Organization Archives

Are Your Goals a Priority?

November 17, 2019 Leave a Comment

Are your habits a priority? Simple questions to ask yourself to find out | ChocolateMusings.com #habits #bulletjournal #goals

Are your goals a priority? How can you tell? Are you consistently meeting your goals? If not, read on.

In this post, I’ll show you how to determine if the habits and goals you set for yourself are really priorities by following the self-assessment I take and show you the planner layout page I use.

Are Your Goals a Priority?

If you make empty promises without the intent to follow up and do the hard things to accomplish your goal, then I hate to tell you the bad news. Your goal or habit is not really a priority.

Reflecting on your actions will show you whether or not your goal or intended habit is actually a priority in your life or if you’re set up for failure.

A Sure Sign Your Goals are NOT a Priority: Making Empty Promises

Life is full of empty promises that we never intend to keep. We make them to acquaintances and friends. Sure, we’ll get together. I’ll give you a call. We should have dinner sometime. We neglect to set a date, time, or follow-up because we don’t intend to keep the agreement.

Do you also make empty promises to yourself? Have you ever promised that you would start a diet next Monday only to find that it’s #nationaldoughnutday? And decide that you should begin your well-intended diet the next Monday instead?

What Changed the Commitment Rollercoaster?

I was always on this rollercoaster of hollow commitments to myself and never got anywhere. After reading several goal-setting and habit-forming books, there was one thought that kept recurring. All of these goals and habits had to become a priority to become an accomplishment or a formed habit.

Here is the Harsh Truth

The harsh truth is this: your actions show what is really a priority in your life. If it’s a priority to lose weight, you will either skip the doughnuts or plan carefully so you can have the right amount of doughnut and still keep your promise to yourself. Most days, I skip the sweets – and guess what? I’m ok.

What are Your Empty Promises?

What things in your life do you empty promise – either to yourself or to those around you? Take a hard look at how you spend your time and the actions you take when faced with a hard choice. You’ll soon find out if your goal is really a priority or if it’s just a wish.

What If You’re Not Perfect?

Keep in mind that not every day will be perfect. And most days you’ll have some sort of set back. This is a matter of assessing your overall intentions and actions. This is not an opportunity to rip yourself apart and tear you down. It’s an opportunity to think long and hard about the positive actions you’re taking. Then build on those rather than bash yourself about what you do to hinder your progress.

Goal Example

For instance, I want to learn how to do chalkboard lettering so I can go to other businesses and pitch my talents (it’s a thing). Well, the harsh truth is a big fat NO – I am not making this a priority.

But here’s what I have done:

I found a really great chalkboard to practice and have all the materials to practice, and I look at it every day. I know it doesn’t seem like much, but I can build on it. If I focus on the positive actions I already have, then all I have to do is change the negative items.

So this is what I would write as my plan to make this goal a priority:

Block out a time every day (or week) to practice chalkboard lettering. Decide which materials I like best to start, but don’t eliminate any upfront. Find some Skillshare classes that teach chalkboard lettering. Use quotes from my monthly quote page so I can have something to practice. Reassess progress in a month.

Continuous Changes to Make Your Habit a Priority

When you do an assessment, it’s not once and done, you make corrections, come back and reassess. What new positive actions have you added to achieve this goal? What obstacles do you face? And the Harsh Truth is always there to give a reality check.

Then set your plan, refocus your attention and energy, and go out and work toward those goals again.

Here’s the Planner Page I created to help me assess whether or not I was serious about the goals I set. You can recreate this in your planner (tag me @chocolatemusingscreates – I’d love to see it!).

Are your habits a priority? Bullet Journal spread with questions to find out| ChocolateMusings.com #habits #bulletjournal #goals

Goal Priority Assessment:

Goal	Positive Actions I Take	Actions that Hinder my Goal	Harsh Truth – am I making this a priority, Yes or No?
Weight Loss	– Weighing in every day – Recording everything I eat -Using an app to track everything -Sticking within my recommended daily allotment	-Snacking too much -Getting stuck in a rut and not finding healthy alternatives when I want a snack or meal -Going to the store hungry -Not planning meals	Yes, but I could do better. The goal is to change my eating habits permanently and affect the rest of my life. Refocus and keep going!

