Solution #5: Organization

What it feels like:

I’m so disorganized! My desk is such a mess! I can never find what I need.

• Your space feels messy, cluttered and stifling
• You waste a lot of time hunting for things you can’t find.
• You have a tough time keeping track of your many ideas and projects.
• You don’t have good systems in place for keeping track of and following up on contacts, or for keeping track of money.
• So you forget things, miss opportunities and feel like you’ll never get on top of it all.
• And – you’re just too busy spend the time getting organized!

This challenge, like time management is also a place where people feel a lot of shame. Perhaps as a child, your mother yelled at you to clean up your room, over and over. I know mine did. But it’s a rare parent that actually teaches their child HOW – how to organize in a way that suits your personality, your lifestyle and your innate tendencies.

Even when you get your space organized it doesn’t last, because you organized it from some external idea of what organized should be, rather than working within your own habits. In order to maintain it, you are required to create an entire set of new behaviors and that’s really hard to do without a lot of help and support.

Success Solution:

You might be asking, why even bother? Being disorganized costs. It costs you time, money and opportunities. But less obviously and more importantly, it gets in the way of your creativity. Clutter affects your mind and spirit as well as your home.  And the dust it gathers and the mold it hides can also affect your health.

You won’t even know how much it’s costing you until you begin to clear it out. But, trust me, you will feel healthier, more creative and more energized when your space is organized.

So, what’s a disorganized person to do?

The first step is to stop beating yourself up about it. Shame keeps you locked in the same place. So, forgive yourself. And instead of berating yourself for your bad, bad habits, start noticing what those habits are.

Notice where you like to pay bills, for example. Ask yourself, “Am I paying bills here because it really truly works for me, or because there’s just no other place?” If it’s the first, then set up a bill paying center there. Create a file to store bills to be paid. Create a drawer that will hold the checkbook, pens, stamps and return address labels. When you sit down to pay bills, it’s all at your finger tips and when you’re done, it’s really easy to put it all away.

Awhile back I lived in an apartment where the coat closet was literally as far away from the front door as you could physically get. Now, I have always had the habit of walking in the door and dumping my stuff — my coat, my purse, my keys. So, all of my coats and scarves would pile up right in front of the door. What a mess!

What was the solution? I placed a coat rack and a shelf next to the front door.  Immediately it felt better.  Coats gathered on the coat rack, the purse and the keys lived on the shelf.  It was easy!

Spend time now to get organized and it will save you many hours of frustration down the road.

First, Create your Vision of your space. In your ideal use of your current space, what purpose will each room serve? And if it serves more than one purpose, what area of each room serves which purpose?

Now that you’ve determined what gets done where,

• what do you need in that space to serve that purpose well?
• What kind of storage?
• What kind of furniture, lighting, tools?
• What kind of decor would best support your energy and intention for that space?

Then, attack one room at a time. Don’t try and fix all the rooms at once.  Unless you can spend a week doing nothing else, like on those make-over shows, it will overwhelm you.

If you share your space with others – significant other, children or even roommates – you need to get their alignment with the project.  If you share that space, you can’t organize it to suit only you, it will never stay organized and become a source of arguments for you and your family (if it isn’t already).

Be aware that when you begin to organize, things will inevitably look worse before they look better, because you have to pull everything out in order to put it back in the best way.

While working in the one room, if you discover items that serve a different purpose and therefore no longer belong in that room, just move them to their appropriate room – don’t try and put them away as it will just distract you from the room you’re working on. Just clear it out and deal with it when you get to the next room.  (This is part of why things look worse before they look better – but it’s a classic cause of organizing failure – stay focused on the room you’re working in.  Resist the temptation.)

I also recommend spending some time researching storage solutions, not buying at first, just researching. Walk around the Container Store, Bed Bath & Beyond, Ikea, Lowes or Home Depot. Look for ideas that might fit your needs, your budget and your esthetic. You can ask for advice from the folks who work there. Look at your friends’ houses, what do you like or dislike about how they organize? How can you adjust it to fit your needs? Look through magazines such as Better Homes and Gardens, Real Simple, and browse internet sites dedicated to organization. The point is to get creative, look for ideas and explore how other people solve the problems you are dealing with.

Once you know what you need and have some creative ideas for what would work the way YOU work, be willing to experiment. Your idea of what could work might not actually work the first time out. Try it and watch yourself. Are you easily able to maintain it?

If not, how could you adjust your solution to make it work better? (Notice I didn’t ask what you could do differently – design the solution to fit you, not the other way around.) This is a learning process. It involves both an understanding and acceptance of your habits and a willingness to slowly build new habits.

Also, be aware of any emotional issues that come up.  When you start throwing things out – do you feel fear?  Are you finding it hard to throw things away or even to decide what purpose they serve?  Here’s an exercise – if you’re not sure about something, put it in a box and put a date on that box.  If you haven’t opened the box in 6 months – donate it.  Don’t open it, just donate it.

If you are dealing with organization projects that are associated with mourning or loss, I strongly recommend getting help from a disinterested third party.  Whether it’s your late mother’s stuff or the leftovers from a divorce, having someone there who doesn’t have your emotional connection to those things will help you get some distance and perspective in the process.

Recommended Actions

1. I highly recommend “Organizing from the Inside Out” by Julie Morgenstern – buy the book and read it.
2. Take before pictures – they will be a great motivator to keep going if you get bogged down in the middle.
3. Pick your first room and schedule several time blocks over a few weeks to work on organizing that room.
4. Get help from friends or family, especially for the big clean out jobs – working with help is always easier and more fun than working alone. Put on some great music. Have fun with it!
5. Once you have things in hand, schedule 10-15 minutes every day – yes, every day – to organize. This is how you maintain. If you’re finding that it takes more than 10-15 minutes a day to maintain, then there is probably something in your system that isn’t working for you. Assess and adjust things. Try new ideas. But most importantly, don’t quit! You can do this!

 Additional Resources:

• Ask the Organizer – Article
• Get Organized – Article
• Get Organized – Class
• Systems Creation – Work Smarter, Not Harder – Class
• Ask The Organizer – An Interview with Joshua Zerkel, Certified Professional Organizer

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