I finally got the closet organized.
I am back in my routine. In fact, I have added a step that has been hugely helpful. I now bring all my empty hangers for my shirts into the laundry room.
When I take the shirts out of the drier, I immediately hang them up.
This has made ironing my shirts so much easier.
This time, when my laundry was finished, I took everything into my closet and put it away. I hung my pants, I put my t-shirts in their drawer, my socks, etc. in their drawer, and my shorts in their own drawer.
I was able to run the vacuum in the closet without having to move piles of clothes around.
This is a major victory for me. I feel much more confident when I go to my walk-in closet and I can actually walk in. I count this as part of my self-care, having an organized closet makes me feel better.
Now I need to understand what is going on with my desk.
Weeks ago, I was going to clean it off and organize it. (Read: Is this a new trigger or am I just messy?)
The next day, I did start to organize the desk. My piles began to shrink, I found things I could toss into the burn barrel, And I found notes that I had written to myself to handle certain tasks.
But cleaning off the desk in the traditional sense did not happen.
In fact, most of what I did was to sort and make new piles out of the old piles. This morning, I had to level out the piles so that I could lay my legal pad on top of the mess. I had a 9 AM phone meeting with a client that I had written a resume for last year.
She has found a position that would not require travel and is ready to slow down, focusing more on quality of life.
To work , I had to lay the resume and cover letter I wrote, plus the job posting for the position she is applying for, on top of the mess on my desk.
The phone meeting went wonderful and I am excited to be a part of her life’s adventure, contributing my expertise to help her achieve her goals. She is a very talented woman and deserves to have a position that helps her achieve more balance in her life.
Back to the desk, man do I need to stop and organize the stacks.
This has gone on long enough. Even as I am writing this, I am not feeling that when I stop writing and post this, I will jump full force into cleaning off my desk. I am justifying this (or making excuses) by reminding myself that there is going to be a staff meeting today at my day job, and I need to go in an hour early.
This gives me an “out” for not working on the desk today.
Which means, when I get home just past midnight tonight, I will be walking into the same piles that I see now. This is bothering me and not bothering me. As I prioritize my day, it falls to the bottom of the list. Higher up on the list is getting a shower, ironing my shirt, packing my lunch, getting the birdfeeders out (you remember I must bring them in at night or the black bears ravage them) and get a fire started in the woodstove.
As you can see, I can find any number of other things to do besides clean off the desk.
In fact, had I stopped writing 15 minutes ago and just focused on the desk, it would be clean now. That is what gets me. I am procrastinating for some reason. Maybe I am not sure what is at the bottom of some of the stacks. Maybe I subconsciously remember what is there, but don’t want to face it.
Or maybe it is just me being lazy.
(Of course, that starts me on the path of unhelpful thinking) You can read my thoughts here:
READ: Up Against the Wall
Now I am off to the kitchen to make my smoothie.
I will see if there is enough time after I get ready for work to dive into the piles on my desk. I can see that I am still a work in progress.
What have you put off lately?