The Plan:

Order groceries online so I don’t add snack items as I wander the aisles.
Do not shop hungry!
Add daily walks back into my schedule.
Use my bullet journal to plan meals & shopping lists.
Make a list of healthy alternatives and post it on the pantry/fridge door (maybe it will help the kids, too!).

Want to know more about my weight loss & health journey? I share snippets from my planner and daily activities in my quest. Click on the image above

Other Examples of My Goals in Need of a Priority Assessment:

Running a creative business.
Creating a how-to doodle book.
Getting out of debt.
Replace the income from my job.
Create a lettering course.
Go-to Chalkboard letterer for local businesses.
Clutter-Busting (read post #1 & #2)

Here’s your question: What do you want to do?

How to Get Started

What’s the big goal in your life you keep chasing but never seem to get any closer to the end? Follow my example and write down your goal, the things you do consistently to achieve your goal. Then admit to yourself what you struggle doing. Finally, what does the harsh truth say?

Remember: this is not a time to beat yourself up. Capitalize on your positive actions (even if it’s a recurring thought) and build on those.

Here are some books I’ve read on organizing, decluttering, and habits. I’d love a recommendation and add it to my list. Let me know if you have more to add in the comments below.

Two Things to do Every Night to Have More Productive Days

August 29, 2019 Leave a Comment

Here are two things to do every night to have more productive days. Since I started doing these two small tasks every night, my days are much more focused and productive.

Number One Thing I Do Every Night to Have More Productive Days:

Clean up before you go to bed.

I’m not talking about breaking out the mop and scrubbing the floors. I simply mean that I straighten my desk. Put away markers, straighten papers, stow electronics. When I’m creating, my office gets very messy.

I try to keep my desk clear when I’m creating videos for my YouTube channel or taking photos for the blog or Instagram, but around the perimeter of the video, the markers spill out of their box, drawers flung open, supplies riffled through and disheveled. You’ll find paintbrushes strewn about the surface, resting on paper towels, sticky notes and open notebooks laying about. It’s really quite embarrassing.

Is Your Work Area Like a College Dorm Party From the Night Before?

Don’t you hate waking up and have to clean up after last night’s mess? Your work area looks like a college dorm party where you wonder what happened the night before. How could you have caused this much mayhem? You probably don’t remember any of this.

A Little Goes a Long Way to Have More Productive Days

If I straighten my desk and put back the pieces in their respective places, I wake up ready to work and surprisingly more alert. The same goes for my kitchen and living room. If I put away the dishes and generally straighten the counters, my morning is much smoother. Before the kids go to bed, I have them tidy the living room.

Little Tasks – Huge Impact

These small actions have a significant impact on the next morning’s productivity and enthusiasm for being productive.

If you haven’t conquered the magic of tidying before going to bed – give it a try: spend 5-10 minutes and straighten your main work areas or areas of your home that tend to be a distraction. You’ll see the difference in your mindset. It’s so refreshing to be ready for the new day instead of cleaning up last night’s mess.

The second thing I do every night to have more productive days:

Plan the next day.

I’m sure you’ve heard it a million times. But it works. Write down your top three focuses for the day, make sure you have school notes signed for your kids and put back in backpacks. Set out any other supplies you need next to your planner to get started with your fresh, new morning. I like to leave my planner open on my desk, turned to the correct page, so it’s the first thing I see.

Add a To-Do List

Leave a sticky note or a loose page with ideas, instructions, to-do lists, and other details for the day. In the morning, it’s easier to jump right into your tasks instead of trying to remember what you intended to do.

Both of these items are kind of ‘duh’ moments. I know I’ve heard these two little productivity hacks hundreds of times – but usually not paired together. Cleaning up my work areas and other important (and distracting) areas of my house plus planning the next day the night before are both game-changers.

The best productivity comes not just after straightening or merely planning for the next day but when paired together. If you want to have more productive days, give these two suggestions a try.

What do you do to create a productive day?

