More on Getting Organized

I’m finding out first hand just how important it is to get - and stay - organized. And how important it is to take the time to make a rational, logical plan using the information I’ve gathered.

A case in point: I spent most of yesterday working on the sales and thank-you pages for a resell rights book I bought as part of a package. The learning part of that is certainly valuable, but if I’d been paying attention to my own program, I would have known that putting that effort into thank you pages for the books I want to put on eBay would be time better spent.

The books in the resale package are books that I plan to sell from my website, not on eBay, and any potential of getting buyers to my web site depends on getting things listed on eBay. So my activities yesterday would have been better scheduled for later this week, after I get some eBay listings going.

Another ‘aha’ moment came when I was looking for a logon password for a membership site. I’m a great one for writing those things down on a scrap of paper, vowing to myself that I’ll put it somewhere I can find it later… Of course, later hasn’t come yet, so I’m pawing through piles of notes trying to find the one I need. I know I spend more time looking for stuff than it would take to organize in the first place.

So, today’s mission is to just plain get organized. I have all the tools - file folders, notebooks, dividers, tabs, etc., sitting in a corner where they got deposited the last time this inspiration struck - and then passed.

Think about how your desk looks, about how quickly you can find that site and password you discovered a couple of weeks ago. If, like me, it takes more than a minute or so to put your hands on it, you really need to get organized, too.