Sherry Borsheim

Oct 21

Organizing Your Closet Twice a Year Can Help Your Favorite Charity!

By Sherry Borsheim Blog, Closet Organizing, Home Organizing, Inspiration, Quick Organizing Tips, Resources No Comments

Closet organization is best done in the fall and spring time. When the weather is changing you naturally want to switch over your clothes plus it’s the best time to purge and reorganize your closets. You’ll stress less each morning when your closet is beautifully organized and key items are at your fingertips!

Before you begin switching over your clothes, take a few minutes to decide on what you are going to do with items that no longer fit, you haven’t worn in the past year, clothes kids have outgrown or you have too much of and it’s time to pare down. If you’re downsizing find out how much closet space you’ll have in your new home. Whatever your situation, here’s some closet organization tips to consider.

Pick Your Charity or Non-Profit

Before you switch out your clothes for the warmer or colder season, research one to three places you will donate clothes and other items to. For women’s business clothes donate to Dress for Success. For baby, maternity and children’s clothes look for women’s shelters in your area or churches. And there are many other charities in your area that will pick up your items for you. If you’re going to consign clothes you need to be thinking 6-12 months in advance to get an appointment in a lot of cities. So plan ahead. Then get a box and/or bags and label it with the name of the charity.

Schedule Time to Drop-off at Charities and Non-Profits

Next, schedule time in your calendar to drop off the clothing to the charities or non-profits you want to support. This accomplishes two things –you set a completion date for organizing your closet(s) and getting the charity items out of your home.

Non-profits Always Have a Wish List!

Call organizations you want to support and ask them what kind of items they are looking for. I always ask them for their “wish list” and keep that on hand for when I come across items they need. You can do the same and share that list with your friends. Sheway House is a Vancouver Women’s shelter and some items on their wish list are crockpots, tea kettles, hot plates, baby toys, strollers, maternity clothes and baby clothes size 0-3 years. And often times, non-profits have their wish lists already posted on their website. You’d be amazed how many times during the year you’ll come across an item that you know your favorite charity really needs.

Brighten Someone’s Day!

Dropping off good quality clothes and items brings a big smile on the volunteers face! Oh the happy feel good stories I could share with you. Like the time I was parking and saw a young lady looking in a dumpster for house items and I happened to have six large pages of clothes. I asked what she was looking for and she was setting up her very first apartment. I mentioned that I had some new containers that I wanted to give her several bags of clothes. She thought she had won the lottery and they were all in her size. As I shared the story with my client, we were both in tears of joy.

What to Let Go Of

Most people have a number of items in their closet that have not been worn for a long time. For the most part, these items are just taking up valuable space. Anything that no longer fits should be placed on consignment or donated to charity. Additionally, any items that have not been worn for a year or longer should simply be given away.

Go through every piece of clothing in all your closets and ask yourself “Do I love this?”, “Does it fit?”, “Does it look great on me?”, “When was the last time I actually wore this?”

Letting go is so freeing. And you’ll be able to see what’s in your closet and spend less time getting ready each morning. Plus, less stuff means, less work maintaining all your stuff!

Aug 27

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procrastination, procrastinating, time-wasters, scheduling tasks, getting things done

Top 10 Tips to Beat Procrastination (Part 1 of 3)

By Sherry Borsheim Blog, Business Organizing, Free Articles, Home Office Organization, Home Organizing, IABO Weekly News, Quick Organizing Tips, Resources, Time Management No Comments

As I’m writing this article the stopwatch on my iPhone is set for 30 minutes to complete this article. Then I’ll take a 5 minute break, come back and set the stopwatch for another 30 minutes to upload on my blog, send to my S.O.S. Newsletter community and post this to my social media. I have allowed myself an extra 30 minutes for editing and troubleshooting in case any technical issues come up. So that’s a total of 1.5 hours from beginning to end to complete this task. Oh and before I even started this article, I posted on Facebook that this article was coming in a few hours. So, talk about beating procrastination!

What is Procrastination?

According to Wikipedia, procrastination is ”the practice of carrying out less urgent tasks in preference to more urgent ones, or doing more pleasurable things in place of less pleasurable ones, and thus putting off impending tasks to a later time.”

Yes, I see how procrastination as crept into my day on certain tasks because it’s a lot more fun to do the pleasurable tasks. Can you relate to this? I’m sure I’m not alone.

Missing opportunities, being late for work, class, meetings or other appointments creates undo stress, overwhelm, guilt and often times resentment from those who were waiting for us and these are just some of the symptoms. And what about the physical and mental impact this has on our body and mind.

How about all the times you said you would do something for someone else? Or all the times you promised yourself that you would take time to go for a walk, exercise, eat healthier meals and take time for yourself.

So What Are You Procrastinating On?

I’ll share with you one task I procrastinated on for years. The night before my bookkeeper would come to my office, I’d be stressed, frustrated and up till 2:00am and then get up early the next morning to finish the task. When I first started my business it was growing fast and I didn’t have all my business systems in place. Plus, I didn’t know what I needed to have in place. For years I made the mistake of scheduling in my calendar “Get ready for Bookkeeper” and proceeded to procrastinate. Hmmm…I wonder why?

Well, I don’t like the task and its low on my priority list, but it’s a necessity as a business owner and I don’t like the penalties and late fees if I’m late on my reporting. One day I said enough stress and last minute drama and I opened up a calendar event in Gmail and proceeded to write down all the tasks involved in “Get ready for Bookkeeper.” Wow, there were a lot of tasks and it always took a lot longer to do than I had scheduled for.

