This is a post that I put together for my other blog - MessyMomsSLC.blogspot.com. I thought it was such a good post, I'd share it with you too. I'm getting ready to start another round of cleaning and organizing classes in January, so if you've got anyone near the Salt Lake area that you think could benefit from a class like this, please send them my way. More class info is on the blog or click the contact button to E-mail me for more info.

I've been scouring the Internet for good tips to help you with your New Year's resolutions and I thik I've found a really great one. This post from Zen Habits is a couple of years old, but it had such good information, I just had to share it with you.

Controlling my habits is probably the biggest challenge I've ever had to deal with, both breaking bad habits and creating good ones. And I'm not alone. I read somewhere that something like 90% of heart attack patients can't change their habits, even when it might cost them their lives. No wonder we struggle so when we make our little resolutions to lose weight, clean up our houses, and stop abusing our charge cards.

So, what's a girl to do? Well, actually this article has some excellent suggestions for building up your habits in a very deliberate way that will make your changes stick. It's called Engineering Your Life and if you do it properly, you will make it almost impossible for yourself to fail.

One technique that I have used is very similar to the ideas shown in the article. I am perpetually late for work, mainly because I like to dawdle in the shower. That's where I do my best thinking and it's not unusual for me to be in there for half an hour or more, which always makes me late for work. So I set up a plan with my youngest son Blake. When I go to get into the shower, I set out a load of laundry along with a timer set to 15 minutes. When the timer goes off, he goes down to start the washer. I'll tell you, that gets me out of the shower extra quick, when that water turns cold as ice! Plus I get a good start on a load of laundry for the day.

Click HERE to read the article.