Simplify Your Time: Stop Running and Start Living!

Praise for Simplify Your Time

"Marcia Ramsland’s easy-to-read book will motivate you to create the time you need to live the life you want. With over twenty years of experience as a professional organizer, her eye-opening, time-saving tools and tips will give you the insight to Simplify Your Time and more!"

BARRY J. IZSAK

President, National Association of Professional Organizers

Time is all we have. Here’s a way to maximize it and get great results.

MARK VICTOR HANSEN

Co-creator, #1 New York Times Best-selling series Chicken Soup for the Soul ®

Co-author, Cracking the Millionaire Code and The One Minute Millionaire

No one ever said life is easy, but my friend and colleague Marcia Ramsland really makes it simple. Follow her advice and discover years of free time. I did!

DR. DENIS WAITLEY

Author, Timing is Everything

Who couldn’t use more time? Marcia’s book is like being given the gift of time! Thanks Marcia, I hope millions of men and women also get the gift of your book!

PAM FARREL

Speaker and Author, 10 Best Decisions a Woman Can Make

"I thought I knew a lot about time management until I read Simplify Your Time. Marcia Ramsland has challenged me to get off ‘the gerbil wheel of life’ and to start developing routines and systems that will make me more effective in my role as a wife, mother, and business owner. Every page is packed with stress-reducing and time-saving habits, tools, skills, and strategies that will make me more productive when I’m working, and free of guilt when I’m not. If you need more hours in your day, read this noteworthy book!"

CAROL KENT

Speaker and Author, Becoming a Woman of Influence

"Help! I want off the merry-go-round! My head is spinning, I’m going too fast, I’m not sure I can keep up! If that’s your cry, Marcia’s book can help you live a more balanced life. You will find her short chapters very easy and quick to digest. A plus feature to the book is her 101 Time Saving Tips. A must-read for those who want to make sense of the maze of life."

EMILIE BARNES

Speaker, Author, and Founder of More Hours in My Day

"I loved Simplify Your Life, Marcia’s first book. I was so impressed that I wrote her from my organized desk, ‘Now I’m ready for the next book.’ And here it is! Now we have time to get things done and live the life we want."

JOANNE ROLLER, C.P.C.

Senior Recruiting Consultant

"After reading Marcia’s suggestions, I am motivated to manage my time. I never realized how much time we really do have control over."

ANN LARSON

Tax Accountant and Author

"So much to do with so little time, or so I once thought! As a homemaker, mom, and with a part-time business at home, it’s overwhelming to have a full calendar and a huge pile of projects that never seem to get done. Marcia has changed all that with Simplify Your Time, teaching us to break it down into smaller opportunities to be accomplished so we are not facing a mountain of frustration—very needed."

TINA DEARMONT

Homemaker and Former Executive Assistant

simplify

your time

© 2006 Marcia Ramsland

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotation in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

Published in Nashville, Tennessee, by Thomas Nelson. Thomas Nelson is a trademark of Thomas Nelson, Inc.

Published in association with the literary agency Alive Communications Inc., 7680 Goddard Street, Suite 200, Colorado Springs, CO 80920, www.alivecommunications.com.

Thomas Nelson, Inc., titles may be purchased in bulk for educational, business, fund-raising, or sales promotional use. For information, please e-mail [email protected].

The names and identities of clients mentioned have been changed or concealed in composites to protect their privacy. For those who granted permission to print their names, details about their lives appear as they happened.

Editors: Karen O’Connor and Jennifer Stair

Acquisitions Editor: Debbie Wickwire

Cover Design: Terra Peterson at www.brandnavigation.com

Interior Design: Stacy Clark

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Ramsland, Marcia.

Simplify your time : stop running and start living! / Marcia Ramsland.

p. cm.

