Life Balance

Finding balance with productivity and organization

I’m not a big fan of New Year Resolutions for myself because I set goals quite regularly throughout the year. That being said, I support others that do use new year’s resolutions as a means for changing habits and trying to get on track.

I have written about some ideas to help others who want to set some financial resolutions and try to develop some healthy financial habits.

Although I don’t really set new years resolutions for myself, I have found that I have been really productive in getting organized this year and it’s helped me with finding balance in life. The New year is only 3 weeks old and I’ve managed to undertake some big projects to get organized

Organizing the garage

You might be able to imagine the garage of a household with four young boys. There’s a lot of bikes, soccer balls, skating equipment, and other sports equipment for active boys. Add in my tools, building materials, and other storage items for Halloween, Easter, and Christmas and you have one full garage.

On boxing day, I went out and bought a bunch of new Christmas lights for a net year and that motivated me to get organized and find space to store these new boxes. I re-organized for an entire day and although the garage is still full, adding shelves and purging ‘stuff’ has really helped de-clutter space.

Purging toys in the basement

Getting the garage organized put me in the purging mood so I moved to the basement and got the kids to help put away toys they do not use anymore. We threw away a ridiculous amount of broken toys and found lots of things that we could donate to other kids or organizations.

I was really proud of my kids for doing a great job purging but the best part was having them understand how much stuff they have and how they only play with about 20% of what they have. When we got rid of stuff, the boys were really happy with the extra space and organization downstairs. One of my boys said “There’s so much room down here. It feels way bigger.”

Changing light bulbs

This may sound odd but I spent the next half a day changing light bulbs in the house. When we built our house, our lighting designer recommended 144 pot lights. I did not think anything of it at the time but the problem with 144 pot lights in the house is there’s always light bulbs that need changing.

Changing light bulbs may sound simple enough but I have 10-foot ceilings and for someone that is 5’5, changing light bulbs is a bigger deal than standing on a chair or even a small ladder. In the end, it feels good to get that off my to-do list.

My financial files

Lastly, I spent a good part of a weekend getting my financial files organized. I use a binder system and because I’ve been so busy with a growing business, I was a little behind on my financial spreadsheets and organization.

I updated my net worth statement and reviewed my spending in 2014. We spent more money in 2014 but we also made more money. In the end, we had a healthy increase in our net worth because of savings, investment growth, and business growth.

The bottom line

The new year is a great time to get organized. When I think about finding balance in my life, the past few days have reminded me about the importance of simplification, purging and just spending time on getting organized. Do you feel better when you are organized and when you get rid of stuff?

In the past few weeks, I’ve completed some good projects. I think I’m ready to coast for the rest of the year. Now how that for finding balance?

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