Getting Organized

Intro

1. Learn Vocabulary - Learn some new vocabulary before you start the lesson.

• trick
• fresh start
• tip
• attitude

• Spiritual
• recreation
• balance
• Eliminate

• waste of time
• Prioritize
• dedicated
• focus

2. Read and Prepare - Read the introduction and prepare to hear the audio.

It’s a new year, and you’ve got a great opportunity to make a fresh start and get yourself organized. Whether it’s your house, your job, your school work or your relationships, I’m sure there’s something that could be organized better.
I’m not an expert in organization, but I’ve been trying to make my life more organized lately, so I do know about lots of organizational resources. Read on for some tips and tricks about getting organized in 2004!

Dialog

1. Listen and Read - Listen to the audio and read the dialog at the same time.

Log in to Listen

2. Study - Read the dialog again to see how the vocab words are used.

The first thing you have to have if you want to get organized is the right attitude. You have to be excited about making positive changes in your life. If you know that you can get organized – you will!
Once you’ve decided that getting your life organized is important, you should focus on these things:
Balance
Life is made up of many important things, including: Self, Family/Friends, Health, Work/School, Financial, Spiritual, Social, Recreational. You must make sure that you find balance amongst all these things – never letting one of them rule your life.
Track Your Time
- Write down what you do during a whole day (for three days).
- Examine your time tracking and figure out how much time you’re wasting doing things that don’t need to be done.
- Eliminate the activities that are a waste of time.
To Do Lists
- Break down big projects into many small ones.
- Prioritize all of your projects (choose which are most important).
- Make a goal for when you want to complete your tasks.
- Give yourself rewards when you complete something (for example, you could eat a cookie after you clean up your bedroom).
The Right Tools
There are many different tools you can use to help get yourself organized. For example, to organize your time and data, you could use a PDA:
Palm Pilot – www.palm.com
Danger Hiptop – www.danger.com
Sony Clie – www.sony.com/clie
For your house, you could build a new closet:
Closet Company – www.portlandcloset.com

Quizzes

Go Super to take Quiz

Lesson MP3

Go Super to download full lesson MP3