Money, Mess and Motherhood: Finding Balance Beyond Organising

Ever wondered if organised people were just born that way? My journey proves otherwise. Twelve years ago, I was drowning in debt with zero money management skills and a home full of clutter. Today, I manage investments, run a business and maintain a functional home while raising four children. The transformation wasn't overnight, nor was it straightforward.

My organising odyssey began with finances after my husband graciously cleared my pre-marriage debt. Rather than learning my lesson, I continued struggling with budgeting and spending, creating uncomfortable conversations and feelings of inequality in our marriage. The breakthrough came when instead of judgment, my husband offered partnership, acknowledging we needed to tackle our financial chaos together. This collaborative approach became the foundation for all future organising efforts.

What surprised me most was how organising one area created ripple effects throughout my life. As I decluttered our bathroom (chosen strategically for its lack of sentimental items), I discovered I'd been spending money to "solve" problems actually caused by excess stuff. With less physical clutter, my financial decisions improved, eventually leading us out of debt completely. When motherhood arrived, time management naturally followed as I adapted to the reality that "just running to the shops" now involved multiple steps with a baby.

The most valuable lesson came from going too far: becoming so organised that perfection became the enemy of peace. I'd snap at family members for "messing up" what I'd just cleaned, not recognising how my excessive standards were stealing our joy. This led to developing what I call the "4D Filter": Delete (remove what's unnecessary), Delegate (assign tasks to others), Delay (postpone non-urgent tasks), and Do Differently (create simpler systems).

Finding your personal organisational sweet spot (where you function well without sacrificing happiness) is the true goal. Whether you're just beginning to tackle clutter or you've gone too far into perfectionism, there's a middle ground where organisation serves your life rather than consuming it. Connect with me on Instagram @shes.organised or grab free resources at beyondorganised.com/toolkit to continue your journey.

Chapters

• 0:18 Welcome to Beyond Organised
• 1:30 How It All Started with Money
• 9:21 From Financial to Physical Decluttering
• 16:30 Finding Balance in Organisation
• 23:21 The 4D Filter Method Explained
• 31:42 Episode Wrap-up and Invitation

Transcript

Mel: 0:18

Welcome to Beyond Organised, the podcast that helps you simplify your life and amplify your purpose. I'm Mel Schenker, life coach, speaker, founder of She's Organised, but, more importantly, a wife and mum of four little kids. If you've ever felt overwhelmed, like you're constantly juggling everything but never quite catching up, this is the place for you. Here we go beyond just the tidying up and creating systems. We're talking about real life strategies that bring order to your life, but also we talk about the things beyond the organizing, the things that really matter, like the parenting relationships and so much more. So grab your coffee and let's dive in. Welcome to today's episode.

Mel: 1:14

I wanted to take it back a little bit. I wanted to go back to how I got started with organising, with this organising journey. I'm hoping that by me sharing my stories and sharing my journey with this podcast, it's going to help you with your journey. So most people think I got into organising because I'm naturally tidy or because I had kids that needed to be managed and all of that. But the truth is this organizing journey started long before the babies. People ask me you know how do you do it all Kids, clean, home work, friends, all of it and I tell them I certainly don't have it all figured out. It's taken me 12 years to get to this point and there's a lot I have learned along the way. So I'll share a little bit of how I started out and what set me on this path and a practical tip to help you not have to spend the next 12 years of your life figuring it out 12 years of your life figuring it out.

Mel: 2:33

So I guess it all started really back early when I first got married 12 years ago, and I didn't set out at all to be this organised person or anything. I just wanted to get on top of my finances, our finances. I was terrible with money. I came into the marriage with debt. My husband cleared it all, which was nice because I guess you know what's his money is mine and vice versa, but I certainly wasn't expecting him to bail me out. That was a really tough pill for me to swallow, very humbling, but I did not want to face that again. I did not want to experience that again. I needed to get on top of how I view money, let alone how I spend it and everything else that goes into it. So organizing actually started with my money. But I failed again and again and again and again.

