Get Clear to Get Clear

I am still working on clearly stating my goals...um...and it's February 22.

One thing I CAN say, is that being serious about writing down my goals - a first time for me -  revealed one very necessary goal to me: the need to de-clutter! Not just my desktop, my closet, my room, but my life!!

It's funny, but just as I came to that realization, I looked up and saw the current edition of the Oprah Magazine in a store and lo and behold the front page title -

"De-clutter Your Life" 

How apt! and how about that for synchronicity?!

Now, don't get me wrong; It's not that I am hoarder or even that I am generally disorganized. It's just that life was taking over. I was so busy all the time, that I did not always make the little extra effort of putting things exactly where they belong. I would put them somewhere that made sense. Even somewhere that I would find them. But it just wasn't EXACTLY where they belong. Slowly, with time, I noticed that I had several places having the same things in them and this over time does start to interfere with finding things. You will know where they are, but it could be one of several places. I had to get back to basics and specifics. 

And so I have begun to de-clutter! 

Out with the excess, the non-essentials, and the things are really do not need to be here.
In with a new organizing system, some labels and some storage bins and shelving. We are going to make sense of this mess yet.

And the first really necessary thing was my desktop on my laptop. I swear it looked like this...

Whenever anyone saw it, they would gasp in shock because I had so many icons, files and folders on there, it filled the entire screen and actually went beyond it. It had become hard to find folders or files when I needed them because there was always the chance that they were some where beyond the screen. And the worst thing is...this was my work laptop, not my personal home laptop. I used to bring my laptop home everyday because I worked from home often and so it was inevitable that I used my work laptop for most of my personal things too. I had many personal files on there. It was definitely time to clean that up. Time to separate my work from my personal. I am relieved that is done. My desktop is clean, and all my personal files and folders have been moved to a portable hard drive which I keep in my bag so that I still have access to these files at a moments notice should I need them during the regular work day.

Now I have started with our shelves at home and the basement. I want to be done before my LLC registration papers arrive because that's when my real work will begin and I want to be all de-cluttered, clear and organized when that happens.