Two Things to do Every Night to Have More Productive Days | ChocolateMusings.com #productivity #planning #organization

Want More Ways to Organize Your Life? Check out These Posts:

Battle With Stuff #2: How to Create Decluttering Habits

May 16, 2019 5 Comments

How to Create Decluttering Habits

Create your Own Declutter Habit Plan | Create, Do, Conquer the Everyday Clutter | ChocolateMusings.com #declutter #organize #plan

Hey! Welcome back! Here is post #2 in my Battle with Stuff Series – I call this one Decluttering for Life. It’s all about creating putting those decluttering habits on autopilot.

I’m excited to show you what I did to make decluttering and straightening my house a daily part of my routine. This process helps me identify the biggest “Clutter Problem Areas” for my house, what I would “ideally” see and what I’m going to do about it.

Read Post #1 Here

I hope that it will help you and help you start thinking about what you can do in your home in small snippets of time rather than waiting for a big chunk of time or feeling like you ‘wasted’ an entire Saturday or weekend just to have it fall back into disarray the moment your kids get home from school.

My Ah-a Moment for Creating Decluttering Habits

In the last post, my aha-moment was that decluttering is not a one-time event, it’s an everyday battle that requires specific decluttering habits to combat the on-going clash between all the things and the ideal view I have in my mind’s eye for each room in my house.

Now here’s the hard question: How can I make a habit of decluttering my life? Because it’s not just one act, it’s an everyday movement to keep stuff from taking over every inch of space. Part of my clutter is the everyday neglected chores. The laundry that piles up, the dirty dishes scattered after cooking a meal. All. the. legos.

I knew I needed to identify specific times and events that helped me take care of the ‘clutter problem areas’.

What To Do First

First, I started with the known – my schedule. And then I will figure out where the problem is and how to tackle it with clearly defined decluttering habits.

You can think about your schedule and the sequence your day follows. Make a list of the things you do every day starting when you wake up to leave the house then what you do when you return home.

My Schedule:

I go to work at 9:30 am every day. I get up with my kids at 6:30 every day, and the oldest two leave at 7:20 when the bus whisks them off to school. We get home at 4:30 after taking one of my friend’s kids home from daycare. From there it’s homework (which drags on forever) dinner prep, dinner, and then it’s time to get the little one to bed followed by the other two with some spare moments in between.

If you saw my Ideally Planned post a while ago – the day is rarely ideal. Maybe I need to declutter my day as well….But that’s a story for another time.

Do you feel like your days are also cluttered with ‘stuff’? Such as stuff to do, stuff to finish?

Here’s the Plan to Create Decluttering Habits:

Declutter Habit Key: Use snippets of time to keep areas organized, and doing specific tasks when other known events take place.

For instance: Dishes in the morning while the kids were making lunches. Sweeping while talking to mom on the phone. (Does anyone else do this? Just me?)

Nightly Decluttering Habit: Just before switching the light off in my office nook – look at my desk before turning out the light at night and taking a minute to put away the markers, throw away the scraps of unused paper, nestle all the pens back in their spot, plug in my iPad, set out my planner for the next morning, dump any dirty watercolor water. Generally, straighten before going to bed. That way, I wake up with a clean area – a place to work in the morning with fresh ideas. Rather than worrying about the mess from the day before.

Create Clutter Busting Habits - Grab your Free Worksheet | ChocolateMusings.com #clutterbusting #declutter #organize #habit

How to Start

To start ‘decluttering for life’ I collected a list of all the ‘problem’ areas in my house. (Scroll to the bottom of the post, my video walks you through the process.)

Make a list of all the problem areas in your house. If the ‘stuff’ has a place, then it needs to be straightened. If you put something away where it belongs, and it spills over the space, it either needs a different space or there’s too much stuff. So in that case, ask yourself “what can I pare down?”

Declutter Inventory Checklist | ChocolateMusings.com

My big issues in my house:

Kid’s toys picked up and put away
Dishes in the dishwasher/sink cleared
Table cleared
Too Much Paper (school paperwork)
Laundry – specifically when laundry has to be re-washed several times or clean laundry piled up in my room
Master Closet
Surfaces cleared

You can also make a list of the big issues in your house. We might have some of the same issues. Whatever they are, you can use the worksheet to create a plan.

