Organization. This should be your one goal this year. Here’s why:

It helps you pave the way for other financial goals.

If your level of financial organization allows you to do nothing more than pay your bills on time without overdrafting your account, reaching financial goals or milestones is impossible. Period.

On the other hand, if you have a firm grasp of what your financial obligations are and how much additional income you have at your disposal, you suddenly have the ability to allocate this money to bigger short-term purchases and long-term planning.

Organization allows you to be in the driver seat of your financial situation, instead of simply hoping you will still be afloat a few months or years down the road.

It allows you to exchange time upfront for less stress moving forward.

While getting organized might require a significant initial time commitment, it doesn’t have to be repeated month after month. In fact, the upkeep is usually minimal.

For instance, spending a bit of time writing meal planning cards saves you the time of having to look up ingredient lists of recipes, which in turn saves time in recording your grocery list — not to mention saving the headache of deciding what to cook that week.

Or, consider making a batch meal on a weekend evening, dosing it out into resealable containers, and boom! You’ve got yourself a week’s worth of lunches (or dinners… or both)!

This upfront investment of time saves you on inconvenience throughout the week. It removes the stress of feeling like you’re always one step behind.

With systems in place and our finances organized, we are able to make better decisions on a day-to-day basis because our brains aren’t preoccupied by small, insignificant but essential tasks – like deciding what to eat for dinner.

If you’re sick of not being able to look at the bigger picture because you’re too consumed by working out the logistics of your daily life, make organization your one financial goal this year.