Organize 365 Podcast

It is so important to know the kind of tasks you have, how much time they take you, and where you need to be to complete them! Then when you look at your calendar you know where you can plug them in. After a couple weeks of this repeated activity, your brain will start to anticipate these activities and you'll be in your Pro Era. Blue Orange Purple If you are anything like I was, you have very long lists with not enough time or money to complete them all. I started with the Sunday Basket®, identifying and categorizing with the slash pockets. Then I had to figure out where and when I could get them done. I have my blue work which is all my weekly invisible work like calendaring, budgeting, getting ready for the next week of school (when my kids were younger), mail, you get the idea. Then I have Orange work which is my house work like food, laundry, and cleaning. And then I have my purple work which is a larger project, in this case errands. In order to time block your tasks, start by identifying which tasks fit into those three categories; invisible work, housework, and errands. How Much Time Do They Take & Where Do You Need To Be As I budgeted my time, I got really good at knowing how long each task would take. This made it easier for me to know how many tasks I could fit into any open block of time. I was always in the car, at a doctor's appointment, or working so I had to make the most of any "free time," once I discovered blocks of time I would write in the tasks I would do. Keep in mind that not all tasks are created equally; they require different amounts of time and different kinds of energy from you. Calendaring these blocks of time became a visual representation of the invisible work I was doing and it gave boundaries for these tasks to get completed. Once you have claimed these time blocks, protect them so you can actually get your tasks done. Obviously my orange work had to be done at my house. Pretty hard to vacuum from the soccer field. And there is a reason that there is a portable Sunday Basket® because then you can bring your blue work with you. You can go through slash pockets in your car, at the pool, or at a doctor's office. I know, because I did! And when it came to errand day (purple work) I knew where the farthest away stops were and I started there. That way, if my kids needed to go home the remaining stops were closer to my home when I did them later. Some of you really have no free time like me when my kids were younger. I found a way to make it work and I want to encourage you that you can too. Going Pro You need to be aware of your highest productivity energy during the day. I realized my energy is highest for physical tasks in the morning. My body knows on Saturday morning I'm going to get a cup of coffee and soon after I almost look forward to getting all of my machines going. Your body starts to expect these "work times." It's a cadence you have gotten your body used to, almost like muscle memory. And I know I have more cognitive energy later in the day so I used to do my Sunday Basket® in the afternoon but I have changed that to late morning now. You have to adjust your tasks and time blocking to your phase of life. And this task stacking acts as scaffolding to our brains. Our brains love structure. The Sunday Basket® creates a weekly cycle that can evolve into a yearly cycle when you add in Planning Day and the Productive Home CEO Sessions. EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Paper Solution® The Productive Home Solution Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter 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.

Thought leaders have thinking time. There is a difference between remembering and thinking. Thinking is that time when you mull through all your thoughts and plans. Maybe you merge them to find a solution to a problem or see where one decision could benefit your family or home. A visionary, a thought leader takes time to think to better plan the trajectory of their organization even if it's just for their home. Mission Vision Values In 2012, after I'd been in business for 5 years, I took advantage of a 5 hour flight to CA and the returning flight to think. It was on those plane rides that I solidified Organize 365®'s mission statement which is: Organize 365® helps you get functionally organized in one calendar year so that you can do what you are uniquely gifted and created to do. Then I identified our values being positivity, abundance, proactivity, and that everything is easier in community. The old theory was that it took 10,000 hours to become an expert at something. And if we use a 40 hour work week, it takes roughly 5 years to accomplish said 10,000 hours. And I've observed that, generally speaking, every 5 year cycle we use our experiences and lessons learned and apply them to our lives. When I wrote "Escaping Quicksand", I shared all of my lived experiences to help others escape their own quicksand with the lesson and mindset shifts I've made along the way. Ain't Nobody Got Time to Think In your 20's and 30's you are so busy doing that you never really take time to stop and think. Then you hit 40 and life has gotten away from you. You put your foot down and decide to simplify life and start saying no to stuff. No to projects you don't have time for, no to people that are energy vampires, no to requests on your time. And in my 40's is when I took my life back. I wrote all about it in "Organization is a Learnable Skill". I shared all of the emotions I was going through at the time. I needed thinking time. But first I had to get my house in order. When All Is Accounted for I Can Think I started with the Sunday Basket®. A safe place to store all my thoughts till Sunday or till life demanded I addressed them. I hate admin work just as much as the next. But it has to get done so I can keep my car and the lights on in my house, ya know? And the Sunday Basket® helps me to exhibit delayed neglect of requests. Often, the request will take care of itself or the circumstances have changed so the request has changed. And each minute before completion of whatever the task is, is more time to think about the answer and listen to my intuition. So why do we resist the Sunday Basket®? You may say the Sunday Basket® is too regimented or like another thing you have to do. And I hear you BUT, I'd rather have time set aside to do those things once a week than those piddly tasks taking up any of my project time or thinking time. Because I don't like that even more! So the Sunday Basket® holds everything safely for me and gives my brain peace so I can think. I know everything is completed or accounted for due to the Sunday Basket® and now I can think expansively. I love my time with me. No input from family or my team, just me, myself, and I… thinking. EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Escaping Quicksand Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter 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.

