Organize 365® Podcast

In over a decade of studying female heads of households in their homes and researching what it takes to get them organized, I've thought a lot about time and the invisible work we are doing.

The big thing when I started my business was hitting six figures. Everyone wanted to hit $100,000 in yearly income. Back then, I had just quit my teaching job in a private school making $24,000 a year in take-home pay. I couldn't even wrap my mind around ever being a six-figure income earner!

Over the years, as I've looked at how women use their time, I've come to this conclusion: You can have six-figure time without the six-figure income. It's all about mindset and how you choose to spend your time. In this episode, I share my observations of six-figure income earners and my suggestions for developing a six-figure time mindset.

How Six-Figure Income Earners Spend Their Time

As a professional organizer, I went into the homes of many six-figure earners with million-dollar homes. These were often doctors, lawyers, business owners, and C-Suite executives. I had the opportunity to see how they run their lives and the type of help they hired. Having a six-figure income gave these women and their families a choice in how they spend their time.

Can you have this six-figure time mindset without the six-figure income? I think you can! Many millionaires are time-poor while many who have no income at all are time rich. What's the difference between time poverty and being rich in time?

Time Passing vs Making a Difference

Most people see time in terms of how much time is passing and what they can get done. Truly productive people see a third dimension: If I spend my time doing this today, will it make a difference in the future? Will it make a difference a month, a year, 5 years, or 10 years from now? People who are time multipliers always make their time decisions based on the significance factor.

If you could get the to-do list done, what would you do with your free time? Too many of us just add more to-do items to the list. 

I think we most want time freedom. To reach that goal, you must be proactive and not reactive. I talk about this all the time at Organize 365®. This is not a new concept. But, this is more than just planning out the big projects. You have to develop the habit muscle of proactivity in every area of your life.

It means not doing every little thing when you have the thought. You write the thought on the index card, drop it into the Sunday Basket®, and do those little things all batched together to save time.

Six-figure time takes being proactive a step further. Instead of waiting to have the thought about the dog's medicine or the bills that need to be paid, you put it on a schedule with a plan for how to get it done or create other automations for the task like using bill pay. You purposely plan ahead for how the task will be done. What in your life can be systematized, scheduled, and automated to save you time and mental space?

Forward Thinking and Planning Days

Everyone is a forward thinker according to Ben Hardy. The difference is how far ahead into the future you think. It's great to have 15 minutes of free time and do something that your future self will appreciate like emptying the dishwasher or starting the laundry, but this is reactive productivity. How do you move to the next step and think farther into the future?

The answer is planning days.

Planning days for your home and your work give you the focused time to get more done and have more impact. The goal isn't a longer to-do list. The goal is more time to do what you're uniquely created to do so you can have more impact.

I'll be honest: It's more comfortable to add to the to-do list and check off the low-level tasks because it makes me feel productive. It takes time to wrestle with the question of what you're uniquely created to do and to try things out to see if that's the right thing for you. It takes time to develop skills and practice those skills. Six-figure income earners spend a lot of time growing their skills. 

Six-figure income earners also spend a lot of time networking and making connections with like-minded people. Surround yourself with people who are investing their time and resources into being more productive so they can have an impact on the world.

They also change their role as they grow. Six-figure income earners do the things that are the highest use of their time. You have to focus on working your way out of jobs. This might mean delegating jobs to other people or services that can do the work for you. This might be other family members. Consider meal planning services or hire a house cleaner. It might also mean changing the standard at which you do a task in your home. Can you lengthen the time between dusting or changing your sheets?

Building Relationships

I think that the true freedom of six-figure time comes when you can start to think about not just the work that needs to be done at home or in the office, but how you can impact relationships in your family, friends, and work. This is harder to prioritize because no one is holding us accountable. 

Using the Sunday Basket® for Six-Figure Time

The Sunday Basket® System is the first step in developing a six-figure time mindset. It helps you think about and systematize your personal life, household, family, and finances. I teach you how to move from being reactive to proactive.

Now, based on this podcast you can take your thinking to the next level. When you focus on your Sunday Basket® color of the week, consider the chess level next steps. What can you do for yourself, your household, your family, or your finances that would save you time and give you time freedom for the future?

