We’re halfway through the first month of the New Year. How are you doing with your fresh start and goal setting, planning, new habits, or resolutions? Making time to set goals, write them down, and implement them is integral to how some function. However, for many of us, planning is elusive, or our intentions quickly get derailed.

Does this sound familiar? You want more organization and less clutter, so you commit to decluttering and organizing your entire house. While the goal is doable, it’s so big that you feel overwhelmed and unmotivated. You give up and go down that negative self-talk path. What if you had the right support to help you clarify what is most important, create a doable way to reach your goals, and provide accountability and advice? Can you feel the big exhale?  

It’s all about surrounding yourself with people that will help you thrive. Marcy Stoudt, the founder of The Executive Mom Nest, understands the value of teams. She launched The Nest, an exclusive network of women whose vision of success includes career, family, and self. The Nest is a unique and trusting community for new moms to explore ideas, ask for feedback, and seek advice. Members have access to Advisors in diverse industries, including marketing, finance, design, nutrition, life coaching, and organization.

“Surround yourself with people that will help you thrive.”

— Linda Samuels, CPO-CD®, CVPO

I’m thrilled that Marcy invited me to join the Executive Mom Nest as their Professional Organizer Advisor. To celebrate the New Year, The Nest has an incredible giveaway that I’m participating in, and excited to share with you. 

Fabulous ‘New Year, New Me’ Giveaway

Giveaway Description:

The Executive Mom Nest’s ‘New Year, New Me’ giveaway provides you with support and guidance to become the best version of yourself as a mom, businesswoman, and mompreneur. It’s a chance to close the gap between who you are and who you want to be. Bring harmony to your career and home.

Prizes: 

The giveaway winner will receive three amazing prizes from Nest Advisors:

• A one-hour virtual organizing session with Oh, So Organized!, and a signed copy of the book, The Other Side of Organized – courtesy of Linda Samuels, CPO-CD®, CVPO

• A business introduction video paired with branded graphics for social media – courtesy of Branded Interviews, Alison Nissen

• A one-hour executive coaching session with Marcy Stoudt – courtesy of Revel Coach

Rules for Entry:

• Follow Executive Mom Nest on Instagram.

• Tag three friends in the comments on the Giveaway post.

• Get a bonus entry if you share the post to your Instagram Story.

• The giveaway closes on January 22, 2021, and the winner will be contacted shortly after.

How are you doing with your New Year plans? Have you taken on any new projects or goals this year? Have you run into any snags? Who is on your success team? I’d love to hear your thoughts. I invite you to join the conversation by adding your comments below, and pop over to Instagram to enter The Executive Mom Nest giveaway.

In these times of uncertainty, it might feel like a superhuman feat to think about setting big goals. However, in many ways, it’s the perfect time to stretch. The change going on around us encourages more experimentation and flexibility. You might notice your internal obstacles dissipating, which makes way for new ideas. Maybe you’re on the other side and have recently completed a long-term goal. If so, I hope you stopped to acknowledge and celebrate your accomplishment. 

A goal doesn’t happen in a vacuum. We need help with accomplishing our goals and celebrating them along the way. Think about a big goal you set. While you were undoubtedly the driver, who helped and supported you?

“A goal doesn’t happen in a vacuum. We need help with accomplishing our goals and celebrating them along the way.”

— Linda Samuels, CPO-CD®, CVPO

Talking about milestones, my good friends at Smead just hit a huge one. Over the past seven years, I’ve loved being a regular guest on Smead’s Keeping You Organized podcast series. The host, John Hunt, has done hundreds of interviews with professional organizers and productivity consultants on chronic disorganization, getting organized, time management, change, coping during a crisis, and more.

Smead just celebrated their 300th podcast and start of their eighth year. What an incredible achievement! As John told me, he didn’t set out to do 300 podcasts, but here we are. I was thrilled to be John’s guest on this special episode where we talked about setting big goals and ways to include celebrating in the process. Listen to the podcast below to learn more.

Setting and Celebrating Big Goals

Have you recently set a big goal? Are you in the process of working towards one? What help have you received? What ways do you celebrate? I’d love to hear your thoughts. I invite you to join the conversation.

Words like harmony, evenness, stability and symmetry come to mind when I think about balance. Yet to find that right balance, we have to shake things up to enter a more calm and balanced state. I also equate balance with a certain amount of predictability or sameness.

Here’s the thing. What if we purposefully decided to poke at our balanced state in order to change that status quo? What if we made one small change? That might be forming a new habit like waking up or going to bed earlier. It might mean tasting a new food you never thought you’d like. It could mean letting go of something old to replace something new coming in. Changing the balance on purpose might open your perspective to something you hadn’t thought of before. One small change could unleash a host of possibilities.

You might find this odd that I’m suggesting to purposefully mess with the status quo or your balance. This might seem particularly strange coming from a professional organizer who often writes about “finding a balance that’s right for you.” I do see the value of stirring things up every so often.

This inadvertently happened when I was shopping recently for a replacement journal. I’ve kept a journal for over forty years. Every year or so, I buy a new one when the journal is filled. For over ten years, I’ve happily used a black Moleskine® sketchbook journal. I like the thick, smooth paper.

This time the stores didn’t have the exact style that I wanted. The interior paper was either too thin or it had lines, dots or grids. The black-bound, thicker paper, blank Moleskine® journals were not in stock. I did find the right journal with a red (not black) cover. I immediately dismissed the idea of buying the red one. It seemed too radical, too different, and just too scary. All my other journals were black. How could I break from tradition? What would happen if bought a different color? I could feel my heart palpitating at the idea of making an unexpected choice. Was it fear or excitement?