Second Step: Imagine – Give Yourself a Visual Reward for Your Hard Work

Imagine what you want to see. What is your ‘ideal’ view? What do you want to see when you look at a particular drawer? How do you envision your living area? Where are your kids’ toy’s stored? What feeling do you get when you see a clean space instead of a cluttered mess?

Third Step: Be Specific about Change

Considering that I do not have huge spans of time to dedicate to straightening or decluttering, I need to use triggers or certain times of the day or events to change my everyday actions.

Clutter Problem Area:

Piled Up Clean Laundry

Ideal:

Laundry sorted and put away when it comes out of the dryer instead of stacked against the wall in my bedroom.

Plan – Be Specific

Here’s how I break never-ending, always overwhelming laundry into specific tasks per day:

Do one batch of laundry per day. Start the batch at 6:45 am while the kiddos are eating breakfast. 8:00 am switch the laundry from washer to dryer. 9:15 am just before leaving for work, take the laundry out and put it away.

I’m a fan of anything that doesn’t create too much overwhelm and can be checked off on a day-to-day basis. In other words, laundry is a never-ending task, but telling myself that I’m required to only to do one batch per day gives me the freedom to do something else without the guilt AND bonus – I can check it off my to-do list! So instead of a chore that never ends, I’m done after one!

Set a Specific Time – a Switch in Mindset

Setting a specific time makes a HUGE difference in my mindset. The ideal is no longer arbitrary. There’s a means to accomplish the goal and I know what I must do every day to do it. Decluttering is a life skill and I plan on learning it so well I don’t realize I’m doing it.

Setting a specific time is something that I learned from a Skillshare class taught by Cynthia Koo – “How to Design Your 365 Day Challenge” – she also suggests writing the event you will do before or after your task. Just that simple step makes all the habit-creating difference in the world.

(By the way, look at her Instagram @wontoninamillion) she said she used the 365-day challenge to help build her business and post every day, which made her have to create new content for Instagram, which was a win-win.)

The Power of Habit

As Charles Duhigg suggested in his book “The Power of Habit” – we need to create a simple and obvious cue, implement it in our routine and receive a reward, and create a craving for that reward. I can’t tell you how satisfying it is to walk into my room and see no laundry piles. That in and of itself makes me do a little happy dance. Up until I came up with my trigger, doing this happy dance was far and few between, but it’s something I want.

So, let me ask you…when it comes to clutter, what do you want most to see when looking at your own clutter problem areas? What is your ‘dream view’ and subsequently what is your reward for dealing with clutter?

My Plan to Win the Daily Battle with Decluttering and Stuff #1

April 11, 2019 5 Comments

My Plan to Win the Daily Battle with Decluttering and Stuff

I battle with stuff every day. The things that I have in my house and my life – all the minutia. All the stuff. Stuff from Target, stuff from Walmart, stuff from Costco…stuff we’ve had for years, just stuff. I wanted to figure out a way to deal with all the things, and manage it going forward.

Last year, I read Marie Kondo’s book – before she was on Netflix – and it spurred me to clean out my closets, drawers, kid’s toys, kitchen, I even roll my socks to this day… but evidently, I went wrong somewhere. I still have too much stuff for my 3-bedroom, 2 bath house. 3 kids and 2 adults have a lot of stuff.

Love of ‘Stuff’ at its Limit

Don’t get me wrong, I love my art supplies and notebooks, but I feel like I’ve hit the ceiling. A limit. And yet when I walk into a supply store, the intoxicating smell of bound paper, the crackle of a package of pens lure my senses into insisting that I need yet another item despite the lack of space in my house.

I read books on happiness, books on habits, books on decluttering my life, and yet, I still can’t find the answer to my problem.

The Answer

But today, I think I found the answer to my problem. I am not specific enough, and I don’t put decluttering or ‘finding joy’ in my things into regular practice. I read the advice and yet don’t carry through on most of it.

Decluttering is not a one-time event. The once and done is a nice concept, but I know now that it’s not permanent. It’s a battle fought constantly. Clutter and stuff want to make my home it’s home, and the tiny humans living under my roof don’t help one bit. In fact, I created a planning spread ages ago with a similar idea, but never put it into regular practice.