Mel: 3:38

Um, we had many awkward conversations and I have to tell you, in the early days I felt like we were unequal that's probably the best way to put it and you might be someone that's partnered with someone that their spending is out of control, or you are the person that spending is out of control, and I've seen it so much on you know mum's groups and all that on Facebook where you know the women are saying, oh, my partner, you know, spent all his money on that and everyone's like, oh, leave him. And I just think far out, if Sam had left me in the early days, I would not be here today. No way. I mean, apart from the fact I wouldn't have my kids and all of that, I would not have learned the skills to be able to help you and I don't know where I'd be. I just I don't know, and I'm glad he didn't give up on me. I just I don't know and I'm glad he didn't give up on me. But I was also willing to learn. I knew that I did not know what I was doing. I didn't even know how interest worked or anything like that, which to what I know now. You know I manage my own investments and all that kind of stuff, like to what I know. Now that blows my mind that I didn't even know how it worked. But you might be in that position where you do not realize how all this finance stuff works. And I'm glad that I went on this journey and that I learned, because I probably wouldn't end up, having worked in a bank, you know, in the servicing and the operations department side of things. I just, you know I'm dealing with interest rates and all that kind of stuff. So I'm grateful for what I learned.

Mel: 5:42

But it took me a long time and it started in trying to stick to a budget. Well, that didn't work because you had a certain amount of money and I was like, okay, so we'll spend $20 a week on groceries. Well, that's not realistic. So you know, things got blown out because I wasn't really budgeting and and understanding how we lived and how we needed things to in the air, so a lot had to be cut back and sacrificed and all of that and being able to see everything come in and go out, it removed the ambiguity and helped clarify a lot of things and helped me go. Oh, actually I can stop spending on that, but it was still chaotic and my mind was not. It was so restrictive. I saw it as a restrictive punishing of things, and now, no way it is, it's enabling. It's enabling the kind of future that I want for me and my family, and I do not see it as a restriction at all because I don't budget in a way that is restrictive. Because I don't budget in a way that is restrictive, I account for all things, including non-essentials and things like that.

Mel: 7:12

And, yep, I'm feeling that living crisis pinch as well, with the cost of everything, and you know I'm not immune to it. I'm feeling every bit of it too. You know I'm not immune to it. I'm feeling every bit of it too, and you know, having been on maternity leave with my fourth child, there is no money really, but we also don't have any debt and that, and we've managed to not, you know, go backwards during this time. So even you're going to have seasons where you just need to stay afloat until you get through to the next season, and that's where we're at right now, just making it week to week. But I know that soon things will start to pick up again and we can breathe a little bit better, things will start to pick up again and we can breathe a little bit better. But if this was the old me you know, 10 years ago, 12 years ago, I could tell you we probably would have racked up another I don't know $30,000, $40,000 of debt by now, just taking a year off for the baby at least. So it started with the money.

Mel: 8:28

But getting that in order was not what changed everything, unfortunately, because the big problem, apart from my spending, was I was spending to make things easier for me in the home. So I was introduced to a couple of different decluttering gurus and some incredible, incredible people out there and I actually had no idea that decluttering was a thing. I just didn't realize that people actually got rid of things. I only ever got rid of something once it got used, like a I don't know the toothpaste was empty. Then you throw it away. Before that, I just never really I don't know. Yeah, when I say that I was not organized and I really had no clue, I had no clue at all on anything. So I learned a lot when it came to decluttering the home and getting on top of the home, and I started with the bathroom because that had no sentimental items. It had the quickest return on investment, I should say. I got through it within a couple of hours and it felt amazing.

Mel: 10:07

I got rid of all the things that we didn't need, the things that I'd been holding onto because, oh yes, I might need that foot mask one day and it's been sitting there for five years and expired two years ago. Yeah, no, it's gone. So I got a bit ruthless, threw away a whole lot of stuff and, to be honest, I have not thought about any of that again. And if there was anything that I did need, I have bought it again. But in my money once I started to get a hold of everything in the home, when you don't have as much stuff and you actually see all the things you have got and you realize you don't need a lot of the extra fluff, then you don't need to spend money on a whole lot of stuff that you think, oh, hang on, that's just going to add more clutter and is that going to just end up in a donation box six months from now? So it made me stop and think a bit more, and that's when I started to see us bring down our debt because, yeah, even though Sam helped clear the debt coming in. I didn't learn anything. So I was putting things on the credit card and then still not able to clear it properly at the end of the month because, also, when we were starting out, we had nothing Like.

