It’s time to get organized. I thought that being retired would mean finally having the time and energy to get a handle on my life. It doesn’t seem to be working that way. So, after a year of frivolous busyness I am ready to pull things together and get on with the rest of my life.
Relocating, redecorating and remodeling were fun but how much time can you spend on that? What happens now? There are dozens of self help books written about retirement. Some tell you to forget about planning and enjoy the time off; others tell you to plunge right in and start making things happen. The good news is that the choice is yours. The bad news is that procrastination becomes a habit. How do you plan on navigating the world as a single?
How many times have you heard retired people say that they are so busy that they don’t know how they ever had time to work? There still aren’t enough hours in a day. How can this be? How can you manage all of the activities of daily living without making it seem like work?
Author Sharon B. Siepel (Essential Survival Guide to Living on Your Own) writes about everything you need to know to live as a single. Her book is interesting and comprehensive enough to keep on your shelf as a reference book. Her advice is timely and as pertinent to young people setting out on their own as it is to a senior starting over again. She points out rather sagely that opportunities are not going to come your way unless you plan for them to happen. I think she is right. There will always be things that you want to do, but they aren’t going to happen unless you get your act together. Being organized is all about balancing your immediate needs (grocery shopping, cooking, trips to the library, taking a yoga class, learning how to do whatever you want to do, and so on and so forth) against long term goals (getting a GED, going back to college, learning how to draw, building houses for humanity or whatever your passion happens to be).
Productive people throughout the ages learned how to manage their time. They learned how to manage time when they went to school, when they juggled career and home and when they multi-tasked at work. What made you think it would be different now? Efficiency experts will tell you to look at how you spend (waste) your time. How much time do you spend preparing meals, eating, household chores, driving to and from the gym etc. visiting with friends, watching television, surfacing the internet and so on and so forth? They will tell you to write down everything that you need to do and everything that you want to do. They stress learning how to prioritize and then have the gumption to say “no” when you are pressured into deviating from your plan. Just because you are a single doesn’t mean that you have to be at everyone else’s beck and call.
So, what is your pleasure: sticky notes, a calendar with big white squares, an electronic organizer or a computer generated plan (my new phone even has an app for notes and reminders). No excuse for not being able to write things down. Once you have chosen a method you can start recording all of your activities. Remember to factor in those long term goals and think about how you are going to make them happen (take a class; join a group, volunteer, take a trip etc.). Be reasonable. You don’t want to overbook yourself, but you want to do enough that you feel a sense of pride and accomplishment.
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