How I Stay Organized
If you've spent more than 2 minutes with me, then you probably know I'm an organization freak. I believe that staying organized increases productivity, decreases stress, and drastically improves your overall peace of mind. Today I’m sharing my top 3 tips for staying organized in this crazy world that we live in!
1. Tasks & Checklists
Write it down! Task apps like ToDoIst help you remember all those things you have to do throughout the day so that they’re not just floating around in your head. If you think of something that you have to do, no matter what it is, right it down every day so that you don’t forget about it later. You’ll sleep like a baby if you don’t have a million things in your head that you have to remember! Using ToDoIst, I spend a little bit of time at the end of every day organizing my tasks for the next day. This helps me go into the day feeling prepared and excited for the day ahead.
I recently read a book called Free to Focus, which talked about creating routines for every area of your life to automate the things that you do regularly. So I have routines for my morning, evening, work start-up, marketing, and work wrap-up. Checklists are a great way to keep track of your routines. Using checklists, I’m able to easily remember all the things that go into each routine throughout the day. For example, for my morning routine, I have a checklist that includes listening to my audio book, working out, reviewing my goals, breathing deeply, visualizing my dream day, thinking about 3 things I’m grateful for, and more. Check out my full morning routine video HERE!
2. Time-Blocking
Time-blocking is all about being intentional with your time. It’s SO easy to get “busy”, so having a plan for every hour of the day is a great way to ensure that you don’t lose track of the day. If you’ve never time-blocked before, make a list of all the most important things in your life (work, family time, working out, spending time with friends, etc). Once you have this list, use your Google Calendar or other calendar app to plan out your ideal week. Plug all your most important things into the calendar. This will show you how much time you actually have throughout the day and might even open up your eyes to how much time you’re currently wasting. You don’t have to exactly stick to your schedule, but having a plan in place will help your day feel much more structured and productive!
3. Declutter Your Email Inbox
If you’re like me, or pretty much anyone else on the planet, you probably get hundreds of new emails every day. It’s extremely easy for your email inbox to get cluttered and overwhelming. A great way to reduce the amount of emails you receive is to unsubscribe from junk email. This may take some time at first, but if you get into the habit of unsubscribing every single time you receive a junk email, I guarantee that you will notice a difference in the amount of emails that you receive.
Once you’ve dealt with your junk mail problem, now it’s time to deal with all your other emails. A great way to clear it up is email folders. Create an email folder for all the main areas of your life or business. Check your email once or twice a day and go through every single email. If it’s junk, unsubscribe and delete it. If you have to respond to the email, respond right away, then put it in a folder. Sort it and forget it! Any emails you leave in your inbox are ones that you need to remember to follow up with later. Everything else can be released from your brain.
For me, staying organized is all about peace of mind. Life is way too short to be stressed out everyday. I truly hope these tips were helpful for you! If there are other topics you’d like for me to cover in the future, please shoot me an email at Austin@theoryRE.com. And make sure to check out the full video below. See you next time!