Mel: 11:45

We both came from living at home with our parents, so, you know, money disappeared pretty quick and I wasn't managing it properly and he was just working really hard and I paid every bill on time. So that was never an issue. I never missed a bill or anything like that. But I wasn't managing the money properly. And one time I actually had to sit down and I had to talk to him and say, hey, we're not in a very good position, and I showed him how, you know, we can't pay the credit card, we can't do any of this. And I felt horrible because he'd just come off like an 80-hour work week and I'd been working too. But it was not a comfortable conversation at all and I felt like a failure, the worst wife ever, you name it. I felt it.

Mel: 12:39

Yeah, instead of him getting upset with me, yelling at me any of that, he just said I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I have not been more involved and I haven't helped you. I knew that money was not your strong point and I just assumed that you'd be okay. So he apologised, which I was shocked about but really grateful for, because we didn't resent each other, we didn't attack each other, we just helped each other. We didn't attack each other, we just helped each other.

Mel: 13:29

And because of him not attacking me, not saying what is wrong with you and why couldn't you manage that Because that's all the stuff I was talking to myself, saying to myself, because he didn't do that to me I changed, I improved, I got better. And when I started getting on top of things within the home and he could even see a physical change in how we were doing things, it started to positively impact the finances too. And not just that, I started to actually say to myself, just that. I started to actually say to myself maybe I can do this, maybe I can learn, maybe I can change, I can improve. And it started to build a more positive self-talk and a confidence that I'd never had before, a confidence that, okay, maybe I can do the whole wife thing and eventually mothering thing and maybe I can adult it's probably the best way to put it so that then ripple effect into the other pillars, I will say the other areas of my life.

Mel: 14:49

So, as you may recall, in earlier episodes I talked about how I have the five pillars. We've got time, home work, money, self-care. So I was starting to get the home pillar in order and my money pillar was starting to get into order. It still took about another four years from there pillar was starting to get into order. It still took about another four years from there to be able to clear the debt. So it was a slow, painful process, but one that helps me see to never go back there. But I still time work, self-care, still had to work on those three.

Mel: 15:25

Now my time did start to become more efficient, and that was particularly once I had my first child, my son. I started to realize that I can't just hop in the car and drive down to the shops. It takes about 30 minutes at least to hop in the car and drive down to the shops because it's not just hopping in, it's getting him changed, changing nappies. Oh yep, make sure he's fed, do all that. Oh no, he's just had, you know, filled his nappy again. All right, change it again. Hop in the car. Oh no, wait, forgot this. Oh no, he's just vomited all over himself. Get out of the car, like seriously. I just wanted to hop in the car and go to the shops but no.

Mel: 16:09

So everything changed when it came to time management once I became a mum and that really helped positively impact how I was then when I went back to work as well. So I was working from home right from the start of being a mum, way before. Covid, where I worked, was way ahead of the time still is that place. I don't work there anymore but it was really a good place to work when I had such little family and everything. So, getting on top of the home, I had less clutter around. I was becoming more efficient when I was working because I could think clearly and then when I was in the office I wasn't thinking about the millions of things I had to do at home and the mountain of washing and the mountain of like. I was on top of it and my time became a bit more efficient. And once I stepped into leadership roles and I learned more about time blocking and all that kind of stuff, the more and more order came into my time and then and that flew like flowed on into the work side of things.

