Peace of Mind Organizing

Five Decisions Away

16 November 2011

Matt Paxton is one of the extreme cleaners on A&E TV’s Hoarders TV show. I had the opportunity to assist him last summer in the taping of an episode. (I’ll be sure and post here when I know when it will air.)

I left that experience a huge Matt Paxton fan. The guy is unpretentious, straight-forward and, most of all, deeply caring. Boy does he care about his hoarding clients. And he’s also a load of fun. Here’s a photo we took that day.

Can you tell it was really hot out that day?

Matt, who is the author of the book The Secret Lives of Hoarders: True Stories of Tackling Extreme Clutter now has a weekly podcast called Five Decisions Away. I downloaded and listened to all three episodes yesterday and want to recommend it to my blog readers.

The podcast is both deep and funny. It’s also both (sometimes very) crude and insightful. I have to admit that I had to fast forward over certain parts because they were so gag-inducing (descriptions of conditions in which he and his staff have worked). But I know I’ll listen avidly to each episode as soon as it’s released. Matt’s a unique guy with an interesting perspective.

You can subscribe to the podcast via the iTunes store (it’s free) or you can listen to it on his personal blog, also called Five Decisions Away.

Check it out!

Happy blogiversary to me!

11 November 2011

Yesterday was the 5th anniversary of my blog. I can’t believe that I’ve been writing this blog for five years. In that time I’ve created 612 posts. (This is the 613th.) That’s quite a few words!

A year ago on my blog’s anniversary, I blogged about my favorite posts of each year. This year, I’ll add my favorite post of 2011 (so far). It’s:

• Interested in becoming a professional organizer? I wrote this post to help answer a frequently asked question about how to become a PO. The reason I love the post so much is that my wonderful colleagues pitched in comments to make the article even more useful. And it’s also saved me lots of time answering emails—I just point people to the post!

My blog has served me well and I’m so glad I decided to start it back in 2006, when I really didn’t know that much about blogging. I’m a former freelance writer, so the writing part of it didn’t intimidate me. When I started blogging, my intentions were to create some valuable content while helping clients and prospective clients get to know me better. Those goals haven’t really changed.

My blog has taught me discipline and the value of routines. I try hard to blog on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. I don’t always manage to do all three posts each week, but most weeks I do.

Thanks to my blog, I see things through a different lens. Everything is a possible blog post and while I’m experiencing something, I’ll sometimes write (in my head) the first line of a blog post about it.

I’m proud to be a blogger and I’m really tickled that I’ve reached the five-year mark.

Some great writing on clutter

9 November 2011

Janet Barclay who is a professional-organizer-turned-virtual-assistant has an Professional Organizers Blog Carnival every month. She sets a theme and invites organizers who blog to submit blog posts on the theme.

This month, the theme is clutter. As you might imagine, Janet was inundated with submissions. I’m proud to be one of the bloggers included (I submitted my 2009 blog post called Standards of Clutter).

There’s some great reading on the list, which includes some really talented organizer-bloggers. Grab a cup of tea (or your beverage of choice), go to the blog carnival and enjoy!

When I was in Toronto last week at the Professional Organizers in Canada conference, I got to meet Janet Barclay in person for the first time. As you can see by our smiles in the photo below, we were both thrilled to meet, after years of knowing one another online!

Janet Barclay and me at the POC conference, November 2011

Creating habits and routines

7 November 2011

If you read this blog with any regularity, you know that I’m practically fanatical about the benefits of good habits and routines.

This morning I appeared on the local live TV morning program, Great Day St. Louis to talk about creating good habits and breaking bad ones. Here’s the video.

Four or five minutes is nowhere near long enough for the topic (just ask the folks who enrolled in my three-lesson Simplify101 Habits + Routines workshop), but I got to touch on some of my favorite points. I had a great time—the interviewer, Carol Daniels, is loads of fun and so welcoming.

Some great tools for new organizers

2 November 2011

Part of me is jealous of people who are starting their organizing businesses now. Of course, the economy isn’t the greatest. But compared to 2005 when I started my business, there are so many resources available, at a reasonable rate, to help people get started.

Case in point: my friend Geralin Thomas, CPO-CD® of Metropolitan Organizing offers a variety of downloadable forms and information that I would have given my eye teeth for when I was starting out.

