As we jump around our homes, today I wanted to give you some helpful hints with something that we all have to deal with - MAIL!
I know - maybe this topic seems a bit odd to you, but mail can be a big issue for many of us; something that for a number of reasons we don’t want to deal with. Bills!! If you still get mail copies of all the monies you owe, we can all agree that this is a big thumbs down. So what do we end up doing? We stack or pile these reminder payments often misplacing them, with the end result being we end up forgetting about them completely.
The same thing can happen with statements we get - we stack them up thinking that eventually we will get to them - and then “eventually” never happens and we end up with piles of unopened envelopes. Any or all of this of this sound familiar? In fact, the stacking and piling can happen with all kinds of mail, not only statements or bills, we may also do this with donation requests, personal letters, invitations and fliers.
We may also find ourselves with piles of packages too, that for whatever reason we don’t want to deal with in the moment, and then sometimes the moment never comes leaving us with a pile of forgotten items. Putting things off may seem like a time saving manoeuvre, but in reality it’s a time suck. If we were to change our way of thinking and decided to deal with things as they happened, we would in fact be saving much more time than we think. Dealing with masses and piles of mail and packages will end up costing you more time than saving it. Procrastination - nobody’s friend, yet it is extremely common amongst all of us. “I will get to it tomorrow/next week/next month” This kind of thinking rarely pays off and often does more harm than good, because our to do lists get so big that they become big to don’t lists.
I want to share some very helpful advice with you that I came across a long time ago but have never forgotten and which I adhere to this day: “you should always open your mail while standing in front of a recycling bin.” I am not suggesting that you throw out all of your mail - but the point is that you will be encouraged to deal with your mail on the spot. This 2 or 3 or 5 minutes of management can prevent the good ole pile and stack up phenomenon. Most of the time, at least half of your mail will be immediate garbage, but some is not. The paper bill with a due date? Open it, note the due date and diarize it right then and there - sometimes taking a picture of the bill with your phone may be handy if you need to access the information at a later date. And voila! Now that item is ready for the recycling bin.
Packages? Open them right away, put the contents away, and move the packaging to recycling or garbage. Statements? If you are one of those people who saves every statement, make sure you have a system for this - a filing cabinet to slot them in or other box to put them in, rather than allowing them to pile and clutter up your precious space. Does this seem like a big time commitment to you? I promise you, if you do it right away this will take up no more than several minutes and it will be dealt with and over - not a lingering task that needs to be tended to. When we allow mail to pile this adds clutter to our lives, and this clutter can start to bog our minds down and waste our much needed energy. The next time you get your mail, see what happens when we deal with it in the moment! Clutter be gone!