Make sure to stay organized

I hope everyone has had a good weekend, I spent a good part of mine searching for documents. I eventually found them right on my desk after shuffling them in with other papers.

One thing that has helped me a bit on my path is to stay organized. I remember when I was younger and I had a savings account how I would loose the statements. I would be in a panic much like I was this weekend. Frantically searching for the paper until after midnight.

What being organized to me means:

• Have a “to file” box. Right when I walk in my door I have a box I put all my mail, receipts, paperwork, etc. It all ends up there. Once every few days I will go through this pile and sort it and one by one record and file away as needed. Although I do on occasion forget to place a receipt there and then I forget what I spent it on.
• Have a spot for everything. I have an old UPS box that I keep all my old statement in, as soon as I reconcile my checkbook I place it in this box ASAP. To many times have I forgotten only to have the statement reprinted since I lost it. I also have a file cabinet for my business and I keep everything of important, from letters to permits and everything else you can imagine.
• Don’t just leave “stuff” out. This is exactly what I did. When I did the article the other day for how much I’ve made thus far I left it on my desk and worked on a paper and it was mixed in with those paper. So when I went to search for it when I was doing book work I couldn’t find it.
• Use a calendar or reminder system. I can not speak enough good words for Google Calendar. I have it setup to text me a few days in advanced and the morning of all appointments. Before I would use a paper, but it would get lost or torn.
• Don’t carry your documents around loosely. I have someone I do work for that does this. Instead of having a nice spot to place it, they carry it around with them. When they go home, go out of state, etc. it’s there with them. As you can imagine they lost a few items. Before I got a clip board and a bag to carry around I would loose paper and lucky it wasn’t anything major, but the other person would loose receipts and the likes.

These are just a few of the numerous ways to help keep organized. I invite you to share your method? Is it the simple Shoe Box or do you have an elaborate file system?