I want you to be able to set your sights on a few projects and actually complete them each trimester. So here's the way I get my projects identified, scheduled, and completed. I love a good project, always have. What Are The Projects? First, let's define "project" in Organize 365® terms. It's a massive to do list that gets done in a short amount of time. So, for Labor Day, I shared all the things that had ended up on index cards that I wanted done on Labor Day weekend. I had garage tasks like clean off the garage counter, make room for a potential Christmas gift, drop off donations, fix the front door situation plus a few other things. Then Joey needed me to look at some stuff in his condo that I wanted to check off my list. Abby and I planned on redoing Grayson's room. And wanted to transition one of the storage areas to Abby. Those tasks were grouped into my four projects. Be Prepared Once all of the projects were identified, I needed to make sure I had all the supplies I needed to tackle each one. Leading up to Labor Day I mentioned this too, you need to be prepared before Project Day. So for redoing Grayson's room, I thought through all of the supplies I needed and how I would get them to the house. I needed to check current supplies at the house, coordinate Greg picking up items from the office, order some pictures for the walls and bedding, and schedule the electrician to change the light fixture. It can really rob time away from your project day if you plan that day to get what you need and depending on store hours, it can really delay the project start time. Also, a friendly reminder to start that housework early so you don't have to do that too on project day. Make Room on the Calendar It's time for calendaring!! It's important to identify chunks of time that you will have for your projects and it's equally important to consider your usual energy at the time of those chunks. There was one I was explaining and said "Actually I'll push that to Sunday so I can spend time with my family on Saturday." It's a good idea to mentally walk through project day and make sure it's right for you and your family. And don't double book yourself. Don't just think you'll do the project in that chunk of time, schedule it. Write in the project on that day so you don't accidentally commit to something else at that time. You gotta budget your time like you do your finances because you really can't spend your money in two ways. This is your way to be proactive with your time. I say you basically get 8 hours extra, not three days, when it comes to these long weekends? Here's how I broke down of the 8 hours I anticipated from Labor Day: Garage & Front Door 3.5 hrs Joey 2 hrs Grayson's Room 1.5 hrs Storage Area 1.5 hrs This is how you get deep work or projects done as a household project manager. EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter 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.

So how do you get project time? You must write all "I need to remember to do that" tasks down and have a scheduled time, routinely, to do them. Your brain will trust you and you, my friend, will have project time. Capture Everything First you must capture everything you need to remember to do. I do this by a good brain dump putting one item per index card. Break up any to do lists, again writing one item on an index card. I go through my email and text messages. This is cognitive offloading, taking the thing you need to remember and placing it in your environment. You could do this digitally or email yourself or something but index cards work the best for me. Plan of Attack I was vulnerable and read all of the to do's I need to do in this episode. And then I shared how I plan to complete them. There were a few things I needed to put in my google calendar, a few things I needed to print, and a few financial tasks. All on the computer and I estimated roughly 40-60 minutes for those tasks during my Sunday Basket time. That is task stacking. Do like tasks at one time, to save time. There are somethings that need to be done before Sunday and they will live on my counter like talking to Abby, my daughter, about a class for my grandson. Joey, my son, has some stuff we need to look at, at his house. So I will do that the same day we go to Verizon to get him a new phone and talk to them about my bill. Because I have clumped like tasks together, some get addressed and some get placed in my Sunday Basket, I am unlocking small pocket of time that when added up are project time. Gain the Trust of Your Brain The reason you are always in panic of forgetting to do something is because you do not have a designated time set aside for all the tasks you are trying to remember. First write them all down to free up cognitive capacity for new things that come your way. And second, commit to your Sunday time so you can gain the trust of your brain and quiet the chaos of your braining panicking trying to remember everything. Because even if you write the tasks down but do not do them, the brain will continue to not trust you knowing you will not actually address all of the items you wrote down. Learn the habit of task stacking so you can enjoy project time. EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter 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.

You understand the value of money but do you concretely understand the value of your time? I'm breaking down how much your time is worth and the value of the time you are saving managing your house with the Sunday Basket®. The Value of Your Home in the American Economy As consumers, home small businesses, we contribute roughly 19-21 trillion dollars to the American GDP. That's 68% of 32 trillion dollars!!! Bet you thought it was all the big companies on the stock market - wrong! Where we spend our money matters. Having a plan in place matters too. But do you prioritize making the plan of that spending? The Value of You in Your Home Let's say in your 20's you can get a job for roughly $20/hr. And in your 50's for roughly $50/hr. This is just for example sake. Ok and it's been said many times that an hour spent planning is five hours saved in execution. So then I say, ok, you take one hour to process your Sunday Basket® which equals 5 hours of time saved due to planning and batching all the small administrative and managerial tasks into one chunk of time. So, if you put yourself making $20/hr. You save $100 worth of time each week or if you like the $50/hr. better (or you give yourself a raise for improvement of implementation of the Sunday Basket over time), it's like $250 worth of time saved each week. $400-$1000/ mo.!! You are valuable! Six Weeks after you purchase your Sunday Basket® we start a clock. We estimate five hours saved per week per Sunday Basket® owner which over time has accumulated to 15.5 MILLION hours of time saved since the Sunday Basket® has been available. I was like what is that in monetary value? It's $310,000,000 at $20/hr. Can you believe that? When you know how much your time is worth and the value of the Sunday Basket, you will make the time, 90 min on Sunday, to save time, 5 hours each week. One more component to the effectiveness of the Sunday Basket® is making the way you are spending your time visible. You won't write down on your schedule to be in two places at once just like you can only spend money one time. It helps you to prioritize what goes in each time block and helps you to see if you need to reschedule in the event you verbally double book yourself. Community Feedback A community member wrote in with her "ah-ha" about the Organize 365® Systems. She noted that each system has periodic review maintenance. Like when we do prep for Planning Day. She pointed out how your brain gets little reminders of what you have and where it is during these maintenance activities. Your brain doesn't have to worry because there's a weekly review with the Sunday Basket® and a review each trimester for the long term archiving of paper work and projects. So your mind stays soothed. Next week we'll continue in this 4 week series about task stacking. EPISODE RESOURCES: The Sunday Basket® The Paper Solution® The Productive Home Solution Sign Up for the Organize 365® Newsletter 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.