Lesley Morrison's Blog (54)

Do you want to live an organized life?

If you are reading this blog, there is a strong possibility that your answer to that question is “YES!”. So what is keeping you from achieving your goal? So often, the top reasons I hear from readers are:

• “I don’t know where to start.”
• “Getting organized feels overwhelming because I’m so far off track.”
• “I’m just not an organized person. It’s not in my nature.”
• “Getting organized takes too much…

Yesterday I had a very real world reminder of why decluttering and organizing the things in your home is a lifelong commitment. There are books and professional organizers out there who proclaim that if you organize once you will never have to do it again, but that simply just isn’t true! I do think that if you organize well once, it will then be much easier to maintain that level of organization, but it really doesn’t mean that you never have to look at it again. Just think back…

When getting and staying organized, lists can be a lifesaver. Not only do they tell you what you need to get done, they tell you what you’ve accomplished and make it so much easier to keep track of things! (Click to Tweet!) I embraced lists long before I embraced every other part of my organized lifestyle, and I still find them so valuable to this day.

There are so many reasons why I love lists, but here are the top three that I want to share with…

Many people think of the physical benefits of decluttering, such as a simplified cleaning routine, which reduces the levels of allergens and asthma triggers and literally allows you to breathe easier. But I have found that there is a huge mental benefit to decluttering your home (or any space that you spend a lot of time in). A clean home has actually been proven to make you happier as well!

The first step to a clean home is getting rid of the excess stuff we no longer need. As you…

So last Thursday I went for my eight week trim and was a little excited and nervous to see what my hair stylist would have to say about my two months with no shampoo or other hair products. She could tell right away that something was different about my hair. I had left it curly that day, and she mentioned that my “curl families” were really well defined with no frizz and looked absolutely amazing. After I told her about giving everything up, she brushed through my hair carefully and…

This quote came through my e-mail the other day and I just had to share it with you. Quite honestly, I don’t think I could have summed it up better myself! This is what my blog is all about. My goal is to give you the resources you need to free up your time, money and energy, so that you have more of each to spend on what is important to you, thus allowing you to move towards living your happiest life possible! (Click to Tweet!)

(Continue reading…

Today I tweeted that “some of the best things in life come from the effort to get past some of the worst things in life”. Part of being able to live an organized, simplified and happy life is to learn the proper mindset to help you achieve that goal. It is unfortunate in today’s society that we have become so accustomed to getting things immediately with no wait and no effort. But does that ever really leave us satisfied? Does it ever really change us deeply enough to be the person we…

So it has been 40 days since I have last shampooed or used any products in my hair. (You can find out why in my original post, My Dirty Little Secret.) I have had a few reader questions regarding this topic and figured I would give you an update on how things are going. And I will have to say, it is different and takes some getting used to, but I really am liking the results. Here are four things I have learned…

This week’s tip is a quick one – a follow up to saving time and money when grocery shopping! If you refer back to my previous post “3 Simple Steps to Organize Meal Planning and Avoid Excess Trips to the Grocery Store”, you will see how my husband and I handle most of our grocery shopping needs. Generally when shopping, we make sure to stick to our list. The…

This week’s tip is going to be a tough one for some of you and remarkably easy for others. My husband and I implemented this tip ourselves over two years ago. Initially, I didn’t think I would like it and I thought it would be tough for me, but honestly, after a week or two of changed habits, I barely missed it. So how do you recapture 10+ hours of your week, each week? Set a limit to your TV viewing time. And by TV viewing I am including cable or dish, Netflix, Amazon…

Last week I mentioned to stay tuned for my “dirty little secret”. It’s ironic because as I was thinking about this title I realized that when I initially picture organization, I tend to think of clean, perfect and always in order. Unfortunately life just doesn’t happen that way. Nothing is ever clean, perfect and always in order. (Click to Tweet!) In fact, I have recently discovered one thing in my life I can leave “dirty” which actually helps me save…

I have been late on this week’s blog post due to a variety of factors – my day job has kept me very busy, there were a lot of obligations surrounding my birthday, commitments for Mothers Day, and most importantly, celebrating my wonderful husband’s birthday. It doesn’t matter how organized you are with your life and with your time, there will always be “life” that happens and I have learned that it’s ok (and even very healthy) to take some time off to celebrate important moments and rest…

Decluttering can be a daunting process, especially if you have a lot of excess items hanging around. Sometimes just thinking about how much there is to look through and the decisions that will have to be made around each item can be enough to keep you from starting to begin with! One thing I have learned over time is that you really just have to start. If you don’t take action, nothing will ever happen (more on that in a future blog post). So what is the easiest way to start?…

Hey everyone! I’m glad you made it back for this week’s blog post. Today I’m going to discuss how I organize meal planning for my household. I am the primary cook in our house. My husband will kick in on the weekends, mostly to make breakfast, but nightly dinners are up to me. Since we both tend to get home from work already “starving” for dinner, I have had to create a system that quickly gets meals on the table in 20-40 minutes. My husband and I also strongly believe in cooking from…

Today’s topic is all about something I struggle with regularly – procrastination. I have learned over time that procrastination is one of the biggest hurdles you will have to overcome on your path to a more organized life. Most likely, if you are reading this post it’s because you recognize that you are not as organized as you would like and are looking for tips to improve your organizational skills. This generally also means that the thought of getting organized is not particularly…

Welcome to the first post at MyOrganizingTips! Here I plan to start a community of individuals who want to share thoughts and ideas around the best ways to get organized. It doesn’t matter if you have already worn out your favorite labeler, or if you are the type of person to find your keys in the freezer, everyone can benefit from a more organized lifestyle.

As you may have read from my about page, I definitely did not start out an organized person (you can access the story…

Motivation is a tricky thing in life. It’s easy to have it for a short period of time, but unless you see results quickly, your drive to continue will give way to whatever the easier choice is – even if the easier choice doesn’t lead you to where you ultimately want to be.

So how to overcome this? Identify your “why”. You have to know the reason you are sacrificing, the reason you are making the harder decisions, and not taking the easy road. You want to lose 20 pounds? Great,…

Do you ever have a sense that something just isn’t right in your life? You can’t really put your finger on it, but you know that something is making you unhappy or creating a little thorn in your side. There is this nagging sense that something needs to change, but perhaps you simply can’t quite put your finger on it?

That happens to me quite a bit. I have a tendency...

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Do you ever get a sense of discontent in your life? You know there is something that isn’t quite what you want it to be, but you can’t always place your finger on it? Generally I find that when that happens to me, it’s the Universe gently nudging me on towards a change. Now changes are never easy, and they can sometimes involve a lot of work to make it a positive experience. But it’s also one of the only things we can guarantee to happen in life.

When you feel that nudge…

It’s holiday time! The time for family, friends, good food, being thankful for what we have and celebrating life together.

It can also be a time of greed, over-the-top gift giving, excessive food consumption, wanting things that are unnecessary, and spending more than you should.

(Continue reading at http://www.lesleysobeckgallery.com/blog/2013/12/more-is-not-better)