She offers the New Organizer Essentials forms a packet of customizable forms that take a lot of the mystery out of getting started. The thirteen-page document comes in three parts: The phone consult, the in-person assessment, and activity/homework log. Geralin also sells a client agreement form and a client invoice form. The whole bundle is $100.

What I like about the NOE forms is that they provide a guideline, but if there are items on the forms not relevant to your region or clientele, you can simply delete them. You can add your logo, add your own questions, do whatever you want to make them your own.

To make them even more valuable, Geralin is offering a group teleclass on getting the most out of the forms. Geralin teaches the Starting An Organizing Business class for NAPO (as well as Introduction to Professional Organizng). She knows how to teach. Geralin’s also available for one-on-one coaching with new organizers.

Geralin recently started offering a group of checklists that beginning and veteran organizers alike will find useful. The Professional Organizers Toolkit offers seven lists of essential supplies to use during your organizing sessions. Going to work in a hoarding situation? The hoarding list will tell you what supplies you need to bring. Organizing an office? There’s a list for that. Again, Geralin’s all about taking the mystery out of doing a great job. At only $10 the Professional Organizers Toolkit is a steal.

There are so many great tools and educational opportunities out there for new organizers to get started so they can figure how to create a wonderful business. I love when veteran organizers like Geralin are willing to give them that jump start.

The holiday season is almost upon us!

31 October 2011

If you’re on the east coast, it probably felt more like Christmas than Halloween with the blanket of snow that fell.

The holidays are just around the corner. (Less than four weeks until Thanksgiving!) I urge you to do as much, but no more, than you want to do in terms of holiday prep and decorating. If you do like to decorate, give gifts and entertain at holiday time, now’s the time to start getting ready.

My friend and superstar organizer, Aby Garvey of Simplify 101 has a 28-day Get Your Home Ready for the Holidays Challenge going on on her blog. Today is just Day 5, so if you’ve been thinking it’s time to get started and you’d like a step-by-step approach, I urge you to check it out.

Aby does an amazing job of making things fun and beautiful while urging you to be kind to yourself. So if you’re a holiday type of person (and, in truth, I’m not, so I won’t be taking part), you might find the challenge really beneficial!

Inspiration from the Cardinals

28 October 2011

I’m not necessarily a big baseball fan. But when my hometown team, the St. Louis Cardinals, is playing post-season, I watch. And boy has it been thrilling.

Last night’s Cardinals 10-9 victory over the Texas Rangers in Game 6 of the World Series (which tied the series 3-3) was a heck of a game, a real roller coaster ride. And the Cardinals offered up all sorts of inspiration in that game:

• Never give up. The Cardinals were within one strike of losing the game — and the World Series — not once but twice in this game. Each time, they rallied back with tremendous hits (in the 9th inning by David Freese, in the 10th by Lance Berkman) that brought in tying runs and kept them in the game. Then there was that last, beautiful home run from David Freese in the 11th inning that brought down the house (even my house).

• Don’t let mistakes get you down. There were some outrageous errors early in this game (on the part of both teams, but particularly the Cards). Freese, one of the heroes of the game, actually had the ball fall out of his mitt trying to catch a routine pop fly in the 5th inning. The errors resulted in runs. I can only imagine how demoralizing that must feel when the stakes are high and the whole world is watching. But these players were able to put those mistakes behind them and play great ball.

• Take each moment as it comes. In baseball, as in so many other aspects of life, you just need to focus on the current moment. Take each ball as it comes. That’s how the Cards dug themselves out, twice, when they were so close to defeat.

• Believe in yourself against the odds. The Cardinals shouldn’t have even been in this World Series. They didn’t win their division. Two months ago, they were 10.5 games behind the leader and being in the play offs seemed unlikely. Yet now they’re one incredible game away from winning the World Series. This team believes they can do it. And, I hope, tomorrow night they’ll show us they can.

• Focus on past success. The Cardinals have more Game 7 World Series wins than any other team. That’s not necessarily relevant to these players, but if I were them, I’d be focusing on that statistic.

Next time you wobble a bit as you try to stay the course, remember the 2011 St. Louis Cardinals. When you stay focused, don’t give up, and just keep doing your best despite the odds, you can succeed beyond your wildest dreams.