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This past week, the last of my friends who religiously makes New Year's resolutions reported he had finally dropped his plans to get better organized this year.

Having never known anyone who actually completed a New Year's resolution, I resolve that we drop this time-honored tradition.

Why? For starters, doing so will relieve the world of a lot of stress and guilt that's associated with unmet resolutions. Second, it just doesn't make sense to me to plan anything based on something as arbitrary as the end or beginning of a year. The same goes for birthdays, anniversaries, or the end of the week, since all are human concepts.

Crazy as it sounds, if you lived on Mars, you'd make half as many New Year's resolutions since its year is about two earth-years long. And on Uranus, where one year equals 84 earth years, you probably wouldn't ever get a chance to make a New Year's resolution given our average life span of 75 years.

Instead of pegging your plans to an arbitrary date, why not organize your personal life based on your need to better organize? Besides it's only ever "now" anyway, right? To get a handle on how to get better organized, there are several options available. You could purchase a book or CD on the topic. My current read is "Getting Things Done" by David Allen, whom Fast Company magazine dubbed "the guru" of personal productivity.

Of course, if you simply want to better arrange things in your home office or garage, you may want to consider one of those storage system companies such as California Closets or Classy Closets.

Alternatively, you may want to explore your personal motivations regarding why you hang onto your clutter. Beyond a full psychological evaluation, how about consulting a personal coach? They might be able to help you uncover the root causes for being disorganized, not just fix the symptoms. There are over 40 members of the International Coach Federation in New Mexico, many of whom also carry the distinction of a being a certified personal coach.

A coach's areas of assistance can include developing a priority list or creating a more balanced lifestyle and better managing your time.

Probably the best approach would be to seek out the services of a professional organizer. There are 15 members of the National Association of Professional Organizers (www.napo.net) in New Mexico.

Professional organizers offer a variety of services including organizing your home and business, helping you manage information and time, as well as coaching and training. Some organizers even specialize in work with attention-deficit disorder and chronically disorganized clients.

"Getting organized may begin on a personal level but is also apropos for business, too," says local trainer Christine Kominiak, owner of Productive Sense Training & Consulting. "In order to remain competitive, even highly successful and profitable companies constantly look for ways to get more done, in less time, with fewer people. When employees become more focused, organized and productive, everything else flows more smoothly. It's important to build your success on highly organized people."

Productive Sense offers a "cost of disorganization calculator" at www.productivesense.com to help you assess how much your productivity deficiencies may be costing you. And to ensure you stay on track, they also offer the "GO System," a training course that includes practical tips to help people improve in the six areas that cause chaos and disorganization in an office environment: handling incoming items (paper, e-mail, etc.), prioritizing, using time rationally, managing projects and handling both personality and psychological issues.

The benefits of getting organized are numerous.

"The greatest benefits include reducing your stress and anxiety, improving your chances of getting a promotion, and for business owners, improving your ability to follow up with your current clients and better managing new business opportunities that may present themselves," Kominiak says.

It's about getting organized and creating systems for the long-term rather than making quick fixes.