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Cassandra Aarssen (“Cass”) runs the highly successful organizing business Clutterbug. Her unique approach helps people discover – and then organize based upon – their unique organizing type.
In Cass’s Clutterbug world, the different types originate from a two-by-two grid based on 1) your preference for seeing your stuff (visual vs non-visual organizer) and 2) your preference for macro vs micro-organization. (I’m a visual macro-organizer, in case you’re curious).
I was fascinated by this distinction, it being so simple yet profound in how it impacted my effort to gain (& keep) better control of my house with two young kids.
I finally understood why my open kitchen shelving and bookshelves always look good without effort, but stuff in closets is a disaster. And why I can’t keep a paper filing system to save my life, but a box full of “keep” papers seems to work.
But I think this principle has a wider application than household organizing.
When someone wants to get on top of their money, the usual place to start is with a monthly budget allocating cash to groceries, eating out, gas, clothing, entertainment, emergency savings, vacation savings, etc etc etc. All. The. Categories.
This categorized cash allocation would be the equivalent of starting to organize my desk by filing my papers into file folders by topic or year (i.e. micro-organizing). I will burn out quickly.
Most of us don’t benefit from starting at that degree of organization. Instead, we start by shuffling the piles into fewer piles, maybe sorting the papers into “keep” or “toss,” then moving on to the next thing.
Money is the same way.
Macro-organizing gives us an easier place to start and then you can go on to micro-organize from there if that’s your style.
The bigger picture is generally more influential than the details anyway. Just like your desk being cluttered with papers and sticky notes probably affects the overall feeling you get sitting at your desk more than whether your paperwork is separated into topics inside that file drawer.
To macro-organize your finances, start with big picture issues: How much per month do you earn in take-home pay? How much per month and per year are you sending to savings? How much per year do you use for covering irregular and unexpected expenses? How much per month must you limit your total spending to keep those numbers balanced?
When you have those straight and the overarching system is fitting together, it’s much easier to go into more specifics in any particular area. You may want to get more detailed with your savings, or not. You may want to get more detailed with subcategorizing your spending, or not.
Just consider how well you have those big-picture figures honed before getting lost in the details.
You are not messy, everyone just organizes differently.
Cassandra Aarssen
L’ennemi du bien est le bien. Translation: Perfect is the enemy of good.
Voltaire
I will always choose a lazy person to do a difficult job because he will find an easy way to do it.
Ziad K. Abdelnour in Economic Warfare: Secrets of Wealth Creation in the Age of Welfare Politics
I hope you enjoyed this edition of Under 2, an email series designed to share quick bites of wisdom to empower your financial journey (while keeping it short). Be sure to sign-up below to get these messages in your inbox.
All for now,
Lindsey