ISBN: 978-0-8499-1458-4

1. Home economics. 2. Time management. I. Title.

TX147.R368 2006

640—dc22

2006012958

Printed in the United States of America

07 08 09 10 RRD 9 8 7 6 5 4

This book is dedicated . . .

to you, my busy friend,

in search of more time and a simpler lifestyle,

to my clients, who insist I teach them how to better manage their time

after I organize their offices and homes,

to Larry Nelson, a favorite client and friend, whose legacy reminds

me that you can live a full life of friends, productivity, and purpose

even if it is shortened by tragedy at age forty-seven,

and to my mother, Dorothy Rasmussen, age eighty-nine,

who outlived all our relatives

and reminds me that life can be satisfying at

every age and stage.

Life is a gift. Live it to its fullest by using your time well.

Contents

A Word from the Author

Day 1 Today Is the Time of Your Life

Week 1 Time-Saving Habits to Simplify Your Daily Life

Day 2 Punch Up Your Punctuality

Day 3 Save Time with Two-Minute Pickups

Day 4 Get Off Your Computer and On with Your Life

Day 5 Power Through Your Paperwork

Day 6 Clean Up the Clutter

Day 7 Plan Tomorrow the Night Before

Day 8 Change a Habit, Change Your Life

Week 2 Time-Saving Tools to Simplify Managing Your Time

Day 9 Capture More Time by Controlling Your Calendar

Day 10 Fine-Tune Your To-Do List

Day 11 Pursue a Personal Project List

Day 12 Put It All Together in a Planner System

Day 13 Practice the Power of Prioritizing

Day 14 Spruce Up Your Support Tools

Day 15 Create Weekly Time-Saving Routines

Week 3 Time-Saving Skills to Simplify Your Lifestyle

Day 16 Take Time for Relationships

Day 17 Simply Find More Personal Time

Day 18 Discover Your Rhythm for Each Week

Day 19 Master the Secrets of Successful Multitasking

Day 20 Overcome When You’re Overwhelmed

Day 21 Learn to Delegate and Say No

Day 22 Take Some Downtime Each Day

Week 4 Time-Saving Strategies to Simplify Your Future

Day 23 Jump-Start Your Dreams with a Five-Year Calendar

Day 24 Upgrade Your PQ (Project Quotient)

Day 25 Do Less to Accomplish More

Day 26 Go for Goals That Simplify Your Life

Day 27 Ensure Your Future with a Strong Family Network

Day 28 Stop Time to Handle a Life Crisis

Day 29 Make Today the Best Day of Your Life

Day 30 Start Living—Today!

Time Management Resources

About the Author

A Word from the Author

Since you picked up this book, you are probably very busy and looking for more time in your life. (Or you really liked the cover.)

I told my publisher that people who need more time don’t have time to read a book; they need answers right now! So after some brainstorming, we agreed that if we organized the book in short, digestible chapters that could be easily applied, it would be invaluable. That’s what you have in your hands. Thirty short, practical chapters that will give you everything you need to learn the nuances of simplifying your time. You can read a chapter each day, or you can read an entire section in one sitting. The important thing is that you immediately start to apply what you are reading and build on those skills day after day.

When you think about it, everything happens in time: work projects, social events, travel and hobbies, crises and celebrations. We can simplify our time by evaluating our lives, learning new skills, and being intentional about where our time is going.

Studies have shown we have more than two hundred inputs a day—e-mail, mail, thoughts, decisions, memos, phone calls, and on and on the list goes. But our short-term memory only holds seven items at a time. This explains why we often feel overloaded. To clear your mind and simplify your time, you need to know the best habits, tools, shortcuts, and strategies of time management. And I promise to make this book interesting by including client and personal stories to illustrate just how you can apply them.

Be ready to learn and to be entertained. Consider me your time coach as we warm up on the racetrack of life. Let this be your personal time management guide to help you relieve stress, find time for yourself, and create a lifestyle that supports you to get more done in less time.

