As you and I know, most bathrooms have limited space and storage. Many of them are crammed with too much stuff: a lotion or potion you used once, shampoo and conditioner samples collected while on travel, medicines or other items used once or never finished using, towels that have seen their day, and reading material and even mail that just piles up and piles up, all while collecting dust and germs.

Your bathroom is a room in which you and others use on a daily basis. The most private area in your home, yet a busy room in which activities, such as baths, showers, brushing hair and teeth, shaving, and using toilet are usually performed by yourself FOR yourself. Yet for some it’s a place of refuge, hiding from world, family, reading or just sitting on "throne," thinking, planning, or daydreaming. Your bathroom can be a place of solitude where you can float away in a sea of bubbles; meditating, planning, creating, listening to music, while candlelight is reflected in mirror dancing around room.

We store and keep all kinds of things in our bathrooms: from linens to tub toys, lotions to medicines, and even books and magazines. Oils, candles, matches, and lets not forget toilet paper. Unless you’ve remodeled or designed your own bathroom-the standard bathroom in a standard home usually only comes equipped with a small medicine cabinet and maybe under sink storage and many don’t even provide this essential storage space.

I know exactly when I started falling apart, not mentally but overloaded with commitments and deadlines I knew I could make. But then suddenly, surgery was to be performed again, on Valentine's Day.

I've never hidden fact that I'm just like you. I'm not perfect and I'm not super human just because my profession is as a professional organizer.

We all have things come into our lives, or out of, usually unexpectedly. We all have emergencies or things that come up that just have to be completed. We all have someone or something needing our attention. This is you, this is me, and this is life!

Many times clients call when their systems have broken down, if they even had systems. But many call because their world has fallen off its axis, leaving them and their world spinning out of control…out of balance.

If they completely ignore situation or don't know how to get their world back into balance - into sync - way it use to be, they will become overpowered by all stuff in their lives.

The daily errands of driving here and there for: >>Appointments >>Children >>Special events >>Meetings >>School functions >>Banking >>Food shopping >>Shopping >>Work seem to make you drive like a maniac down street, racing and rushing from one place to another. And even forgetting to stop at some places.

The daily activities one usually finds in a home of: >>Processing mail >>Answering phone >>Returning calls >>Reading email >>Replying to email >>Cooking >>Cleaning >>Playing with children or pets >>Bathing children or pets >>Watering plants >>Reading >>Being a buffer makes you just want to throw up your hands and turn and run.

And what about unexpected? >>Illness >>Visitors >>Spouse laid-off from job >>Someone moving in or out >>Computer problems >>A friend needing your ear, shoulder, and comfort >>A client or boss needing it NOW, instead of next week >>A child with special needs >>A child with needs >>Travel for your job >>Training for your job >>An accident just makes you want to SCREAM that you have no time or patience for all this!

Your world has just exploded! What can you do about it?

On Valentine's Day my world exploded when I was told I would have to endure yet another breast surgery. I was working on my book, "Secrets of a Professional Organizer and How-To Become One," and deadline was end of February. And worse yet, we get short-changed a couple of days in February! WHO did that? Who thought this up?

Just three days after surgery and between work, clients, writing, and running a home I had to prepare to leave for Florida for 13 days to work with a client and attend school at beginning of March. WHEW, makes me tired just thinking back on all this.

In Florida I stayed with a girlfriend, and had guest/storage room with some closet space, one drawer, and a small desk.

My journey into piles began. Things started living in piles: >>On floor >>On top of my suitcases >>On bed >>On dresser >>On chair and desk.

I had all my toilettes sitting out around sink, carefully placed (but crowded together) so I wouldn't break anything or, God forbid, something fall into toilet!

While in Florida I was so busy I really didn't get to work on any of my "normal" to-dos. I had so many new to-dos' there!