I encourage you to pay special attention to how you invest your time with your family because these are the types of things that never make the to-do list and we fail to think about them until it's too late. I've shared many times about how I spent purposeful time with my kids in their teens to develop the close relationships that I have with them now. 

Here's a simple way to be productive in your home instead of reactive and make time for family and relationship-building this holiday season: Join our holiday blitz! Get on the wait list for the 2022 Holiday Blitz now!

Being a six-figure time person means seeing how valuable your time is and how valuable you are. Invest your time wisely!

Resources Mentioned in This Episode

Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Direct download: Org365-504.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 8:00am EDT

On Wednesdays, I normally get to talk with members of the Organize 365® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps, and triumphs along their organizing journey. You can see and hear transformation in action.

For the rest of this month, I have a treat for you on the Wednesday Transformation episodes I want to share with you some of the extraordinary breakthroughs from women just like you who attended Embrace 2022. Listen in for Part 3 of the transformations!

Embrace is now available on demand! You can learn more about the Embrace Self-Guided Retreat here.

Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Direct download: Org365-Embrace2022-Part3.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 8:00am EDT

There are four types of work that we all do at home. In this episode, I go through these four types of work in detail and discuss how to reduce the amount of time spent on the first three so you can do more unique purpose work.

Housework

We've talked a lot over the last couple of years about housework. As a part of our Organize 365® Research, I have honed in on and defined this type of work. There are three main types of housework: cleaning, tasks of daily living, and organization. You must clean your home to some standard you set, do all the tasks that make you a human, like showering and brushing your teeth, plus the things in your house must have a home. Housework is like a part-time job of 18-25 hours each week for the average household without children!

Listen to these episodes for more about how I define housework:

Invisible Work

This is the work that happens in your Sunday Basket®. I talked about this with Eve Rodsky. Invisible work is the mental load and related tasks to running a household. These are things like paying the bills and planning for holidays. This type of work doesn't fit into the housework category and we have a hard time labeling and quantifying it.

The Sunday Basket® System helps with invisible work. The first six weeks of setup and habit-building can take a lot of time because you're setting up systems and processes. You have a set time to handle all these little one-off or recurring tasks. It might take you 90 minutes to 3 hours in the beginning, but then something magical happens. The time savings (and lightened mental load) that you experience during the week is exponential. The average Sunday Basket® user saves 5 hours each week!

There is a second type of invisible work: emergency invisible work. Illnesses, scheduled changes, and childcare/adult care fall into this category. When you or someone else gets sick in your family, the world around you doesn't stop and wait for you. The regular work doesn't go away and the emergency itself often creates more work. There are also schedule changes that are really just a part of life and we have to just roll with them. Not everyone has the final category, but childcare and caregiving for adults is a full-time 24/7 job all on its own. 

Hobby Work

Angela Watson and I talked a lot about hobby work earlier this summer in relation to teachers. We naturally fill our time with work, but it's not all essential work. Sometimes, we do extra work to make ourselves feel better or make something look the way we want. That's hobby work. This often involves trying to be perfect or redoing work. When I talked to Jacqui, she called this overwork. Whatever you call it, it is robbing you of your free time! This is refolding the clothes in the drawer, matching the socks, folding the underwear, micro-organizing the toys, and over-cleaning.

Unique Purpose Work

The female head of household struggles the most to prioritize unique purpose work over all other work. Unique purpose work is the work that you're uniquely created to do. No one else can do this work except you. But, too many of us feel that we must have an "A" in the first three areas before we can move into unique purpose work. Your family will push back. Your internal thoughts will push back. It's easier to search the internet for a fun printable about cleaning and press into hobby work. The reality is this: The pain of not doing what you're uniquely created to do must become greater than the pain of continuing to prioritize housework, invisible work, and hobby work for you to choose to prioritize your unique purpose work. 

How Do I Find What I'm Uniquely Created to Do?

I'm asked all of the time: How do I find what I'm uniquely created to do?

First, I suggest that you go through the Embrace Self-Guided Retreat. We've set it up as an on-demand experience that you can do alone or make a weekend of it with friends. The sessions will help you focus on yourself and show you how to begin to dream again. 

