A Pleasant Solution: Embracing an Organized Life

Today’s special guest is Leith Speer Barton. Leith is a fellow Fair Play Facilitator and she works both in-person and virtually as a parenting educator and coach. Based in New York City, Leith facilitates RIE® Parent-Infant Guidance classes to support and empower parents in order to build respectful and connected relationships with their children. The key topics Leith and I discuss include: The li...

Today's episode features special guest Hana Thomson. Hana is a jewelry appraiser and writer in the Ann Arbor, Michigan, area. She's worked at museums, auction houses, and in jewelry retail and production. She has a master's degree in the history of jewelry design from 1850 to 1950 from Parsons Cooper-Hewitt in New York City and a graduate technologist degree from the GIA. Hana loves...

I am excited to welcome Marissa McKool to our podcast today. Marissa, Master's in Public Health, is a coach for women in public health and related professions who struggle to find work-life balance, set boundaries, and clear mental clutter. She helps professionals stop chasing productivity at the expense of their happiness and health. Today we discuss ways Marissa helps her clients who want t...

My whole philosophy is that our internal clutter often shows up externally in some shape or form and I believe that our cars can be a sneaky place for clutter to appear. Each of us has a special relationship with our car. If you drive on a regular basis, your car essentially may be an extension of your home. And you deserve it to be a peaceful or restorative space, especially if you have kids. So...

Today I’m talking about inherited clutter. Inherited clutter is when you become the recipient of someone else's belongings for any other reason than by choice. Many people avoid having a conversation with their parents about finances, future living situations, and healthcare. Talking about aging doesn't make it less likely to happen. Instead, it's a way to connect with and better un...

The word "busy" is overused. It is often used as a blanket catchall phrase or a marker of success or martyrdom. I think a more accurate term is being over-committed. It's when you have to be in multiple places at once. It's when you have numerous projects requiring your attention or when your brain jumps from tasks to logistics to problem-solving. Busyness is life without suffi...

How do you want to feel in your home? The journey of creating your dream home and life starts with awareness. Self-trust is the anchor of our lives, and in today’s episode, I’ll share why I believe it’s the third and final cornerstone to an organized life. There are three qualities of self-trust: Trusting yourself to follow through or do what you plan to do. Trusting yourself to problem solve. Tru...

The external clutter in your life starts within your internal mindset. Today, I show how the intersection of emotions and decisions form the foundational elements of a clutter-free life. Most of the media you encounter spotlights systems, routines, and processes as the solution, yet I’ve seen something different. When you learn the skill of emotional awareness and emotional resilience, clutter doe...

In today’s episode, I address the fundamentals of decision-making. But, of course, you already know how to say no or yes. You may also know when you’re stuck or avoiding a project or decision. So join me as I dive into why decision-making is a cornerstone of a clutter-free life and how you can powerfully wield the tool of decision. One of the core values of my business is the simplicity of time an...

The bathroom is an integral part of your daily routine. Your thoughts about routine and your thoughts about it influence the time you spend in the space. So today, we will get curious about your relationship with your bathroom. Noticing the current state of your bathroom isn't about judgment or criticism. It's about listening to the soundtrack in your head and then getting curious about...

So often we’re busy criticizing ourselves for how our home could be tidier. Or how we could have less stuff. Or how things could be more organized. As a result, we forget to stop and recognize the abundance and beauty in our lives. Happiness and satisfaction aren’t directly correlated to where you live, what size your home is, or the number of objects in it. Happiness and satisfaction come from ho...

By embracing an organized life you’re actually more prepared for the moments when life goes sideways. A "glitch" in your matrix is when there’s disruption of such magnitude that your emotional foundation is shaken for a few days or sometimes for a few months.  It’s a season where things are not just off but the disruptions are seemingly random, especially when life has been running in a...

After doing a fair amount of travel recently, I started thinking about why we crave predictability in all areas of our life. You depend upon it, but you may not notice how much you crave it until it’s absent. However, when things go awry, you find yourself suddenly grasping for stability. Predictability is why organization is essential. Building a schedule and structure around your day is another...

This episode is about why consciously defining the hours you're working on household responsibilities or care tasks matters. Women are raised to always be working and always giving our time to others. Therefore some unlearning of this pattern may be needed. First, I share why the idea of "working hours" at home is critically important. Then I'll share my experience, including e...

In this episode, I discuss how to practically declutter and update your wardrobe from a mindset-based approach. I’m going to encourage you to look at your clothing from the point of view of the past, your current reality, and your future self.  Each set of objects holds a story or a memory, which is why they’re so difficult to get rid of. It’s also why it is easy to get bogged down in the swamp of...

If you consider yourself sentimental or nostalgic, or if you find yourself resisting letting go of items, this episode will resonate. I outline the ways in which your brain structure and biological design influence the decluttering process. These factors play a significant role behind your motivation and the way you think about what you own. Your brain often acts on autopilot, giving you sneaky th...

In this episode, I introduce my personal experience as a caregiver for my mother, who is living with dementia. My mother will make several guest appearances on podcast episodes in both stories and in spirit. She is my reason “why” for everything I do and has inspired and supported me through every step of life. When I started my journey as a caregiver, I wrote an influential essay entitled “The Wa...

In this episode, I define mental clutter and why a calm and positive mindset is essential to creating an aligned and sustainable lifestyle. After years of working in-home as an organizer, I realized that our internal experiences profoundly affect our external reality. There is a common misconception that a tidy home guarantees a clear mindset. However, internal and external peace are not mutually...

In this episode, I discuss how pre-project planning improves every organizational undertaking. The hardest part about starting a project is ACTUALLY starting it. Feeling overwhelmed about a project is normal and can lead to procrastination. Knowing where you want to go with a project is essential pre-work. Start by identifying the scope of work you want to accomplish. Then, pre-plan deadlines, exp...

In this episode, I invite you to adventure forward in time and visualize your future self. Who you want to become will guide your decision-making and focus on every action you take today. In addition, I review common obstacles my clients face when discovering their future selves. Together, we will tear down the walls of self-doubt, guilt, and excuses. I know time is at a premium. How often do you...

In this episode, I debunk the myth of domestic perfection. We all have a vision of the “perfect” home. But there is no such thing as the perfect way to maintain a house. Every belief we hold about how our home should look or feel is based on societal messages. We have tricked ourselves into believing domestic bliss is a clean, organized house with bins, labels, and baskets. But the feeling of “bli...

In this episode, I define the meaning of the word ‘clutter.’ I also talk about three ways clutter surfaces in your home.  Feeling uncomfortable is typical when we force ourselves to confront our stuff. Over time our brain naturally adjusts to being surrounded by clutter. It processes excess stimuli as being “normal.” Our brain tricks us into feeling like stuff just appeared in our home overnight....

In this episode, I talk about a central topic of decluttering: why you feel connected to items you own.  It's normal to feel strong emotions about your home. However, the organization and design of your space are morally neutral. We use invented societal standards to judge ourselves and our homes. But you are more than your stuff. It's necessary to unlearn this way of thinking and embrac...

In this episode, I share three reasons why we get caught thinking that our schedule and identity are intertwined. Our society praises overworking and over-committing. Our culture emphasizes productivity, and as a result, we connect our busyness with our worth. I argue that you matter just by being you. How busy your schedule is or your ability to meet a million commitments is irrelevant to your wo...

In this episode, I share what it means to embrace an organized life. Organization, practically and in mindset, was my method to stay sane during the pandemic. Between work, home, and family, I had a lot of things going on. There were many moving parts. Organization is more than tidy spaces. It starts within. What you experience internally shows up in your actions at home, at work, and with friends...