly IS organizing? Is it the heavenly glow of a clean office? Does it consist of color coded files that are perfectly straight? Or perhaps it is an office devoid of all paper? Quite frankly, it can be any of the above or none of the above. Organization is a system that works for you, with your life style and your routine. What gives you the anxiety attacks as you enter your office of mass destruction, is not knowing WHAT your organizational system is and feeling confident about it.

For example, Carrie* is one of my clients who when you walk into her home and even into her office you would swear this woman was organized. She has on the Organizing shows from the cable channels on her TV, her house is immaculent, her office has all sorts of nifty organizational products, and she is about to burst into tears because she physically and emotionally can not function. Her anxiety level over the mass amounts of paper that she has hidden in her garage is pushing her over the edge and it is definitely not a fun feeling.

The worst part of her anxiety attacks, was the very thought of going through the piles and piles of papers and finding invoices, receipts, checks, and notes that she had forgotten about. So, do you know what we did? We left them in the garage.

Yes, Carrie was just as shocked as you are, but really, why would you want to stare at that mess? It's ugly, it's overwhelming, and it makes you want to seriously contemplate becoming an alcoholic. Instead, we developed a plan of 10 papers a day. That's it, 10.

Every day at 4:30 she takes her 10 pages and either files them or does the action required. Sometimes it's just a matter of throwing away 10 pieces of paper. How fun is that? It doesn't stress her out, it is not overwhelming, and it has lifted 10 tons from her shoulders just knowing that she doesn't HAVE to organize it all right away. For Carrie, that is what works for her.

Maybe for other people it is tackling that big old monster and getting it slain once and for all, but it just depends on you. That's all organizing is, it is determining what YOU need, how YOU want to do it, and what YOU have time for.

Happy Organizing!
Suzanne