Second, you need to understand that finding your unique purpose takes time. I told you when we talked about passive organizing that it takes 12-18 months of research before you get started on organizing. It's natural then that it will take just as much time and research to find what you're uniquely created to do. You need focused thinking time.

At Organize 365®, our mission is to help you get organized so you have the free time to do what you're uniquely created to do. Take your time back through organization! Find what you're uniquely created to do and press into it!

Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Direct download: Org365-503.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 8:00am EDT

On Wednesdays, I normally get to talk with members of the Organize 365® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps, and triumphs along their organizing journey. You can see and hear transformation in action.

For the rest of this month, I have a treat for you on the Wednesday Transformation episodes I want to share with you some of the extraordinary breakthroughs from women just like you who attended Embrace 2022. Listen in for Part 2 of the transformations!

Embrace is now available on demand! You can learn more about the Embrace Self-Guided Retreat here.

Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Direct download: Org365-Embrace2022-Part2.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 8:00am EDT

Marie Kondo is like the Atkins Diet of organizing. Yes, it's true. Let me explain.

Please understand that this is NOT an anti-Marie Kondo episode! I think Marie Kondo is awesome in so many ways. She's done so much to raise awareness for organizing and decluttering in the media and the general public. There are benefits to her method, but I do feel that the Marie Kondo method is not the best long-term solution for the average American woman or home.

Last week I kicked off this podcast series by talking about passive organizing. When you're in this information-gathering stage, your interest and initial motivation can be sparked by things like Marie Kondo's book or TV show. 

In this episode, I explain why Marie Kondo's organizational method is like the Atkins Diet of organizing. 

First, ultra-low-carb diets like the Atkins Diet can give you quick results. You can get really, really quick results using the Marie Kondo method. That quick win can give you the motivation that is needed to keep going in the beginning. The problem is that you have to get rid of nearly everything to get those results!

Americans (and Australians) in particular tend to have larger homes and more stuff in those homes. Japanese homes are usually much smaller and rooms are more often multifunctional. When an American woman uses the Marie Kondo method of organizing, there's a lot of pain and chaos that goes along with pulling everything out of a particular space. It's like the headache you get when you go through carb withdrawal.

Second, the Atkins Diet is very one-size-fits-all, as is the Marie Kondo Method. There are strict rules to follow without deviation to get those results. Marie Kondo's Method is very prescriptive, telling you exactly how you should have each area of your home.

Do you have paper? She says get rid of it all except a tiny folder. This doesn't work for the typical American because so many important documents must be kept and presented in paper format. My grandson, Grayson, is a toddler and he already has two pieces of paper that must be kept track of for the rest of his life: his birth certificate and his social security card. We are not and cannot be paperless in the United States at this point in time. There are too many variables in the American household, especially in terms of paper, making a one-size-fits-all approach difficult to follow.

Don't even get me started on books. Marie Kondo says to get rid of all of your books. I did it. I got rid of all of my books. And I regret it! I love books and bookshelves. I have a couple of custom bookshelves in my home and I want more. I have hundreds of books on Audible and I'm in the process of buying many of those again in paper format so I can highlight them and write in them. 

(Side note: I'm so used to thinking in terms of pink, purple, blue, and green work that I'm starting to highlight information in my books this way using our Organize 365® highlighters.)

Third, the Atkins Diet is very restrictive and not as filling. The Marie Kondo Method is very restrictive and not as fun. There is one way to follow her program. If you don't follow the program to the detail, you don't get an A. But, I want an A in organizing.

The problem is, I like stuff. I'm organized, but I like stuff. I don't have a ridiculous amount of stuff, like clothes, but my closet is far from being a capsule wardrobe. 

These types of prescriptive systems tell you exactly what the end should look like to be considered organized. Minimal. Rainbow ordered. What if you have 35 pieces in your wardrobe instead of 33? What if you kept your books instead of getting rid of them all? Then you didn't follow the method and you don't get an A. You're not organized. 

Lastly, most people cannot maintain the Atkins Diet for the rest of their lives. In a similar way, it is difficult to maintain organization like Marie Kondo. As soon as you stop following the prescriptive directions, the organization falls apart. It doesn't last. The Marie Kondo method of organizing gets you started, but it's not a sustainable way for most Americans to live.

