Organization is one of the holy grails in this world of information overload: organizing bills, checking accounts, grocery lists, house expenses, email contacts, computer files, your junk drawer, your travel schedule, etc…. Have you ever felt like if you just had a super organization system all would be right with the world? You would be more successful at work, have a neater house, get in shape, have more friends, be happier in your love life and find more peace?
As a child I loved going with my grandmother to Tom Lawler’s, the local office supply store in our small town. Tom Lawler’s was a handsome limestone building with wrought iron windows, tall ceilings and gentle lighting that gave the feel of a hushed library rather than an Office Depot. Ahh, the smell… colored papers, pencils, stencils, rulers, file folders, notebooks. The smell of order. If I close my eyes I can imagine it, even today. Tom Lawler’s with my grandmother was a magical place.
What I especially loved were the divider pages for the notebooks: 8 plastic tabs in bright red, yellow, blue, and green. You could write on the small, perforated label and then slide it into the tabs. If I could just have the right notebook with colored tabs everything would be in place.
When I got older and took various professional trainings, I always found myself falling in love with the binders they handed out. All the information was neatly gathered in one place. My binder held all the answers. What a delicious feeling of control. Except when I got home those binders often sat on a shelf, inert and lifeless.
Recently a friend told me about a program to turn your life into the most amazing, fabulous, “over the top” life in every single way. Every participant in the program receives a very handsome binder. So seductive. But, if there’s one thing I’ve finally learned, after spending money on courses with notebooks, calendars and time management systems, it’s that just “having it all in order” does not get you where you are going.
Order and organization are really important in creating a life that will make you say YIPPEE! But creating a life you love is actually much more about knowing where you want to go and then taking the necessary steps get there. Creating your Yippee life is about understanding your destination and taking action.
In order to do this exercise, you don’t need the perfect notebook or a complicated system, you just need someplace to write – a blank piece of paper, a journal, an open word document, some sticky notes or a piece of scrap paper, plus your calendar.
The Ten Action Steps:
- Pick ONE area of your personal or professional life that you don’t feel YIPPEE about.
- Describe what you want this area of your life to look like a year from now. Put in as much detail as you want.
- Jot down a few phrases aboutwhy you want this.
- How will you feel when you reach this place? (Go a little crazy here.)
- Half-way there? What accomplishments or results will you have in 6 months? Be specific.
- Write a list of actions you will take in the next 30 days to move forward.
- Put those actions on your calendar (not a long to-do list)
- Make sure to do them!
- At the end of the month, find a way to CELEBRATE. Reevaluate your time period if you weren’t able to accomplish them all.
- Repeat, listing the actions for the next month and so on.
If you need help discovering that first step (what do you want, what will make you say YIPPEE!), come join us in Nashville November 1 & 2, 2013.
Do you know exactly what you want? Share it with us in the comment section below, so we can cheer you on. Sharing your plan is another great action steps to ensure that you keep on track.
Keep me posted on how things are going!
Until next Tuesday. YIPPEE!
Elizabeth