Peace of Mind Organizing

Focus on what you've accomplished, not what's yet to be done

29 August 2012

I did the first of what will be a number of team organizing jobs for a client recently. In that first session, my five-person team made some amazing progress. To me, it seemed like life-changing progress. I was thrilled.

At the end of the session, the client was happy, but didn’t seem over the moon. I chalked it up to her being tired after five hours of decision making.

Then I received a lovely note from her in which she explained that as happy as she was to get started in the process, at first all she could focus on was what was still left to be done.

That’s a common pitfall and just part of human nature. But, as a glass-half-full kind of gal, I so urge my clients (and you) to resist that temptation.

If you’re dealing with a large decluttering project, one way you can focus on what you’ve accomplished is to take before-and-after pictures. It can be a little emotionally difficult to take the before pictures if you’re living with severe clutter, that reminder of how things were can be helpful. Then take after pictures each step of the way and you’ll be able to see your progress.

You can create a private online album, so you have easy access to this valuable reminder of you what you’ve accomplished.

My client has decided to do this and, when the process is completed, to have a photo album printed of her journey. She’ll have every right to be proud. As she wrote to me,

After all, being clutter free will be one of the greatest accomplishments of my life.

A chilling (and cautionary) tale of hacking

27 August 2012

Mat Honan, a tech writer who writes for Wired magazine, recently was the victim of hacking. As a result, his MacBook Air, iPhone and IPad were wiped of all data (and he lost a year’s worth of photos) and Twitter account was taken over.

Honan details the episode—including how and why the hackers attacked him—in a riveting article on Wired’s website.

There are a couple of things in the article that surprised me. One is that the hackers’ whole goal was to take over his Twitter account, apparently they wanted his three letter Twitter handle, @mat. The wiping out of his computer and devices was just in support of that. Honan actually communicated with one of the hackers and found out just how they obtained his passwords. (And he shares the details in his article.)

The other thing that surprised me was that this knowledgeable tech writer did not back up his hard drive, something that is very easy to do on his MacBook. And he really ended up regretting that, since irreplaceable photos he’d taken of his young daughter were obliterated.

If you’re not already backing up your computer, read this and I think you’ll start. (I use Time Machine + CrashPlan Pro.) Also, the article details some weaknesses in Apple’s security, especially coupled with Amazon and Gmail.

Fascinating, if scary, reading.

ETA: Here’s an article in which Mat Honan details how he recovered much of his data (including his photos), to the tune of $1690.

App of the Week: IMDB

24 August 2012

I consider myself a bit of a movie/TV show savant. As bad as my short-term memory is getting as I age, I’m still hanging on to information about movies and shows and the actors who appear in them.

But even I need help sometimes. For more than a decade, I’ve relied on the Internet Movie Database or IMDB to give me the info I need on any movie or actor (or director, crew member, etc).

And now I have the database on my iPhone. The IMDB is a well designed portal to the massive entertainment database that powers IMDB. It’s easy to use. Attractive. And totally handy. I use it at least weekly, probably more often, when I’m trying to think of a name or title.

My only complaint with IMDB is that it makes my superpower of movie recall even less useful!

Go through those computer manuals

22 August 2012

One of the benefits of having a blog for six years is that you can see how often you do stuff. Back in March of 2009, I blogged about decluttering the ancient computer documentation I had in my office closet.

So I cleaned out my computer manuals then, and I did again in February 2011 when I revamped my office closet.

A couple of days ago, I needed to create some space in the magazine holders I used for computer-related paper and disks so that I could store some genealogy-related magazines. I decided to use a decorative box to hold the computer stuff. So I pulled it all out and was appalled to see that I had documentation for software and hardware are no longer in service in my life. (I got a new computer in September 2011.)

Why is it so hard to remember to get rid of that stuff when you switch computers? (That’s a rhetorical question.)

It felt great to reduce that clutter. When was the last time you went through your manuals and software? I bet if you worked on it for 15 minutes, you’d reduce it greatly.

Ditched the landline!

20 August 2012

Last month, I wrote that I was contemplating letting go of my landline, which felt like a huge move for me.

Well, it took me a little while, but I did it last week. I got all my ducks in a row and took the plunge. In the intervening month, I changed my phone number on my landline, email sig, newsletter template and business card. And I realized that no one (except political robocalls, solicitors and collectors of debts I don’t have) was calling my landline.

I ended up purchasing an over-the-head bluetooth headset with a boom mike (the VXI BlueParrott Roadwarrior B250-XT) that’s doing a great job of replacing my landline’s headset. I’m still getting used to keeping my phone with me all the time (though I recognize that I don’t have to always be available).

We still have a landline in the house, so we didn’t have to deal with the question of 911 service or what to do if the power goes out and I can’t charge my cell phone.

I have to tell you, I feel really good about saving about $70 a month. If I regret my decision, I promise to post here. But for now, I feel very modern and youthful.

How my iPhone simplifies my life

17 August 2012

After I’d had my iPhone 4S for six weeks, I wrote a love letter to it. Four months later, I still adore it. And I don’t take it for granted. I consciously think about how much I love my iPhone at least once every couple of days.

Today I was thinking about how many things it replaces. I used to carry all this stuff in my purse:

• Phone
• Camera
• GPS
• Paper notebook
• Flash drive

My load is lightened, which is great. Even better, the iPhone replacement is typically easier to use than the original. Here’s how those items have been improved upon by my iPhone:

• The phone itself is a dream. It automatically syncs with my Address Book on my computer, so I can easily dial anyone who was entered there in the last ten or so years. (And if they call me and they’re in my address book, the iPhone lets me know it’s them calling or leaving voicemail.)

• I use my phone’s camera all the time, way more than I used the digital camera that I used to carry with me. And I don’t have to download them from the camera. The phone does that automatically.

• I use the Maps app on my phone if I need directions or want to check traffic (something I couldn’t do on my UPS).

• Thanks to my beloved Siri I can dictate notes, rather than pulling out a notebook, finding a page and jotting the note. (With Siri, whatever I dictate is transcribed.) If I don’t want to dictate, I can use type on the touchscreen on my phone. If I want to create a to-do list, I use Wunderlist.

• DropBox gives me easy access to files I’ve stored in the cloud, so I don’t have to carry around a flash drive if I need access to certain files.

I love watching futuristic movies, like Minority Report). And, with my iPhone 4S, I feel like the future is here. I know many more wonderful things are coming and in as little as two years I’ll look back on this note and laugh at how easily thrilled I was.

But for now, I’m just grateful. iPhone: I love you.

"Collectibles" may not be worth keeping

15 August 2012

Every now and then, I run across collectibles in clients’ homes. They’re usually packed away and rarely on display. And the client usually has high hopes that if she hangs on to them long enough, the items will end up selling for a good deal of money. I don’t know much about collectibles and offer no counsel when they come up.

Today, I came across article about collectibles on TheStreet.com called 9 Completely Worthless Collectibles that confirmed my suspicions that these collectibles do little more than take valuable storage space. The article was written a couple of years ago, but it’s hard to imagine that conditions have changed.

If you collect Beanie Babies, Precious Moments figurines or Norman Rockwell plates, or other such collectible items, you might want to take a look at the article.

My favorite line is this:

“I tell people that keeping collectibles is like storing money under your mattress,” says Lou Kahn, head of the Bakerstowne Collectibles appraisal and consignment service in West Hempstead, N.Y. “You’re going to have the same amount of money next year, but it’s going to be worth a lot less.”