Organization is a skill that must be learned.

You must know how and why you want to get organized. Your phase of life and the type of order that you want play a part. You need to practice making decisions that become rules and then habits for your life and home so that in the long term, you deal with less decision fatigue. 

Marie Kondo's method of tidying is a wonderful place to start your journey. You can make some great visible progress with her system, but if you are not naturally a minimalist, it is not a sustainable lifestyle. 

If you're like me and you like stuff (and are a bit of a rebel), it's time instead to focus on learning the skill of organization. Use the momentum of these quick-start methods to propel yourself into lifelong organization rather than endless cycles of decluttering and feelings of lack.

Here at Organize 365®, we're not about Pinterest-perfect organizing. Our focus is functional organizing. Learning the skill of organizing is a lifestyle change, not a quick-fix project. It requires a mental shift. It's about having what you need, those things having a home, and regularly putting everything back where it belongs.

The Productive Home Solution™ teaches you the skill of organization, guides you in developing systems, and learning to make decisions that become habits. I help you do the mental and the physical work. I show you how to make the invisible work visible. 

Are you ready to move from passive organizing and short-term solutions to actively learning the skill of organization?

Resources Mentioned in This Episode

Related Episodes

 

Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Direct download: Org365-502.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 8:00am EDT

On Wednesdays, I normally get to talk with members of the Organize 365® community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps, and triumphs along their organizing journey. You can see and hear transformation in action.

For the rest of this month, I have a treat for you on the Wednesday Transformation episodes I want to share with you some of the extraordinary breakthroughs from women just like you who attended Embrace 2022. Listen in for Part 1 of the transformations!

Embrace is now available on demand! You can learn more about the Embrace Self-Guided Retreat here.

Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Direct download: Org365-Embrace2022-Part1.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 8:00am EDT

It's time to add a new term to our organizing glossary: passive organizing.  I've said for years that it really takes three years to get organized, but the first 12-18 months are not easily recognized in that process. The reason is that this first chunk of time is spent in passive organizing.

What is passive organizing? Passive organizing is the time period during which you're becoming aware that maybe organization could help you become more productive. Maybe organization could help you get back your time. You're thinking, you're researching, and you're listening. This is passive organization. The change is happening in your mind, in your emotions, in your heart, and in your beliefs.

Passive organizing is the "pink" work of organizing. This is the time frame when you're working on yourself. You haven't committed to organizing, but you're gathering information and working on your mindset. You're thinking about the when, the how, and the order. You're deciding who you want your teacher to be. 

In passive organizing, you're consuming exorbitant amounts of information. Sometimes, this can cause information overload and paralysis. You might struggle to take action because you see the best in all the options. 

Let's take a little rabbit trail. The Kolbe Assessment is a quantitative test that helps you determine how you think. Among other things, it tells you how you leverage these three areas of thinking and processing in order to complete a project:

  • How much do you need to research something before you can do it?
  • How much structure do you need before you can take action?
  • How much do you need to talk before taking action?

I am a "quick start." I spend the majority of my time talking about a project and then the active work portion of the project comes out really quickly at the end. I verbally process everything and I change my mind a lot. My team on the other hand tends to be much higher in research and/or structure.

An example of this is how I wrote the book How ADHD Affects Home Organization. I completed the writing of the book in a weekend, but I spent two years preparing to write the book and talking about it first!

How much research, structure, and talking do YOU need before you can take action on getting organized? 

The other obstacle to deciding to get started with organing is having a tipping point. You have to reach a point when the pain of continuing to live in the current state of life is greater than the pain of change and learning a new skill to get the result you want. You have to realize that organization is a learnable skill. 

Another tipping point is a golden window. These are big life events: a milestone birthday, a new baby, a new house, a new job, a loss, a health diagnosis, etc. Many times, multiple big events happen at the same time. These are seasons of opportunity. Disorganization leads to more disorganization, but when you seize the opportunity, these are major turning points.

I want to remind you that I was once where you are. Back in 2012, I quit my teaching job, I was overweight, I was depressed, and everything was falling apart around me. You can read my story in Organization is a Learnable Skill and listen to my depression story in episode #69. I was negative and pessimistic. You would not have wanted to be my friend back then. What you see of me now is the after picture!

