Over-Scheduled, Under-Organized

One thing I’ve always been good at is staying organized. Ever since high school, my planner was my best friend. I never went anywhere without it and if it didn’t fit in my bag, I’d carry a small pencil and some of those tiny post-its so I could write down an important event and stick it in my planner when I got home. Yep, I was that anal about it.

For some reason, it’s been really hard to keep up with things lately. I wrote a bit about this when I left my iPhone behind a few months back, but it’s only gotten worse. I have at least one event or outing I’m invited to every day, whether it’s an after-work networking event, dinner with friends, the NY Tech Meetup, a relative’s birthday party, a Sunday brunch, etc. It feels nice to know that there are so many people in my network of friends and acquaintances, and that work-related functions like workshops and conferences are interesting enough to keep me busy… but it sure is hard to balance it all.

All of these invites mean that I often agree to spend time with somebody without realizing I’ve already committed that date to something else. In the past few weeks, I’ve double-booked not once but three times! A friend of mine keeps jokingly telling me I need to hire an assistant to keep track of my social calendar. And to think that just over a year ago, I was complaining about not having enough to do.

Needless to say, it’s about time for me to get myself organized again. My planner is small, but not small enough to take with me everywhere. My iPhone would be an obvious solution, but I’m not a fan of the calendar. Maybe I should buy some tiny pens and post-its to go back to my college routine.

How do you stay organized? Do you have a hard time keeping track of your social calendar?