March 6, 2007 | In: Productivity
How I Got Organized – Pt. 1 – Overview
I’ve always called myself a Type B trying to be a Type A. I’m the creative/social sort who loves office supply stores and “attempting” to get organized. But the clutter and disorganization always seems to find me again.
While no one would mistake me for Martha Stewart, I feel as though I’ve really turned a corner over the past few months when it comes to actually being productive and relatively organized.
I thought I’d share some of the tricks that have worked for me, so today I’m going to list the main ones and over the course of the next few weeks I’ll go into more detail on each one.
Here we go:
- Declare email bankruptcy.
- Set low goals.
- Only use ONE inbox.
- Write down everything – in one place (I carry around a .67 notebook.)
- Wakeup early.
- Simplify your stuff, roles and responsibilities.
- Be faithful in little.
- Get comfortable saying “No”
- Break down to-do’s into bite sized tasks.
Some of these are tips I’ve gleaned from reading GTD blogs and others are things that have just worked for me. How do you stay organized? What are your tips or tricks?
4 Responses to How I Got Organized – Pt. 1 – Overview
Bekah
March 6th, 2007 at 5:11 pm
I *try* to wake up early every day (every day’s different) and I write things down like crazy. I make lists and set goals and…I try to stay organized so I never go crazy. I’m one of those people that needs everything in some sort of order all the time. It doesn’t have to be perfect, but chaos and me don’t go together very well.
Kat
March 6th, 2007 at 7:53 pm
Bekah,
Unfortunately, chaos and I were roommates at one point…ok, maybe I’ve never been that bad, but you get the idea.
As unpopular as it is, getting up early does really seem to be a key to being organized. Perhaps it has something to do with having an offensive attitude towards the day rather than a defensive one.
And yes, writing things down has been vital for me.
Stephanie
March 7th, 2007 at 6:27 am
I’m like Bekah – I prefer order to chaos, but that isn’t true about every aspect of my life. My house is in general working order, but things like talking to insurance companies and student loan people – the “business” aspect of home – feels pell nell to me. I always put that off until the very last possible second, rather than staying on top of it. My husband, on the other hand, is actually really GOOD at organization, he just doesn’t care about it as much as I do. Go figure.
Some things that help me:
* a to-do list on my fridge for the week, rather than the day. My to-do list also includes phone calls to return, since it is one of my least-favorite things to do.
* a running grocery-store list on the fridge, too (the side of my fridge functions as a bulletin board for our home).
* a planner that lets me see the whole week at once; this way I can tell if I’m booking up too much of my week, or if I’m scheduling something that’s going to be ridiculous (like dinner one night and then breakfast at 7 am the next morning).
john
March 7th, 2007 at 8:09 am
I am in the painful process of trying to organize as well. I am also trying to follow the GTD guidelines to develop my personal organization method.
I have started with a mini-guide that was written called “GTD with Gmail”. I found the link on the LifeHacker blog (which has lots of helpful organizational tips). It describes how to use labels in Gmail to create projects and actions. You create tasks by sending emails to yourself. If you have a gmail account, I would suggest giving it a look.
I also found that I save time by letting my information come to me, by using an RSS reader (Google Reader in my case). If you have blogs and/or news sites that you frequent, most of them will have an RSS feed that your reader can access. That way you can go to one place to see everything. It is a huge time and memory saver for me.