You must also believe that you can get organized. You must make a decision that you are now going to live proactively instead of reactively. This is where you draw a line in the sand and step over it.

And one day, you will find yourself listening to an Organize 365® Podcast episode and you just get up and start organizing while you listen instead of just gathering information!

Are you ready to draw your line and get started on your organizing journey?

Resources Mentioned in This Episode

Related Episodes

 

Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Direct download: Org365-501.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 8:00am EDT

Welcome to the newest Wednesday Podcast! On Wednesdays, I get to talk with members of the Organize 365 community as they share the challenges, progress, missteps, and triumphs along their organizing journey. You can see and hear transformation in action. I look forward to helping YOU get Organized!

This week, I am sharing my interview with Loren S. She lives with her boyfriend and her 10 houseplants. Loren describes herself as a natural "piler" but implementing the Sunday Basket® System means that she now has fewer piles around her home. She and her boyfriend participated in the Adult Spring Break Blitz by cleaning out and reorganizing their linen closet together. Loren also introduced me to The Conqueror Challenge, which is an app that gamifies exercise.

I do some teaching in my conversation with Loren about how to manage her Sunday Basket®. We talk about having only 5 slash pockets in each color and how to manage an ideas slash pocket for each color.

Loren shares how she tried to DIY a Sunday Basket® for herself before committing and purchasing the Sunday Basket® System. She found the extra teaching you get with the Sunday Basket® System precisely what she needed to mentally grasp the system and be successful. Is it time for you to make the commitment and purchase the Sunday Basket® System?

I am grateful that you are reaching out to share your stories and progress with me and with the Organize 365 community. If you are ready to share your story with us, please apply at https://organize365.com/wednesday.

For more information about the programs and products mentioned in this podcast please check out these links:

Related Episodes

I look forward to helping YOU get Organized!

 

Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Direct download: Org365-LorenS.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 8:00am EDT

One of the most impactful books I've ever read is The Slight Edge by Jeff Olson. This book taught me so much about consistency, well before Organize 365® was even an idea.

We've reached a major milestone with this episode here at Organize 365®. This episode is our 500th Friday podcast episode. This doesn't count the extra episodes we've done over the years with Wednesday Transformations, Coffee Chats, and more. Counting those would bring us to well over 700 episodes in total and you've downloaded these episodes over 16 million times as of July 2022.

Those numbers and that amount of content creation only come with consistency. In all these years, I've NEVER missed publishing a Friday episode!

I was in my late 20s or early 30s when first read The Slight Edge and it stuck with me. I didn't fully understand back then the impact of a habit over time. You don't see that until you look back later. I knew I had to find ways to unlock more time in my life. I dived deep into how organization could unlock more time for me. Now, with the creation and implementation of the Sunday Basket® System, YOU have collectively unlocked 3 million hours and counting in YOUR lives! Wow!

In this episode, I'm sharing quotes from The Slight Edge and things I learned from the book.

Here are some of my takeaways:

  • I had to see things in life not as being "to" me, but rather "for" me.
  • Consistency beats talent.
  • Most businesses take 10 years to really get started.
  • Things will take longer than you want, but you need to look at time differently. 
  • Stop looking for permission!
  • Podcasts that take breaks don't last.
  • I have higher self-standards now, but there are no "shoulds" and much more "grace" in my life.
  • Focus on what you can change.
  • Visionaries make people uncomfortable.
  • I'm odd. You probably are too.
  • There are fewer people to talk to as you move up.
  • You have to live more in your mind than in reality to see the next big thing happen.

It's time to stop filling your days with to-do lists and household tasks. Quit doing things that don't matter in the long term. Focus instead on being consistent in what WILL make a difference over time. Consistency beats talent, money, and pedigree every time.

I'd love to hear how you're using your extra time to do what you're uniquely created to do! Join me on a Wednesday Transformation episode, tag me on Instagram (@Organize365), or share your story in our community app.

Resources Mentioned in This Episode

 

Did you enjoy this episode? Please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast app. Share this episode with a friend and be sure to tag Organize 365® when you share on social media!

Direct download: Org365-500.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 8:00am EDT

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