Clutter Definition

Here’s where I need to define clutter. I define clutter as anything that habitually gets out of place OR an overabundance of things without a proper home or spills over into other locations. Some people might say it just gets messy, but the mess makes me feel cluttered, inside and out and I don’t know about you, but feeling disorganized on the inside makes me feel restless and ornery all day long.

I don’t want to continually feel like I need to get rid of stuff. If I can put a stopper on the intake, I still have to deal with the items we want to keep. Once I pare down the extra items in my house, I still have things that creep out of their designated places.

My aha moment – combining the advice from two sets of books and combining them into one: decluttering + habit creation = make decluttering a habit.

Working on a Solution

I’ve figured out the problem, and now I’ll go to work on creating a habit for daily decluttering. I’m excited to show you what I’m working on – and I’ll give you a sneak peek!

In the next decluttering post, I’ll step you through how to fill out the declutter habit plan printable.

I’d love to know! What do you do to keep yourself ‘sane’ and deal with all the clutter and mess every day?

Ideally Planned: Year, Quarter, Month Week & Day – How To Create Your Own ‘Ideal’

February 25, 2019 1 Comment

Ideal Year Month Week and Day | How to Make Your Own Ideal Plans | ChocolateMusings.com @ChocolateMusingsCreates #idealday #idealweek #bulletjournal #bujo

Ever since reading the 12-Week Year by Brian Morgan I think less in 12-month calendar time increments and more in quarters or months. I started questioning why I have to live off of someone else’s designated quarters. So I set up my own quarterly calendar. Ideally planned is what I call it. It fits me, and my life. I’ll give you a break down of my ‘ideal’, but my ideally planned life will not fit yours. Customize to your heart’s content.

My Year in Quarters

The future log in my planner happened to break it out perfectly by section:

Spring Quarter: February, March, & April

Summer Quarter: May, June, & July

Fall Quarter: August, September, & October

Winter Quarter: November, December, & January

How It Worked Out

My kiddos go back to school the first week of August, so that month doesn’t really feel like summer. I never feel ready to start a new year right after December and the whole slew of holidays beginning the end of October through December, so that’s why I figured I’d align the quarters and start a new year in February. The Chinese do it, so I think I’m in the majority. To clarify – it’s not about being in the majority. It’s about making things fit the way I need them to fit into my life.

One thing led to another, and I created an ‘Ideal Year, Month, Week & Day.’ It was very eye-opening how much time I have, and how much time I…don’t have. If you want to set priorities, I highly recommend creating an ‘ideal’ plan. Start with your ideal day and work backward. Or start with your ‘ideal year’ (things you do during certain times of the year) and work forward.

Things I do in the different Quarters of the Year:

Spring: Refresh my house by cleaning, decluttering, setting goals, planning for family vacations
Summer: Family Vacation, Back to School Planning
Fall: Plan for next year’s calendar year, Recipe Revisions
Winter: Focus on What Matters

There’s something about the promise of blossoms and blooms that renews my energy and love for life. As I figure it out, I will add miscellaneous house cleaning tasks. But I haven’t gotten there, yet.

Monthly Planning

If there were a weak link in my ideally planned spread, monthlies would be it. I love how planning out your ‘ideals’ shows you your weaknesses and what you can improve. To figure out my ideally planned month, first, I’ll start with a list of things to do every single month. Then break them down and assign them to specific days or weeks throughout the month.

For instance: on the last Sunday of the month, I back up photos, videos and do general digital upkeep on my files. New blog post out on Sundays & Thursdays, Newsletter 3rd Friday of each month. Plan for the next month when there are 2 full weeks left in the month. On the 1st of the month, I do an inventory of statistics.

A cleaning schedule breaks out nicely into monthly and weekly plans. From a financial standpoint indicate bill-pay days and paydays.

Ideal Week Plans

Of course, these plans ebb and flow with life and may change from week to week. This is the reason why my plans are ‘ideal.’ Knowing where to focus my efforts for family or cleaning on any given day when I have a small slot of time to get all the things done.