I kept coming back to that question. What would happen if I bought a different color? And then it hit me and I thought,

“Stir things up, Linda! Break with tradition. Try something new.”

As small and insignificant as this may seem, it represented a willingness on my part to be daring. I thought this would be a great way to enter the New Year by messing with (in a good way) or teasing the status quo.

My new, red journal sits on my nightstand ready to be written in. I can’t wait to make my first entry. I know. I know. It’s just a journal…a red one. However, there’s something about the red color, the different color that suggests interesting possibilities, inspired ideas, new experiences, and unexpected surprises. There’s also something quite cheery about the red. It’s bold. It’s bright. It’s hope wrapping the pages of days yet to be.

Have you ever purposefully messed with your balance? Has one tiny change unleashed new possibilities? I’d love to hear your thoughts. Come join the conversation! 

As the year comes to a close, we reflect and future-think. When we’re exposed to others’ insights, it can spark our own ideas. The conversations we have on the blog are one of my greatest joys and insight generators. We’ve talked about change, clutter, letting go, time management, life balance and more.

I’m grateful for and inspired by the thoughtful words and generous sharing of this community. Thank you to my top engagers – Janet Barclay, Jill Robson, Seana Turner, Nacho Eguiarte, Diane Quintana, Ellen Delap, Sue West, Sheila Delson, Cameron Gott, Leslie Josel, Andrea Sharb and Susan Lasky. I’ve curated twelve of my favorite quotes from the comments you’ve written this year, selecting one from each month and topic. I’m thankful for everyone that adds to our conversations. I’m deeply grateful for the regular supporters and contributors. You bring hope, light, curiosity, and learning to our days.

Enjoy the year in review, one quote and insight at a time. . .

Fresh Start

“It’s always good to have a reset button. That way we don’t get bogged down in self-doubt. Reminding ourselves it is all right to start again, gives more scope for discovery.”

Jill Robson on Pressing the Restart Button

Change

“Small changes are key to lasting change. I have found that when someone tries to make a sweeping huge change it backfires, but when they set a goal and take small incremental steps toward the stated goal they are successful.”

Diane Quintana on How to Embrace Small Changes?

Next Steps

“Making tasks smaller and more manageable makes tasks do-able. I think we all get overwhelmed at some time, but it’s in chunking things down to baby steps that anything can be accomplished.”

Ellen Delap on How to Make Next Smaller and Actually Feel Wonderful 

Letting Go

“I’m a year or so into my process of letting go of stuff and commitments…what I’m noticing is how letting go is becoming part of who I am and how these days I seem to almost crave releasing. I’m also noticing that the more I let go of, the more I become aware of what can be released. What I’m noticing most is that with each item released I experience greater freedom.”

Andrea Sharb on What Inspires You to Let Go of Your Clutter?

Clutter

“Some people have so much mind clutter that they can’t appreciate the value of a spontaneous, spacious morning. ‘Too much to do,” they say. Acknowledging mind clutter is the first step to doing something about it, but unlike a room of clutter, stepping away from the clutter in the mind can whisk much of it away. Mindfulness or the act of just being present doing something you love is a powerful antidote to ‘too much on the brain.'"

Cameron Gott on Unique Ways to Manage Mind Clutter

Time Management

“One thing that struck me is the opposite of the white space; how you take the time and energy to commit to where and how you will spend your schedule time (planning) – the intentional ‘yeses.’ White space (free time) is even more meaningful when there is clarity and purpose to the surrounding time blocks.”

Susan Lasky on What Happens When Your Time is Crammed and Overscheduled?

Motivation

“I think it is hugely important to ‘schedule the unscheduled!’ I think it is important to understand your rhythms though. Where and how do you really relax? Can you unwind at home or is the pull of day-to-day life too much? Do you need one long get away to recharge or are mini vacations or even a day at the beach enough? Do you need to sit still or do you need to explore a new city from sun up to sun down?”

Leslie Josel on How Motivated Are You to Slow Down?

Enlisting Help

“Realizing that it’s okay to ask for help, whether it be delegating a difficult or time-consuming task to someone else, asking for advice, or seeking answers online, goes a long way towards reducing overwhelm in my life.”

Janet Barclay on Shift Perspective By Asking, "What help do I need?"

Success

“I am a ‘doodler’ of sorts, and always have been. Sadly often criticized for doing so because it ‘looks’ like I’m daydreaming instead of listening! However, I too find that the activity of doodling (and sometimes note-taking) indeed helps to ‘anchor’ my learning potential.”

Sheila Delson on Easy Success Tips to Boost Your Creativity and Learning

Possibilities

“Values play a key role in significant relationships, financials, free time uses, whom I choose for friends, our reactions and responses. We are so much happier when we know that we are (a) aware of what we do value and (b) can see the values in our daily lives and (c) we know we are not compromising our values.”

Sue West on How Authentic Decisions Lead to Growth and Possibilities

Wonderfully Human

“Beauty of life is recognizing that absence of sad moments, the happy ones could become just dull. A bad moment is hard to go through, but once it’s over, and happiness arises, the good moment tastes sweeter. My way to approach transitions is understanding that everything changes in life, and sometimes the changes are rough and leave scars.”

Nacho Eguiarte on How to Unlock Gigantic Gifts in What Makes You Sad

Life Balance

“Balance, inherently, is something you need to keep adjusting to achieve. Just watch someone on a tightrope…they have to keep moving to keep the balance. So it isn’t a ‘one time’ goal, but rather a journey. At some moments, I may feel like I am falling, but a little shift in position, and I recover. I guess mostly it is being alert and intentional while focusing far down the road.”

Seana Turner on How to Set the Stage for Better Life Balance

What resonates with you? Which idea will be helpful for 2016? Come join the conversation!