If only I were more organized!  How often have you said that to yourself?  (In my case, about 25 times — since I woke up this morning.)

The desire to be organized is the first step, but we need to put the desire into action.  This week, the blog will focus on techniques to help you manage your time and space. 

The most important thing to keep in mind is the reason for being more organized.  Organization for organization’s sake is rather pointless.  Being organized lets you use your time well.  And that means that you have more time available to spend on the things you love.

The first step in organizing your time well is doing a "time audit."  How do you spend your time now?  Take twenty or thirty minutes to think about a typical day.  Divide the day into chunks and think about how you spend each chunk.  What do you do between waking up and leaving for work (or getting the kids off to school)?  How do you spend your lunch hour?  What do you do with the time between work and dinner?  The time after dinner?  The weekend?

Once you know how you spend your time, you can decide what you want to spend less time doing what you want to have more time to do. 

Now, make a list of the things you have to do in a typical week.  Which of those are essential?  Which are your priorities? (The essential isn’t always a priority.  It’s essential that I pay for my newspaper delivery.  It’s hardly a priority.)

Schedule your priorities FIRST.  If something is really important to you, you have to dedicate the BEST of your time to it, not the leftovers.  If you wait to see what time is available, you will never have the time to do the things you care about.  Other, less important things will creep in. 

First, make time for what matters most.  The rest will find their place.