Category: Organzing

  • Procrastination is a Useful Tool

    As I was sitting in my office practicing the fine art of procrastination, I began thinking about why people (me included) procrastinate. I came up with two basic reasons:

    1. It is something that you just don’t like to do (or there is something you would rather be doing)

    2. It is something someone else told you to do

    I can DEFINITELY think of examples of these from my life! In fact, I have left this blog post several times to send emails and make myself a cup of hot chocolate. What I began realizing during this thinking session is that procrastination can actually be a really useful tool, if examined. Sounds crazy, but stay with me for a minute. First, make a list (or just look at your current to do list) of all the things you procrastinate about. Next, break them into two categories: things you don’t like to do OR things someone else told you to do.

    Now, let’s look at the second list first. If it is something that someone else told you to do then it probably means that a boss or co-worker (or husband/wife/partner) is involved. This could mean it is a really important item and it really needs to get done, but you have been putting it off because you don’t like being told what to do. Well, that is just your ego talking, so let’s move it to the first list. If it is not really important or someone was just dumping their unwanted stuff on your plate, then you need to decide if you want to fight this battle or not. Maybe you have been a doormat and allowed them to dump tasks on you for awhile and you need to stand up for yourself and have a sit down with them to work it out. Or maybe, it is something small and not worth the fight which means you need to move it to the first list. This list should now be empty because everything was either given back to the giver to deal with or moved to the first list.

    The fist list is now full of things that we just don’t like to do or just seem to always find something more interesting to do. We are now down to a problem of motivation, not living by your priorities or time management. There will always be things that we don’t want to do but since they are important to us so we need to find a way to motivate ourselves to get them done. I like to set a timer and say to myself that I will sit down for 30 minutes and work on X. After my 30 minutes, I can leave it alone until tomorrow and that makes the task less painful. I also use my favorite shows as rewards for completing dreadful tasks. If I finish X, then I get to watch Survivor or Top Chef.

    Some items on this list may be there because you said ‘yes’ to something that you really shouldn’t have. You weren’t living by your priorities and being real with yourself about the time you could devote to another task or activity. My advice is to ‘suck it up’, finish the task and put it down as a lesson learned. If you are a ‘yes’ person by nature, I HIGHLY recommend that you never say yes on the spot. Create a patent line that you use when asked to commit to something like, “I don’t have my calendar with me, so let me check my availability when I get home and get back to you”. If you are at work and your calendar is right in front of you try, “I have several projects working right now, but let me take a look at things and see if I can fit it in. I will get back to you later today”. This will give you time to really think about whether you WANT to put this on your to do list.

    These last few items on your procrastination list may still be sitting there due to poor time management. My excuse for leaving this blog post several times before its completion was that I “needed” to send a quick email (that turned into 4 emails). I was “really” thirsty and wanted something to drink. That it would only take a second to answer the phone, check my facebook, see if I got any new emails, etc. If I had just sat down and only opened my blog and written this post in one sitting, it would have been done in 15 minutes (or so, with editing). Instead, it took me an hour and 15 minutes. I know I am probably not the only person around that has suffered from this time management affliction, but if I had just done it, then I would have already moved on to a more enjoyable task and I would have stopped moaning and groaning over an hour ago.

    So, the moral of the story is that you can learn a lot about what you enjoy doing and what you are really passionate about from looking at your procrastination patterns. Next time you are saying ‘yes’ or signing up for something, take a good hard look about where they are going to end up on your list. Are they going to be at the top of your to do list? Or are they going to be at the bottom of your to do list for the next 3 months?

    If you liked today’s article, you’re welcome to use it in your own ezine or blog as long as you include the following blurb: Certified Professional Organizer, Tara Donohue Rudo, CPO, helps families, solopreneurs and mompreneurs focus on what is important. Get her FREE weekly tips and advice at www.NoMorePiles.com . Photo is courtesy of www.freedigitalphotos.net

  • Microsoft Outlook Saved My Marriage

    Any of you out there in a relationship or married have probably had the following conversation.

    Person 1 – “I have a long work day today and I won’t be home until late because I have a meeting with the bossman at 5:30 p.m.”
    Person 2 – “What do you mean you won’t be home until late? Johnny has his school play (or insert other event) tonight and we were going to that and then out for pizza with the Johnsons.”

    Person 1 – “Johnny’s play is tonight? You never told me that! It’s not on my calendar. I can’t cancel my meeting with my boss!

    Person 2 – “Don’t you remember we talked about it last week?”

    Fight continues and yelling begins…if it hasn’t already.

    After spending several months having these ‘discussions’ with my husband, I was sick of it! I began searching for solutions. I was already using Microsoft Outlook for my email and contact management and discovered that for each calendar event I could ‘invite attendees’. This meant that the calendar event was emailed to hubby and he could either accept, tentative or decline the event and I would receive a response back. Easy, peasy.

    If he accepted, it was automatically put on his Outlook calendar. If declined, he could put a response in the email back to me so we could discuss the scheduling problem. The other great feature here is that if one of us changes the times on an event or deletes it off our calendar, it requires that you send an update to the other ‘attendees’. This has been a MARRIAGE-SAVER!! No more fights about scheduling. No excuses for not know what is going on and when. I LOVE IT!

    If you don’t use Outlook, but want to have similar features, check out Google Calendar. You can set up multiple calendars, so you can have one for your personal stuff and set up one for ‘Family’ events or set up one for each of the kids schedules and they can be shared with others. You can also set up the notifications so it would have similar features to what I mentioned above in Outlook.

