Rating: Summary: Amateur Hour Review: I purchased the Julie Morgenstern video and audio tapes as I was hoping to get an organization jump start. I found the video to be dull, slow and boring. And it was no surprise to find the same qualities in the audio series. If you have never seen a file folder then this is a must have. For anyone who has even some rudimentary understanding of how to manage time, I recommend you look somewhere else. I found the information contained in Ms. Morgenstern's presentations worthless.
Rating: Summary: This Book Actually Helped! Review: This book made perfect sense to me. I have been disorganized (and messy) my entire life. I can't believe I didn't think of the simple solutions Julie offers before! The book is written in sections so once you have read the chapters explaining how her system works, you can go to the chapter on the area you want to tackle. She gives examples of how you might organize that area in a way that makes sense TO YOU! How liberating to know there isn't just one right way to do it! I also liked that she herself used to be disorganized--it made me feel like she understood what it was like, and was not just another neatnik lecturing me. I organized my 2 year old daughter's room 3 weeks ago and incredibly, it is still neat!
Rating: Summary: Not just your average "book of tips" Review: I truly enjoyed reading this book and finding that it is a workable and extremely customizable system for being truly organized and not just neat by appearances. I especially like how she breaks each room down into zones by what you do in each place. She likens it to the simple organization of a kindegarten classrom, and it really is very simple. She shows you how to work WITH your bad habits instead of changing them (which, for all my good intentions, I know I won't break), turning my habit of doing the bills in the dining room into an organized and easily put away habit, instead of a cluttered and useless dining table. I am ordering her book on time management based on this book, and I hope she sticks to her unique blend of psychology and action in that book as well. I am about to move to a new apartment and I cannot wait to have a home that is set up completely around this system.
Rating: Summary: Inspiring! Review: This book is wonderful... I read it, and now I am on a role. She puts things so simple, that getting organized is fun and exciting! This is definitely one of the books I'm keeping on my bookshelf to refer back to again and again.
Rating: Summary: Disappointing Review: The advice is too general and commonplace. I found this book to be greatly inferior to Stephanie Winston's Getting Organized and Lehmkuhl and Lamping's Organizing for the Creative Person. For someone really trying to come to terms to with their clutter and messiness, those two books are the place to start.
Rating: Summary: You Can't Organize Clutter Review: I bought this book and was very disappointed with it. I wish I had saved my money. I have gotten far more organization done using the Flylady.net method. This book's method takes too much time and you have to be organized to get organized. Didn't work for a former messy like me!
Rating: Summary: Julie is my home's newest best friend! Review: Thank you, Julie. I read it and reread it, then finally went through my home office, my closets, my bedroom, my file cabinets, etc. My house, home and life are so much more my own now. Julie lets you do it YOUR way, not her or somebody else's way. So you never have to feel that you are organizing "wrong". Funny thing is, she taught me to throw away or sort more than just the material things too! For someone who really does want to organize and prioritize, I recommend this book strongly.
Rating: Summary: Great for Beginners Review: If you've never read a book on organizing before, this is a great one. BUT, if you have, even though the book claims to have a fresh, new approach, you'll see some of the same old techniques used here. Good for review, and her SPACE technique is a handy way to remember the order in which to organize anything. But I lost interest half way through the book, thinking it was the "same old, same old." STILL, if you've never read a book on organizing before, this one is probably one of the best.
Rating: Summary: Finding what works for YOU Review: Finally a useful organizing book! I have read many, and there are plenty of smart ideas out there on how to do things, but once implemented, they always had a very short life span in my house. I had to think hard where items were supposed to go and why. It was always a system that came from outside of myself. What Julie Morgenstern suggests is that each of us has our own, individual way of looking at things and of categorizing things. I finally understood why nothing had worked for me so far and started investigating what was true for me, how I wanted to save and retrieve information, how I wanted to organize items. It did not need to make sense for anybody else, or be endorsed by anybody else but me. With this burden of "doing it right" removed, I have come to find amazingly simple solutions for my needs, systems that are easy to maintain and that I won't forget, because they correspond to my logic system. Thanks!This book somehow reminded me of another great book a read recently, called "Working on Yourself Doesn't Work" by Ariel and Shya Kane. Even though this book covers a much broader topic - transformation through awareness and living in the moment - what impressed me most about this book was the message that you have to find your own truth and live it, irrespective of what society's pressures or experts' advice may be. I highly recommend both of these resourceful and inspiring books!
Rating: Summary: Save your money - here it is in a sentence Review: Save your money on this one; here is the whole book in one sentence: "A place for everything and everything in its place." This book will tell you to get lots of tubs, boxes, and baskets and make a place for everything. If you can apply a bit of common sense to getting organized, your time would be better spent doing so than reading this.
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