Well, it’s time for a detox, a deep cleansing, and a spring cleaning. Doing your taxes. Clearing and sorting your wardrobe. Getting rid of the magazines you’ve been unwittingly storing since college. What a wonderful release. Now, those are the big projects, and don’t worry yourself into trying to do them all at once. Just pick a project each month and do it a little at a time, or else set aside a whole weekend to blast through, whatever suits your style.
And for the rest of the month, take aim at the little, repetitive, everyday stuff. Work hard to make it a habit to sort your mail right away, clean out your pockets and purse every day, and dream up new ways to multitask effectively. Train yourself to make a difference in tiny ways all day long, and soon you’ll forget it’s an annoyance, because when it all adds up, you’re way ahead of the game. If you can coax yourself into making the art of organization second nature, I promise it will serve you forever.
Find Your Focus
You may not be able to foresee what the universe has planned for you, but that doesn’t mean your own plans should be unpredictable.
—SANDRA OLIVER
Sometimes I still lose my head, even though it is attached to my body. But if I’ve left myself a note, I can usually find it again.
—MARLO THOMAS
Detail is electric.
—BONNI GOLDBERG
To know where you can find a thing is the chief part of learning.
—UNKNOWN
Only when your consciousness is totally focused on the moment you are in can you receive whatever gift, lesson, or delight that moment has to offer.
—BARBARA DE ANGELIS
On clutter: chaos begets chaos in our homes, and in our minds.
—CAROL WISEMAN
A place for everything, and everything in its place.
—ISABELLA MARY BEETON
Just before bedtime prayers, evaluate each day. Make plans for tomorrow that will move you toward your long-range goal.
—FLORENCE S. JACOBSEN
Words are a lens to focus one’s mind.
—AYN RAND
Most of what you obtain in life will be because of your discipline. Discipline is perhaps more important than ability.
—CHRISTINE DARDEN
Never walk into or out of a meeting without a clear agenda.
—MARY JANE RYAN
Many a woman has a 'to-do' list that resembles the phone book! Don’t overdo your 'to-do' list. Keep it reasonable and keep it doable.
—LESLIE ROSSMAN
Write out your problem on a piece of paper, stick the paper in a drawer, and close it. Do not allow yourself to look at or think about the list until the end of the week. By then, you may look at your problems differently and will have solutions.
—MICHELLE STRONG
I don’t wait for moods. You accomplish nothing if you do that. Your mind must know it has got to get down to work.
—PEARL S. BUCK
Plan and Prepare
Look twice before you leap.
—CHARLOTTE BRONTË
The very best impromptu speeches are the ones written well in advance.
—RUTH GORDON
What I’ve learned from fairy tales: Invest in some good string rather than breadcrumbs. That way, you can always find the path back to the gingerbread house.
—WENDY ST. CHARLES
Failing to plan is planning to fail.
—EFFIE JONES
If one asks for success and prepares for failure, she will get the situation she has prepared for.
—FLORENCE SCOVEL SHINN
Don’t agonize. Organize.
—FLORYNCE KENNEDY
Plans are necessary to life and achievement in any sphere. But they should never overcome our powers of flexibility.
—DIXIE MARTIN
Lack of confidence is born from a lack of preparation.
—SHANNON WILBURN
Luck is a matter of preparation meeting opportunity.
—OPRAH WINFREY
You had better live your best and act your best and think your best today; for today is the sure preparation for tomorrow and all the other tomorrows that follow.
—HARRIET MARTINEAU
Winning is the science of being totally prepared.
—GRACIE ALLEN
Preparation, I have often said, is rightly two-thirds of any venture.
—AMELIA EARHART
Dream On!
Fantasies are more than substitutes for unpleasant reality; they are also dress rehearsals, plans. All acts performed in the world begin in the imagination.
—BARBARA GRIZZUTI HARRISON
What the world really needs is more love and less paperwork.
—PEARL BAILEY
If we would only give, just once, the same amount of reflection to what we want to get out of life that we give to the question of what to do with a two weeks’ vacation, we would be startled at the aimless procession of our busy days.
—DOROTHY CANFIELD FISHER
I want to so order my life that its impression, its impact, might always be positive and spiritually constructive.
—DOROTHY BROWN
For the happiest life, days should be rigorously planned, nights left open to chance.
—MIGNON MCLAUGHLIN
To stay ahead, you must have your next idea waiting in the wings.
—ROSABETH MOSS KANTER
All the flowers of all the tomorrows are in the seeds of today.
—PROVERB
Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble and logical plan never dies, but long after we are gone will be a living thing.
—LITA BANE
It’s never too late—in fiction or in life—to revise.
—NANCY THAYER
Take Your Life in
Your Own Hands
It’s true that life’s gifts come with responsibilities. When I don’t feel like cleaning up my desk or my car or my house or my general existence, I try to remember the people who would be desperate to have all the things I take for granted.
—RACHEL CLARKSON
You