One of the tasks in preparing for the meeting with my bookkeeper was to print off receipts from all my online services so she could match them up to my credit card statement, merchant account and bank statement. In Canada, it’s a requirement to have printed receipts and this is such a time consuming task. So, I bookmarked all the login pages and created a folder on my browser toolbar called “Finance” and a sub folder called “Month End”. I also typed out all the tasks in my Gmail appointment and made it recurring once a month.

Do you know how much time that has saved me over the years and it can be totally delegated. Stress levels are reduced significantly whenever I see the task in my Calendar now and there are only a few tasks that I need to do and the rest are delegated. When I see the task “Month End – Prepare for Bookkeeper” I simply open up the task and all the next action steps are planned out and a click away.

Tip #1 – Your Calendar is Your Stress Reducer

Your calendar is your stress reducer and a place to get things out of your head and onto paper or into your electronic calendar. Take it a step further and write in the amount of time you think the task will take. Than double the time and schedule a more realistic time-frame into your calendar. Refer to your calendar often to see what the next step is.

Tip #2 – Get Clear on the Next Step

Often times, we procrastinate on a task or big project because we are unclear about what the next action step is. You’ve heard the saying “you can’t eat an elephant in one bit.” Well the same is true for getting things done whether it’s a small task or a big project. If you are procrastinating on a getting something done, take a time out, and write out all the tasks that are required to get that task or project to completion.

Many times when we have a task in our calendar like “go to gym,” organize garage,” “launch new product,” “return phone call,” or “get taxes to accountant” there are probably several tasks inside the task that need to be done first. Get clear on the next step and schedule each task with the appropriate amount of time.

Tip #2 – Delegate or Streamline Unpleasant Tasks

Sometimes it’s just not a pleasant task to do and you simply don’t want to do it. We can come up with all kinds of reasons to procrastinate on the task. When all you need to do is ask yourself “What is the next action step?” When you are clear on the next steps that is what you schedule into your calendar. When you look at your calendar it’s easier to see yourself actually completing the task at the specified time and less chance of procrastinating.

Create a recurring appointment in your calendar and list all the tasks inside the appointment. Include any links to documents, websites and resources that you may need to complete the task. Set yourself up to succeed at completing the task.

Tip #4 – Build in Accountability

Setting boundaries, building in accountability and creating realistic time frames is a great first step to set you up for success, change a habit and beat procrastination.

Action Required: What will you do today to set yourself up for success and beat procrastination? Leave your comments below.

In part two, we’ll discuss other topics like perfectionism which is a big and a huge time-waster that steels away our time. Stay tuned next week.

Aug 20

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Best Clutter Busters for Home Organization

By Sherry Borsheim Blog, Free Articles, Home Organizing No Comments

One of the best ways to eliminate clutter is to use the “one-in, one-out rule.” If you want to get and stay organized, this best practice is one of the best clutter busters for home organization that can change your life, free up more space and that you can implement immediately!

What Does This Rule Mean?

The one-in, one-out rule is a general rule of thumb or best practice to keep clutter from piling up. If you keep bringing in more stuff into your home and run out of space to store all your new purchases, the stuff will start to pile up. When things pile up, the piles attract more stuff and before you know it, your home has clutter everywhere. Notice how things tend to pile up every available flat surface.

You may even say “oh, I’ll just put it down here for now and deal with it later.” But as we both know, later doesn’t come and the stuff keeps coming into the house and gets added to the piles if not dealt with immediately. It’s a vicious cycle when the “one-in, one-out rule” is not used on a regular basis.

How Do You Apply This Rule?

You might relate to this shoe scenario. You’re at a shoe sale and you come home with one or two new pairs of shoes. Your shoe racks are already full and you may even have out of season shoes tucked away or stored in another room. You bring your shoes and decide that the best solution is to buy another basket. A month later, you come home with another pair of shoes and add them to the pile on the floor or to the overflowing basket.

Before you know it you have a mountain of shoes and you can’t get to your clothes. So you decide to get organized and start sorting your shoes. You tell yourself that you wear all your shoes or you might need them someday when in reality you only wear 20% of your favorite shoes 80% of the time. Sure, you’ll have some fancy shoes for going out or seasonal shoes for summer or winter and that’s ok. After a several hours of trying to organize your shoes you give up and decide to keep all your shoes.

Letting Go Can Make a Difference

At some point you need to realize that you only have so much space in your home and on your shelves. Letting go of something isn’t always easy, but choose to focus on how something old is something new for someone else. When you bring something new into your home and give something away to someone else, you are making a difference in that other person’s life! The stories I could share with you when I gave items away to those in need would bring tears to your eyes I’m sure. Clutter busting tips are a life skill you can easily learn and pass onto your children.

Clutter busters for home, like applying the one-in, one-out rule, is just one way to eliminate the clutter and piles and you can pass on items to family or friends, someone in need, or donate to a charity that is near and dear to your heart. Letting go can be very fulfilling and cleansing at the same time! The next time you bring home a new pair of shoes, let go of a pair that are uncomfortable and you don’t like wearing, hurt your feet or are scuffed up beyond repair. It’s time to let them go and make room for something new.

Also, don’t let your out-going items pile up in your home and get them out of the house as quickly as possible. You can apply the one-in, one-out rule to articles of clothing, kitchen gadgets, books, magazines, tools, office supplies, and so much more.

Whenever possible, when you bring something new into your home, practice this clutter busting tip by donating, recycling or tossing items that no longer fit, are broken, you don’t wear, don’t use or does not enhance your quality of life. And get to know where donation bins, drop-offs centers and recycling depots are in your area and watch the piles in your home.

Where will you practice the one-in, one-out rule in your home?