Keep Organized

The only thing worse than not writing down a thought is writing it down and having no idea whatsoever where it is. When I take notes on a given subject, I like to keep them all together. Unfortunately, ideas come to me at all different times, so I don't always have the right papers with me to do that. I write down thoughts on the closest piece of paper, and I mean to transfer them as soon as I get to home base. But because I'm me, I often forget to or don't get around to consolidating all my notes.

It is very easy to lose track of paper scraps or even of where you saved a file to in your computer. Organization, though, is critical. Much as your written words require a certain order to make sense to a reader, so, too, does your personal space need order to remain a usable tool for doing work.

If you are the lackadaisical type, you may never feel that it's bad enough to need reorganizing, or even basic cleaning up, but trust me that the minutes, or even hours that you spend clearing out trash and putting like items together and giving each of them their own space will all be well worth it. Not only will you be more effective at being a writer, but your mind will feel uncluttered and free to do more than it did before.

It never ceases to amaze me how much a clean working space clears my mind, but invariably it does. Keep organized, and keep it up.