![How Habits Make Life Easier]()
by Katherine Macey
It’s extraordinary how much of our lives are run by our habits. It’s our choice which actions we allow to become habits, although many habits are formed unconsciously. The trick to make life easier is to run supportive habits, rather than bad habits. Charles Duhigg’s book, “The Power of Habit” has an excellent and easy to understand model of how habits are formed and operate. Stephen Covey’s book, “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” talks about general strategies to live by in order to be effective. These books are all very good in theory, but how can we apply the theories to every day living?
Here are a few ideas in different areas of the house that have made my life easier over the years.
In the kitchen: I admit, the kitchen is not my favorite place to be. I go there because I have to eat and I have to feed my family. I don’t love pouring over recipes finding the next cool taste explosion. I don’t have a million little gadgets for shredding this and that or spiraling those, or whatever else they all do. I prefer to get to know a recipe well and then make it by approximation from memory, because when I do a new recipe, it takes me ages to read and do, read and do. I also hate cleaning up in the kitchen. My worst nightmare is when all the pots and pans have been used, they’re spread all around the kitchen, a dozen chopping boards are out, miscellaneous forks, spoons, knives that were used in the cooking process are sprinkled around. In short, it’s a disaster. It seems so overwhelming to have to clean up at the end of the day.
![How Habits Make Life Easier]()
by Katherine Macey
Is paper a problem in your life? Does it end up all over the house? Are there piles on your desk? Let’s identify the problem and then look at some solutions.
First, the problem. Paper comes into your house or your office. You have other things to attend to right away, so you drop your mail on the nearest horizontal surface on the way to your task. What happens is that over time, piles are distributed everywhere. There is no semblance of order. You don’t know what mail is oldest and which is newest. Time sensitive mail, such as bills, are mixed in with junk mail. There is no method to the madness. You are overwhelmed with the clutter.
Contrast this with the ideal situation. You bring your mail in and deal with it immediately, each day. It doesn’t even reach a surface because it is dealt with immediately. There are no piles, no overwhelming paper clutter. You can access any piece of information within 30 seconds. Your bills and correspondence are up to date.
It is difficult to change our habits overnight, but there are steps we can take to move towards our ideal.
One of the first steps is to create a landing spot for your mail. It could be a tray, an attractive box, or my favorite, a magazine rack like
this one from OfficeMax. I like the vertical sorters because they take up less horizontal space and they have limited space – so you are forced to sort your mail on a regular basis.
Another idea if you have several people in your home or office is to use a hanging wall organizer with a pocket for each person. Pendaflex has one like
this.
There are many different ways to manage your mail. The first step is to contain it in one manageable place.
by Katherine Macey
Do you have more paper clutter than you know what to do with? Can you find a specific piece of paper when you need it? How do you manage the information contained in all the paper you have?
Control your paper clutter – FAR your mail: File, Action, Recycle.
If you have piles of paper, try doing a pre-sort first. It’s easier to keep only a few categories in mind to start with. I use the FAR method, adapted from Julie Morgenstern’s FAT method. She uses File, Act, Trash. I take her trash and put it in the recycling. Now we’re going FAR with our mail! This initial pre-sort can be done very quickly into two piles and the recycling bin.
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