The other day, I listened to a radio host breaking down the hours in the week. If there are 24 hours in a day x 7 days per week =168 hours per week, subtract 8 hours per day for sleeping (who gets that much sleep in a day on a regular basis?!), remove the hours at work (typically 40 hours) and you have 72 hours left. My goodness, that sounds like a lot left over.

It got me thinking about what occupies my time. In my case, I have three kiddos, and they require (and I intend to give) a lot of time. Self-care time (including showers and getting ready), dinner prep, travel time and a myriad of other things. So if I could block like items together (even more than I do, already), it’s possible to conserve precious hours and minutes.

What do you do on a particular day of the week? I find that I get more laundry done if I assign it to a specific day. I clean my bathroom regularly if I know it’s Wednesday. Adding recurring events like my son’s scouts on Thursdays helps me to not over-plan that evening.

Ideal Day Planning

This section was a HUGE eye-opener. I realized how much time I don’t have. So I have to choose what I want to do. Prioritize, prioritize, prioritize. If it’s not that important, reconsider. Time is a precious element every single day. Visually organizing my days, weeks, months, and years showed me just that. And emphasized how important it is to prioritize.

How to Make Your Own “Ideal” Plans

Not sure where to start? I recommend starting big and working down. Map out your year. Do you change batteries in your smoke detector in the Spring? When are your family vacations? Do you seem to always clean your house in the spring or hold garage sales when the weather turns nice? What about holiday shopping? Do you wish to have that all said and done by the end of October so you can enjoy the holiday season without the stress? Well, that’s a good thing to plan.

Ideal Year Plans

Ideal Year: Recurring events or tasks throughout the Year – for me I broke it into quarters.

However, you might break it month-to-month. For instance, if you have kids, do you shop for school supplies in August or July?

Ideal Month Plans

What tasks do you need to do each month? Can you assign them to a particular week or a specific day? Make a list of all the things you do. Cleaning, bills, tasks. See where it all fits in. You can make a calendar view here or add a second section where you list the days numerically. 1st & 15th – paydays. 5th, mortgage due. Etc.

Do you have recurring events? Include those so you can plan around those items.

Ideal Week Plans

What days do you feel stretched too thin? Are you scheduling too heavy on those days? What can you prioritize? For instance: if you have dance and soccer on Tuesdays for your kids and you’re gone from the moment the kids get out of school to the second they go to bed, scheduling laundry on that day is probably not a good idea.

Do you have any other recurring tasks to do during the week? Figure out what those recurring items and pencil them in. Move them around until it makes sense. Ideally planned is another word for ‘makes sense in my life’. At least in my opinion.

Ideal Day

Now, this is where things get real. List the hours in a day and plan out the big things first. Sleep, work, commute. Then start adding the smaller items around those scheduled chunks of time. Dinner prep and eating dinner seem to take up a good part of the time.

After the smaller ‘have to’ tasks appear on your day, start prioritizing. It’s not about how much time you have, it’s about how much priority you give the things in your life. I wanted to schedule more time for developing my business but saw that I took away time from my kids. I know they are a high priority and had to make a choice. Kids won out. Efficiency just became more important than ever.

Need help getting things done? Set a time to do a certain task. And include it in your habit tracker.

Check out my list of Mid-Month Habit Check Posts Here – there are so many things in my life I’ve improved by keeping a habit tracker.

What gets measured, gets managed - Peter Drucker

Side note: I saw someone on Instagram who planned their ideal day and left nearly 4 hours to sleep every night. If that’s ideal to you, by all means, miss out on those precious zzz’s. But sleep is a huge part of my self-care regimen, so I schedule it out. I discovered when I scheduled my sleep, I made an effort to go to sleep then.

What is Ideally Planned – Really?

For me, ideally planned is not all about fantasy and the perfect life, it’s about the realities that we deal with regularly and how to map it out so life does not overwhelm us on any given day. Creating an ideally planned life allows you to map out your life on paper and show you where your strengths and weaknesses are. Any day life doesn’t overwhelm me, is an ideal day. You’ll have to define what ‘ideal’ means to you.