    If you are not a computer person, you can use the pen and paper method. Just make sure that a family calendar is posted in a high-traffic area of the house like the kitchen where it will be easily seen. That it is big enough to easily see events.

    No matter which type of system you use there are a few things you will need to do for it to be successful.

    1. Always put events on your calendar! The system only works if you are diligent about entering events on it.
    2. Every week you need to have a quick family meeting to make sure that everyone has their events on the calendar and knows where they need to be when.
    3. Don’t overbook your calendar! This is the most important rule. If you jam pack every minute of your week, you will feel stressed, rushed and things will fall apart.

    Calendars are one system that EVERY family needs to run smoothly. They also give every family member accountability and help you avoid the stress of conversations like the one at the top of the page.

    If you liked today’s article, you’re welcome to use it in your own ezine or blog as long as you include the following blurb: Certified Professional Organizer, Tara Donohue Rudo, CPO, helps families, solopreneurs and mompreneurs focus on what is important. Get her FREE weekly tips and advice at www.NoMorePiles.com .

  • Basement Overhaul

    I took the summer off from blogging so that I could spend a little extra time with the kids, but now that school is back in session it is time to get back to work. I want to show you some great before and after pictures of the basement overhaul we completed this week. This client was a busy family with their third child on the way. Some family and friends had asked them to store items for them in the basement which started the clutter. Then they had grandma and grandpa move in with them and there were now more items to store. Then, life just got busy and anything that they couldn’t make a decision on went to the basement. Any time there was company coming over and there were piles anywhere, they went to the basement. Out of sight, out of mind…..except with #3 on the way they realized that the basement had gotten out of control and they wanted all their ducks in a row before #3 shows up. We put up some great shelving to get the bins and boxes off the floor for easy access, cleaning and in case of water seepage since it is an unfinished basement. We used lots of clear bins (labeled, of course) but clear helps you see what you need and allows you to access things more easily. This was a great project with wonderful, motivated clients and even grandpa did his part in sorting his items and sending some off for donation!

    [slideshow id=2 w=460 h=300]

  • Perfectionism

    As I was working with several clients this past week, all busy moms, there seemed to be a common theme. PERFECTIONISM. It seems like a nice word. Even seems like something you want to strive for. But what I was finding amongst these busy women was that perfectionism equaled procrastination. Since it had happened to me also this week, I could completely identify with them. We want to do our best for our families and our business and our expectations of what ‘our best’ means may have just been out of line with the amount of time we could devote to these tasks this week. We wanted to:

    • Write hand written thank you notes to a few business colleagues who referred clients to us
    • Pick out the perfect thoughtful gift for a niece’s new baby
    • Go sale shopping at Toys R Us to stock up on toys for upcoming birthday parties

    But sometimes, in the interest of saving our sanity and staying on schedule, we need to understand that “imperfect is still…done”. I can’t take the credit for this quote. My client is the one who said it or something similar when we started talking about the issue that we were facing. Imperfect is still…done. I wouldn’t say that this can apply to everything in life. I certainly wouldn’t want the air traffic controllers to adopt this as a mantra. But, sometimes in life, with non-essential tasks, we need to give ourselves permission to:

    • Send a thank you email instead of a hand written note
    • Send a gift certificate to your niece so SHE can buy something nice for her new baby
    • Buy a stack of Toys R Us or Target gift cards in $15-20 values so you always have a ‘present’ on hand for those kids’ birthday parties

    I think that it is far more important to do these things in a timely manner then to do them ‘perfectly’. I would much rather receive a baby gift while I still have a baby then to receive the perfect baby blanket when my kid starts kindergarten. I would much rather receive a thank you note soon after an event or situation then to receive one and have to sit and think about why this person is sending me a thank you note.

    OK, so here is the new mantra: When it comes to non-essential tasks, imperfect is still….done! Take a look at your to-do lists this week and see where you have been striving for perfectionism and instead procrastinating and try out our new mantra.

  • When your schedule falls apart

    We have all had those days (or series of days) where nothing seems to go according to plan. Mine began this past friday morning when my 17 month old woke up with a fever and obviously felt terrible. Instead of me getting to the gym for my hour of Bodypump and going out to lunch with the kids and my in-laws, the kids and I spent all day sitting on the couch watching Nick Jr. Definitely not what I had planned! By the end of the day, my 3 year old was climbing the walls because he was tired of sitting around. My 17 month old still felt terrible and didn’t want to be set down. Here we are on Monday morning and things are starting to get back to normal, except that everything that I had on my agenda for Friday has gotten pushed to Monday and now there is twice the amount to get done.

    For whatever reason on any given day our schedules get derailed. It could have been a broken down car, an illness, traffic or the weather, but there are plenty things in our busy lives that can make our day fall apart. The key to getting through days like this is the remember:

    • Some things are just out of our control!
    • Don’t stress, most of the things on our to do list are not life and death items.
    • Tomorrow is a new day!

    From an organizational perspective, we now need to focus on what happens with today’s to do list when we get derailed.

    1. If there is something that ABSOLUTELY needs to get done today: delegate it or call in a favor to get it done. Have your neighbor give you a ride to the car repair place. Have a family member/friend watch the kids for an hour or two. Ask a co-worker, employee or even your boss to handle the situation. There is always a way to get something done if it really needs doing.
    2. Prepare yourself for a busy day when you are back in the swing.
    3. Reallocate some things on your to do list to other days so that you have a more reasonable amount of work to get done.

    The biggest thing to remember when you get a day (or two) like this is that, “this too shall pass”. It happens to everyone….even organizers!