Simplify Your Time: Stop Running and Start Living! is the practical application of the time management books you may have read and loved. From now on you’ll know how to save time, spend time, capture time, and multiply your time to simplify your life. Let’s get started!

Warmly,

Marcia Ramsland

The Organizing Pro

Day 1

Today Is the Time of Your Life

Being rich is having money;

being wealthy is having time.

—Margaret Bonnano

Hi, honey. All 168 boxes are packed and ready to go. I held the phone in one hand and a well worn to-do list in the other as I sank into a chair. I was relieved to tell my husband that all of our belongings and I would soon join him. David was already in California while I was closing things out at our home in upstate New York after our decision to move across the country for his new job. Our three teens would join us later that week.

As we talked, I suddenly noticed a gaping hole with only the prongs standing upright on my engagement ring. I gasped and almost dropped the phone. Oh no! My diamond is missing! David, you won’t believe it. It’s gone!At that moment, a million thoughts raced through my mind. Where did I lose it? The movers had just spent two days packing boxes which were ready to be picked up and delivered. I could just picture our three teenagers unpacking the boxes at the other end and me distraught with agony, scolding them, Be careful. My diamond could be in there.

I knew I didn’t want to add any more tension than we already felt. So I took a deep breath and spoke to David in a calm voice. OK. What do I do now? Was it insured?

No, David said, but don’t worry; just come. Everything is great here in California.

What?! It’s not insured? I didn’t know whether to scream or cry. This was no ordinary gem. My husband had picked out the diamond especially for me when he was a college student traveling through Europe with his family.

Was That My Only Diamond?

That night I went to dinner with friends and their two sons, and I told them my dilemma. We’ll go back and find it, offered one of the boys. Their parents were eager to come too. However, there was one obstacle—no lights in the house. No problem, we’ll bring flashlights, they volunteered.

After dinner, the five of us went back to our empty home. In the darkness, we focused our flashlights on every step we took. Where were you today? my friend asked.

Time-Saving Tip #1

If I have a clear mental picture of what I’m looking for, I can take steps to find it.

I remembered going up the attic steps, so we decided to start there. Carefully, we unfolded the stairs from the ceiling and creaked up one step at a time. Then down the stairs. Next we explored the bedroom . . . the family room . . . the kitchen . . . the living room. As we walked carefully through the last room, I began to lose hope of ever seeing my diamond again.

I paused to regain my thoughts and asked of no one in particular, Now what would this diamond look like? I glanced down at the carpet tweeds. It would look like this, I said as I spied something shiny like a piece of plastic wrap. When I picked it up, it held its shape. It was my diamond!

There it was—just sitting at the foot of the attic folding stairs. All five of us had been up and down that stairway looking for it, yet we missed it. Thankfully, I now had a second chance to appreciate my treasure.

Time Management Lessons from My Diamond Hunt

I learned some lessons from that emotion-packed diamond hunt that relate to our topic of simplifying time:

LESSON #1: WHAT I DIDN’T KNOW WAS COSTLY. As a starry-eyed fiancée, I must have missed the instructions to regularly check the prongs holding the diamond. Regular maintenance would have saved me from a crisis at a critical moment in life.

In time management, there are some basic rules, tools, and skills you need to keep your life running smoothly too. Don’t wait for a crisis to realize you missed some important steps. You’ll learn them in this book.

LESSON #2: I TOOK IT FOR GRANTED. I was wearing my diamond every day but not really seeing it. I liked knowing it was there, but I didn’t realize I needed to take better care of it.

Something similar can happen with time. We use time every day, but we don’t realize it can get away from us if we don’t manage it well.

Time-Saving Tip #2

Remember, time is on your side if you use it well. But it works against you if you bite off more than you can chew.

LESSON #3: WHEN I KNEW WHAT I WAS LOOKING FOR, I FOUND IT. I thought I knew what my diamond would look like, but I missed it several times. Until I focused on the gem’s qualities of size, shape, and color, it remained lost to me.