Our friend and colleague Karen Meade of Let’s Get Organizing will be hosting her annual Organize and Energize workshop. It’s on Saturday, January 19th, 2013 from 9:30 AM to 12:30 PM at TriPoint on North St Mary’s, in San Antonio, Texas. There’s a great lineup of speakers talking about organization, meal planning, health and fitness and Dan will be there talking about tech. For more information check out LetsGetOrganizing.com or Facebook.com/LetsGetOrganizing. Hope to see you there!

So for the rest of this topic, let’s just consider clutter as “anything we don’t need, want, or use that takes our time, energy, space and serenity”

You see…the truth about clutter and accumulating more, is that eventually you’ll be overwhelmed by the physical clutter which in turn will overwhelm you emotionally in terms of stress, indecision, guilt and so on. Clutter slowly but steadily creeps into your home and sucks the life out of you.  It can affect both your mental and physical health.

 As Peter Walsh said in his book It’s All Too Much:

“Clutter robs you of far more than the space it occupies–it steals your life!”

If you find yourself saying yes to many of these questions then clutter may be negatively affecting your life.

Now, of course I have an entire website: Get Simplifized.com, dedicated to getting organized and helping you control the clutter with TONS of written posts and videos…and I even offer virtual organizing and consultation, just click on the Virtual Organization tab at the top of the Get Simplifized website.

So you can check that out, but the fact of the matter is, there are tons of resources out there…it’s just a matter of taking the time to tap into them.

Communication should be so simple and natural, but often it’s not.  But, I think universally, effective communication is a common goal. Everyone who is a party in that communication has  responsibilities in that communication. But that doesn’t always happen. When we say that there’s a “breakdown in communication” more often than not it’s a case of someone not meeting their responsibilities in the communication process.

So, I thought I’d share a few techniques that can help simplify communication. You can use these at home, work, school…wherever.  If you think these help, let me know and I have a couple more that I be happy to share in another show! Now I’ll preface this right up front that these are techniques I learned long-long ago as part of my training and they served me well throughout my time in the military and when I was teaching at university.

There are 4 main actors in effective communication and if one of them is out of sync then there will likely be some breakdown, so you’ll have ineffective communication.

Giving Tasks or Directions Properly: The next technique is a foolproof way to make sure you give out tasks properly that include guidelines and expectations. We’ve all been in situations where we’re given a task and sometimes the task itself is vague or most likely, the expectations are vague.

A Poor (But Unfortunately, Typical) Example of Communication

Your spouse calls or leaves you a note that says “pick up some eggs.” That night your spouse gets home, goes to make the meal and oops! No eggs. You say “well I’m going shopping tomorrow.” “Well I needed them tonight!”

So obviously, the task was vague and the expectations were vague.

Here’s a solution that is so commonplace in the military that it’s taken for granted. It’s called  the:

Here’s what each one means:

So using the buying eggs example, let’s use the Task-Condition-Standard-Time model:

This tried and true model is great for written or oral communication. If you’ve gotten away from this you may want to revive the habit. But add the necessary elements of Task-Condition-Standard-Time in there when applicable.

Example: Say you’re sending a party invitation… the 5W and How explain all the basics, but adding the Standard could sure help when it comes to things like the appropriate attire for the party. That could be an embarrassing thing to leave out…especially if it’s a costume party!

Bonus: And a quick tech tip to go along with it is if you’re a Gmail user, build one of those Canned Responses that Vanessa talked about in an earlier episode and then anytime you need that format, just pop it in!  Or, if you’re not a Gmail user, in virtually any email system you could just build a template for these communication techniques and just save it in your drafts to copy when needed.

So there you have it, two not-so-secret, but potentailly quite helpful, military tips, one reminder for the old school “5Ws and How” with military spin, and a quick tech tip. All to help you with more simple and effective communication. Again, if you think these help, let me know and I have a couple more that I be happy to share in a future episode, sound good?

I’ve mentioned that I’m a frugal gal, but there are a few things I don’t mind spending a little extra on….like my Vera Wang boots and Saddleback leather tote bag.  I buy them at a discount, but quality beats quantity almost every time!

I don’t have lots of use for spreadsheets but when I do, I love the functionality of them in Google Docs or Drive. They keep track of all older versions and I can always restore to an earlier version. plus, both Vanessa and I can work on them at the same time and everything syncs! I like to use them for online forms, too! Super easy, they work essentially the same as an Excel spreadsheet. For power spreadsheet users they may not have all the functionality of an Excel sheets, but for people like me who still count with their fingers and toes, they’re great! You can even use the forms function for surveys, etc, on websites and in emails. I’m using them to track our stuff for the Edit & ForgetIt Challenge, too. They’re functional and simple…that’s why they’re my Thing this week!

Emily wrote on the website: “Found you through Cliff’s podcast – great first show, I look forward to catching up and then keeping up with it. You have inspired me to continue on with my own simple living podcast, that I recorded twice and then stopped, and have been waffling about whether to keep it going.

On iTunes, Mamabearny wrote: “Great tips to start 2013 out right! This is the first time I’ve listened to a podcast and I’m glad I listened to this one. It was a great use of time and the hosts provide great practical advice that can be implemented right away to help simplify your life.”

Once again, Happy 2013 and we hope this year is a great year for simplifying your life. If you haven’t started yet or have just been thinking about it, now is a great time to start. We’re blessed to be able to share some ideas and some of our experiences as we journey toward a simpler life in the modern world and we’d like to hear some of your experiences, too.

It sure would help if you you took just 2 minutes to review the show in iTunes. The more positive reviews we get, the higher the show is in the listings and that’s how people find us.

If you like the show, please subscribe and consider giving us a good review in iTunes. It takes less than 2 minutes to review the show in iTunes and that’s the best way for people to find us.

If you know someone else who might enjoy the journey too, send them a link to SimpleLifeTogether.com

Connect with us on Twitter, I’m @DanielHayes and Vanessa is @GetSimplifized. You can find links to our Twitter and Google Plus profiles on the left side of the home page.

Be sure to leave comments below, send us a voicemail from the little microphone icon on the right side of the page, or you can go “old school” and email us!  Comments, questions, thoughts, ideas, suggestions…they’re all welcome and we’d love to hear from you!

Karen Meade of LetsGetOrganizing

Clutterer’s Anonymous

Institute for Challenging Disorganization

Peter Walsh: It’s All Too Much

National Association of Professional Organizers

The Truth About Clutter

Lots of YouTube Videos to help you get rid of clutter and get organized!