How to: Organize your inspiration files

Over the past few months I've accumulated tons of inspiration: articles torn out from magazines, photos pinned to my Pinterest board (or downright printed out), books and blog posts that I've bookmarked for future reference. But I have this one big problem: I almost never go back to these sources. I just keep adding more while looking for something new and interesting. This is something I really need to change: if I want to make my life more chic and glamorous, I need a clear idea on how to do it. And I need not only to gather inspiration, but actually use it. Thus one very obvious task: edit, classify and organize my inspiration files.

If you're like me and you've gathered thousands of papers, articles and photos, this may seem like a huge bite to take at once. I admit, when I first contemplated the task (see the Before picture), I wasn't extremely enthusiast either. But there's one little trick that really helped me: set the timer on your phone on 30 minutes, and once it goes off, you can stop editing and do something else. This way it won't seem like such a daunting task and maybe, like me, you'll realize that even if your allotted time is over, you still want to go on.

This exercise proved to be very effective: I think I threw out 3 or 4 garbage bags of papers that didn't inspire me anymore. I've kept only those I truly love and which bring me that necessary jolt of inspiration when I flip through them.

I used several pretty binders to keep things organized: one that pertains to French chic, one for fashion, one for home décor, one for beauty, one for personal development, and two huge binders for recipes. I keep them close at hand in my home office and I know I can rely on them whenever I lack motivation, when I feel down, drab and sadly uninspired. And now that everything is perfectly classified and organized, I promised myself to renew the exercise once a month, toss what I don't love anymore, and add whatever new sources of inspiration I've accumulated in the meantime. This way I'll be able to keep my inspiration and motivation fresh and new and I believe that these binders will be an incredible source of inspiration for both my Project Chic and my blog in general.

Do you have any special means to keep your creativity fresh? How do you organize your inspiration files? What do you do when you feel particularly uninspired?

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