By now you either have your new calendar for the coming year or are seriously thinking about it. Commitments are already cropping up and you probably have written notes or circled the dates in the tiny calendar at the back of your old one and made notes in the margins and are running out of room.
Now is a great opportunity to take the time to really set up your 2015 calendar so that is will work for you. I really enjoy this annual ritual. I sit comfortably with some nice pens and a lovely hot drink. I put on some holiday music and take my time to reflect and plan.
I review my current calendar. I note birthdays, anniversaries, and standard meeting times ( networking, goals group, weight watchers, etc.) I also note medical appointments that are already set for the new year.
I transfer these dates onto the new calendar in red. I want them to stand out from all the other appointments and meetings that will crowd my calendar as the year goes by.
At the top of each month I note what zone I am going to work on in my house (see former blogs on my zone plan). January will have “office” zone, February will have “guest bedroom” and so forth throughout the year. On the notes side of my calendar I will write in other actions that I do in that month. January might have “take down birdhouses and clean them”.
Also on the notes side I keep track of when I pay yearly obligations, renewals of subscriptions, donations, or memberships. Then when I start getting letters to “renew” something 4 months in advance, I can easily flip through my calendar and see when they are really due.
Finally I write in any known scheduled events for the upcoming months such as client appointments, presentations, and upcoming adventures (Europe in July!).
Once I have all the known events in place, I feel ready for anything the new year is going to bring.
Jonda S. Beattie Professional Organizer