Staying Organized | Student Blog

I once read that organization isn’t about perfection: rather, it is about efficiency, reducing stress and clutter, saving time and money, and improving your overall quality of life.

These perks of organized living are what led me to become part of the organized lifestyle. In order to become more efficient and orderly, I first identified my main issues that either delayed my days or prevented me from accomplishing specific tasks on time or without much stress. These issues included a messy room, unorganized files, lost items, time-wasting, and lack of planning. In order to fix or at least better these issues that were holding me back from being organized and efficient, here are the four routines I implemented into my life:

1. Waking up early

I know it is hard, but the first step to being more organized is having more productive time, and the best way to get this time is by waking up early. Now, to you night owls: I feel for you, as I have been one of you since I was 13 years old. However, as much as I wanted to convince myself that I could get just as much done at night as I could in the morning, it just isn’t true. After long days, from 9 in the morning to 11 at night filled with rehearsals, classes, coachings, lessons, and more, it is nearly impossible to be fully functional in order to get more done. Rather than staying up all night trying to get work done with an exhausted brain, waking up the next morning from a good night's sleep and having a light breakfast will make it much easier to focus, prepare, and finish work/organization for the upcoming day. Now, in order to wake up from the most comfortable place in the world, aka your bed, I recommend planning something exciting for the morning. The things that make it much easier to lose my sleepy sense of warmth and comfort quickly is something to put a jump in my step like an exciting correspondence, good news, or a message from someone I care about or something I will get to do that day. It is important to figure out what excites you as this is the crucial thing to keep you from hitting SNOOZE on your alarm and falling back asleep.

2. Cleaning

The second step I took to promote an easier time keeping things clean and orderly is taking 5 to 10 minutes everyday (usually in the morning or evening) to clean up everything that I may have left out during the day. Doing this prevents a four-hour cleaning session on Sunday and studies show that a clean space allows your mind to stay decluttered through the week as well. Since implementing this, I find that I have gotten into a natural habit of keeping things tidy and I never feel like I have a struggle with keeping things clean like I used to.

3. Scheduling

After cleaning I have found that it is a tremendous benefit to review and schedule your entire day out. I like to practice a technique called schedule blocking which is basically when someone blocks out every single minute of the day with everything they need to do. This means that I include eating, personal, work, school, professional, and other times. This allows me to get a true sense of how much free time I really have. Even though I don’t have much free time currently, whatever time I do have I usually use my third technique, which is to schedule my to-do list. Having a to-do list is extremely beneficial and will help you remember and complete important tasks. Something I learned about many to-dos, however, is that unless they are scheduled ahead of time, they won’t be completed simply because they need a specific amount of allotted time. Therefore, I use my open time windows in my blocked schedule to fit in these to-dos and accomplish them rather than holding off on them and never really getting them done.

4. Keep yourself busy!

My last, yet certainly not least tip is to keep yourself on a busy schedule. I find that with more free time, I end up being less productive. Rather than accomplishing things, I can end up reverting to Netflix, naps, or other time-wasters. That is why now, I make sure I am busy throughout the day with rehearsals, coachings, meetings, rehearsals, etc. I have also learned that being busy has left me less time to feel negative. By being busy I don’t get lonely, as tired until the end of the day, or sad for no reason. I feel motivated, energized, and happy when I am at my busiest.

I hope these few tips will help you live the more productive lifestyle you have been dreaming of. See you in the next blog!

XoXo
Maggie