Mel: 17:28

But I kept learning, I kept growing in my efficiency, but there was probably that sweet spot that I then overshot and I kept going to the point where you heard on the first episode I ended up snapping because I was aiming for this level of perfection. That was not sustainable and very hard to attain and it was costing me my happiness and my joy and it certainly was impacting my family's happiness and joy. So there is such thing as going too far with this organizing journey and I definitely had the four pillars out of the five more down pat and I was doing so much better. But self-care that last pillar there, oh my gosh, didn't even exist. It was like a hole in the wall. It just there's something missing.

Mel: 18:39

And the more I became organized, the more I was doing stuff around the house and with work and everything else. And I was doing stuff around the house and with work and everything else, and I was just aiming for this level that, quite frankly, impressed a lot of people but was just not sustainable. The time for me just disappeared. It became almost non-existent, and that's why I was getting angry at everyone, because I'm saying you know, stop making a mess. I've just cleaned that. Stop making a mess. You know it's not fair. I want to have some time for myself. I want to sit down and relax when in reality I probably didn't need to clean that thing for the 20th time because who's really going to care and I could have done that once they went to bed and then I wouldn't have had to have redone it another 20 times. Okay, there's things that you still have to get done during the day, because otherwise the house will probably be burnt down by the end of the day. But if your kids are anything, anything like that, but yeah, it was just this unbalanced way of being organized and I became resentful, and that is something that I do not encourage anyone to get to.

Mel: 20:05

So you might be someone that is not very organized right now, just sort of on early on in your journey, I encourage you to, you know, get a bit of order and a bit of control in your life, because it really does help make a difference. But I also encourage you to stop at a certain point and if you are that person that has gone maybe too far the other way, to the point where the whole purpose of having an organized life was to bring you some joy and now you feel completely robbed of it. Well, there's hope for you too, because I now call myself a reformed perfectionist. I'm not a perfectionist anymore. Look, there are still tendencies and it can be a little bit tricky at times, but I've changed the way I talk as well, and what I speak over myself, and I don't call myself a perfectionist anymore, but I do still have a spirit of excellence. I still aim to do things the best that I can before I get to a point that is counterproductive. So it's finding that level for you and we're all at different levels, we all have different levels of capacity with things, and it's okay. I think if you're doing the best you can without going too far, then you hit that sweet spot for you in this season of your life.

Mel: 21:45

So once I let go of having everything perfect and being too organized the other way, then the self-care side of things started to go up again and exist. It's like the wall got patched and now I can confidently say that, even though my life is still crazy in a lot of ways, but I can confidently say that I am pretty well balanced. And balance is not this static place of like you got a seesaw and you come to this static medium because then what? That's not how life works. It's like getting on a bike every day and pedaling and riding and hoping you don't fall off. It's a bit like that. And look, there's going to be things that come and go in your life and you've got to know what to hold on to and what to let go of. And that's not easy in the beginning because I held on to everything, because I thought I needed to be across everything or have everything. But there are certain things and certain people that don't align with where you're at or where you want to go. And that kind of leads me into.

Mel: 23:29

The next point is once I dealt with a lot of the physical clutter and it helped with getting these other areas of my life into better balance. I then realized I had so much mental, I had so much mental like emotional clutter that I needed to deal with too. And until you start going through these things, you kind of don't realize how much is beyond the surface and you know you start unraveling because all of a sudden you start seeing how maybe particular friendships are toxic and you didn't realize how much they are bringing you down. You didn't realize that by working that second job to help pay the bills because everything's through the roof, you thought, yep, I can do this, it's sustainable and I'm somewhat enjoying it. You didn't realize that there was a greater cost somewhere else. And look, I get it. You got to do what you got to do and I technically have two jobs right now Well, three if you include motherhood. So, I get it.

Mel: 24:47

You got to do what you got to do, but I encourage you to prioritize time for you, because if you do not put yourself first and I know I drum on about this a lot but if you do not look after yourself, you don't put yourself first. You are good to no one. You're no good to your family, you're no good to your friends, to your workplace, no one. You have to look after yourself, and it's not selfish, Like you wouldn't believe how many people I talk to where they just can't put themselves first and look, I was one of them. It's hard putting yourself first, but when you start to see it in a way that it's not just about you, it is a way of being able to serve those you love better and have your heart in it more, then it becomes a little bit easier to look after yourself. So if you're someone that struggles to put yourself first just for the sake of needing to put yourself first, think of it as a way of still being able to then look after the people you love so much better because you put yourself first. It's like the oxygen mask theory. You know, in the airplane you've got to put on your own mask before you can save everyone else.

