Time to Take Action: All the Ways to Get Organized This New Year
Organization can be a daunting word to many as it is not something that comes naturally to everyone but that doesn’t mean its impossible. By taking simple steps and applying certain strategies, the task of organizing certain facets of your life becomes quite doable. With it being Get Organized month, we gathered together some tips and tricks to kick start the year with some needed sprucing and organization.
Bullet Journaling
Since 2013, the world got introduced to bullet journaling when Ryder Caroll launched bulletjournal.com and it became a full-on craze ever since then especially on platforms like Pinterest. This dotted notebook has become a versatile tool capable of organizing every facet of a person’s life. It is mix of a daily planner, to-do list and diary and within its pages, people usually record their goals and achievements but also use it as a personal log for everything imaginable.
You can literally go wild with your creativity and use it to log in everything. You can add in a habit tracker, mood tracker, daily, weekly and monthly cleaning routine and even an entire page devoted to self-care ideas. The options are endless because it is all based on your life and what you want to accomplish in 2023. So to truly get organized for the new year, you could start with filling in your very first bullet journal. We’d recommend planning everything you want to include and then getting some pens and markers and letting your creativity run wild as you fill in each page.
Adding in a Routine
With your bullet journal at hand, one of the best pages you can prepare is one devoted to a daily routine. To get you started, you could sit down with a pen and paper and decide what needs to be in your routine. Do you want to get more exercise? Or some reading time? Prioritize what is important to you and have it written down on paper. Make sure this is something you can fit in your daily life and won’t be hard to sustain in the long run.
Now with your goals written down its time to break them down into smaller parts. Big goals that are hard to tackle very often lead to failure so its important to start small. For example, if you want to reach the point where you exercise regularly, at least 5 days a week, you can start small by exercising once a week for some time and gradually increasing the number of days as the process becomes easier. Use that approach with all your goals and you will see results.
Taking Inventory and De-Cluttering
Now with your life plans and goals all set up, it’s also important to organize the living space you surround yourself by on a daily basis. To do so, you will need to roll up your sleeves for a much needed clean up and not just of one scant room but every room in your house. Get yourself a pen and paper and start the process off by taking inventory of every thing you own.
This can sound pretty time consuming so to make it simple, we’d recommend dividing the task across several days or even weeks. You can work on one room for two days or an entire week even, pace the entire process towards your life schedule and priorities so it doesn’t feel overwhelming. Once your inventory is out of the way, the next step is to ask yourself two important questions, “does this item belong here?” and “do I even need it?” Do that for every item in the room and have three boxes ready, labelled “keep”, “donate” and “trash”, making sure to designate each item to either of those three categories, this process of decluttering will have you feeling liberated and in the right headspace.
Visibility, Accessibility, Flexibility
With everything in its right place, you can take things a step further by following the simple rule of three: visibility, accessibility and flexibility. When it comes to visibility, it is always good to be able to see the items easily without the need of opening drawers or closet doors. A smart way to do so is by storing your items in transparent containers or you could even label drawers, closet doors and the like to make it easier to know where everything is without rummaging through the contents of your room.
When it comes to accessibility, it is all about making sure the items you need the most are the easiest to access. The opposite is applied to items you do not really need which you can place on a higher shelf or a spot you do not access on a daily basis. Finally, there’s flexibility, and this is the one that will help keep you organized in the long run. With flexibility, it’s all about choosing a storage system that can adapt to your changing needs.
So with that, you’ll get to start off the new year with a decked out bullet journal packed with goal and habit trackers to keep you in check. You’ll also get to enjoy the upcoming months in a relaxed, organized space once you’ve de-cluttered and stored everything using the three rules of organization. We hope that through this article, organization no longer feels as daunting but instead has become an enjoyable task that you will continue to practice for as long as you can.
