Have you ever wished you could just be more organized without feeling like it’s a constant struggle? The good news: your brain is capable of change. By leveraging neuroplasticity, you can make organization an easier, more natural habit.

Neuroplasticity is your brain’s ability to reorganize itself by forming new neural connections throughout life. This doesn’t just help with memory or learning a new skill.  It also allows you to retrain your habits, including how you approach organization. A recent InsideHook article notes, London taxi drivers’ brains grew in the hippocampus over years of navigating the city’s streets, showing that consistent practice changes the brain structurally.

What is Neuroplasticity and Why Does it Matter?

Neuroplasticity is the brain’s remarkable ability to rewire itself by forming new neural connections throughout life. This doesn’t just help you memorize a new skill or learn a language—it allows you to retrain habits that may have seemed “hardwired,” including how you handle clutter, manage tasks, or maintain systems in your business. Studies show that consistent practice can physically change the structure of the brain. For example, London taxi drivers develop a larger hippocampus over years of navigating complex streets, illustrating that sustained mental effort leads to measurable brain growth.

The late Dr. James Doty, previously a clinical professor of neurosurgery at Stanford University and founder of the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education, extensively studied how our minds can influence our reality. In his book Mind Magic: The Neuroscience of Manifestation and How It Changes Everything, Doty explained how practices like attention, meditation, visualization, and compassion can change our brain structures, allowing us to move through the world in ways that help us see clearly and realize our dreams.

Whether you’re trying to clear the clutter from your home, streamline your workflow, or get consistent with marketing tasks, understanding how your brain forms habits gives you a roadmap to success.

Here’s how you can harness these principles in your daily life:

1. Neuroplasticity and Mindfulness: Awareness is the First Step

Before you can change a habit, or the beliefs ingrained into your subconscious, you have to notice it. You have to be aware that the beliefs exist. Mindfulness allows you to become aware of routines that come from subconscious thought patterns or beliefs.  Although the book is listed as a biography, the late Dr. James Doty’s landmark book Into the Magic Shop outlines clearly both the mindfulness strategies for changing beliefs and the neuroscience behind it. For example, do you automatically pile items instead of putting them away? Do you avoiding starting a project because you are afraid it won’t be perfect? Do you avoid making yourself and your business visible because you are afraid you might fail – or be successful? By noticing these habits without judgment, you create a window for neuroplastic change. Mindful awareness is your first step toward rewiring your brain to support great organization of your home, office, to-do list or business activities.

2. Neuroplasticity and Fun: Everyday Challenges and Novelty

Your brain thrives on novelty and challenge. Everyday activities that stretch your mind — from solving puzzles to taking a new route on your walk — stimulate neuroplasticity. Traveling is a perfect example: navigating unfamiliar places forces your brain to adapt to new patterns, strengthening memory and problem-solving pathways. You don’t need a plane ticket to reap the benefits.  Small changes in your daily routine, like changing your walking or driving route, engage your brain in the same way. Experiment with a digital app to use it differently. Change the time of routine activities in your day. Or simply, change how and where you eat lunch.

3. Locking in Neuroplasticity: Emotion, Interest, and Positive Associations

Our brains learn most effectively when experiences are tied to emotion, interest, or pleasure. Music, for instance, can prime your brain to form stronger connections.  This is why pairing tasks with enjoyable stimuli makes new habits stick. Linking desired behaviors, like putting items away immediately or scheduling your day intentionally, with positive feelings makes them more likely to enter your subconscious and become automatic over time. Music, smell, taste are all senses that generate emotional responses based on previous experiences. These can be tied to activity to help you build new neuropathways and therefore habit. For example, play a favourite group of songs from a very happy time in your life to create an upbeat mood while you are sorting clothes. Drinking your favourite tea or coffee while working on a project can have the same impact.

Putting It All Together: 3 Tips to Apply These Strategies

1. Be Mindful of Small Habits: Pause before you act and notice what your brain is doing automatically. Catch the “default” behaviors and replace them with intentional ones.

2. Add Novelty to Routine Tasks: Change your environment, rearrange spaces, or try new methods for tasks you usually do on autopilot — this challenges your brain and strengthens new neural pathways.

3. Pair Tasks with Positive Stimuli: Listen to music you enjoy, light a favorite candle, or give yourself a mini reward while practicing new organizational, productivity or marketing activities. Emotion strengthens memory and habit formation.

By incorporating mindfulness, novelty, and positive associations, you’re not just organizing your environment — you’re training your brain to support the behaviors you want, making organization feel more natural and less of a chore. The more you practice, the easier it becomes, and the more your brain rewards you with clarity, focus, and confidence.