Mel: 26:15

So I do encourage you to deal with physical clutter, mental clutter and all that. And you're thinking, okay, well, that's good, but how, where do I start? What do I do? Everything's a bit of a mess and there's so much in my life to filter through. I don't know how to. Well, I may have mentioned this before, I can't remember now, between social Tricks method, where you've got the five pillars and all of that, I also have what's called the 4D filter. So within that filter we've got the delete. So, looking at whether it's physical stuff, let's just go off physical stuff for now that you can remove actual items from your home, from your schedule, from your work, whatever it is, delete.

Mel: 27:24

Then you've got delegate. Is there someone else who can do this task? So for me, in probably the last four or five months I've started to get my kids to help a bit more with some of the tasks that I was doing, because starting this business and podcasts and everything else is a much bigger demand than I'd ever anticipated, and so I need more help. And my two older boys my daughter tries to help, but it's not that helpful. But my two older boys they now unstack the dishwasher in the morning for me and they put away what they can the glasses and stuff they can't quite reach, so they just leave it on the bench and I put it away. But that still saves me so much effort. So delegate, you know you might think, oh, I can't get my kids to do this because it's so much more efficient if I do it, it's quicker if I do it, it's easier if I do it. Well, yeah, maybe, but we need to also teach them skills, because I want them learning skills that I had to learn once I moved out of home. I want them to learn before they get to that stage and for it to become normal and to help their future wives, partners, and to do their bit too. So it might take a little bit longer right now, but it does help. It really does help. I don't have to worry about as many things I still oversee, because that's just how I am, but yeah, it does help.

Mel: 29:01

So, after we do the delete and the delegate, we have delay. Now, this isn't for everything and I'm not telling you to go putting off doing a certain task that you need to do. But if you are getting to the point where you're becoming over-organized and it's like, oh, I've got to do these 20 things every day, all the time, well, maybe just step back for a minute and go actually, do I need to be scrubbing the shower right now? Like, actually, instead of doing it every week, maybe I could get away with doing it every two weeks in this season, because I've got a lot on my plate. Like, is it really going to kill anyone? Probably not. Or you just clean the floor part where your feet touch or whatever. Like, you delay and you put things off a little bit.

Mel: 29:50

And then the final one is do differently. So this one I like for automating, having better systems, putting things in place. That's going to actually simplify the way you do things. So, like an easy one is if you're paying bills manually all the time, well, maybe set up direct debits and other ways to actually automate it and make it easier for you. Maybe set up so then it notifies you on your phone when a payment's gone through or comes out, so you don't have to keep logging in to see if payments have gone through and all of that. So there's always a way that things can be done differently and possibly more efficient, and it might take you a minute or two to set up initially, but it will save you more in the long run. So I just want to encourage you that you know you don't always need more containers, more systems, more anything. Sometimes you need less.

Mel: 30:50

So I know I've rambled on a lot, I've talked a lot. I'm sorry if it's bored you to death, but I do want to just let you know and encourage you that I started off terribly. I then went too far the other way and now I'm somewhere in the middle and it can happen for you too. And if you've got questions, if there's particular things that is bugging you and you want to know more about, please send through an email. I'll be more than happy to answer your questions directly. And yeah, I really look forward to hearing from you and remember to send through your questions and that too, so I can keep answering them through on future episodes as well.

Mel: 31:37

So I hope you got something out of today and I'll talk to you next time. If you loved this episode, don't forget to hit subscribe so you don't miss what's coming next. And if you want to continue the conversation, you can connect with me on instagram at shizorganized, or, for some free resources, head over to beyondorganizedcom. Slash toolkit. Remember, organising is a tool to live the purposeful life beyond it. See you next time.