In grad school, I was known among my colleagues and the faculty as being super-organized. In fact, I was the butt of a lot of good humored ribbing after my advisor innocently mentioned at a student/faculty mixer in my first year that I had plotted out my entire grad school career in an Excel workbook (complete with tabs for each year to plan and record my classes, a grade record sheet, and a place to track my progress researching and writing my thesis). I knew what I needed to accomplish long before the deadlines. I had to. I was working full-time in a career that had a lot of responsibility while attending graduate school (I had spreadsheets for organizing my work life as well).
I needed the structure in both aspects of my life. Chaos was a luxury I couldn’t afford.
So, I have to ask myself what the hippy happened to me in the past three years! It feels like my life has degenerated into chaos. Not full-blown chaos – there are parts of it that have remained organized – but comparatively speaking there has been chaos! And this is not comfortable for me. It feels like I have lost control of the vehicle and can crash at any moment.
This week, I have been working hard to organize the physical work spaces in my life. Now I have an office where I can actually sit and work. It still needs some organizing (there are books on the shelves that need to be moved to another area of the house and my desk drawer needs to be sorted), but basically it is a dedicated work space. I can close the door and concentrate on my job. My research materials are contained in this room, and I need only to leave for bathroom breaks and water. It feels great.
My creative workspace is also receiving a makeover. I am sorting through my various stashes of materials, organizing it all, and discarding what I won’t be using. This is difficult because I do believe that there is a creative use for everything (very little has been discarded to date). I have an area for the “dry” tasks in bookbinding, which also doubles as a place to cut fabric, assemble objects without adhesives, make bobbin lace, etc. I have a “wet” area for bookbinding, where I can also paint and make prints, play with glue, gel mediums and paper, etc. And I have a corner where spinning fiber takes place.
My life is on a “zone diet.” :-p
I have also instituted a pretty rigid daily work schedule complete with hierarchal To-Do list. Routine is key. If anything the past three years has taught me, it is that I can’t live against my type. I enjoy a routine. It makes me feel like some variables in my life are controlled, and gives me the breathing room to weather, and in some cases actually enjoy, the many unexpected occurrences that crop up in this crazy stew we call life.
Living a care-free, come-what-may existence sounded like a good idea in my burned out brain four years ago, but it’s like living on a steady diet of pastry – sounds like a yummy idea, but it is really just sickening. And eventually you lose your taste for baked goods. I’m still going to love the bohemian spirit, but I’m going to embrace the structure I crave in my life as well. In doing so, I’ll be free to indulge in the “out of control” moments that can liven up one’s existence.
And now for the how-to portion of the program – here are some helpful techniques I found for organizing my stuff:
- Catalogue your collections. It is good for insurance purposes, but also helps clear your mind. You know what you have and what you need. I now keep an inventory (yes, in Excel – sheesh!) of all of my bookbinding supplies, fiber, and other various art supplies.
- Double-think your storage. I have a spinning seat that I made from planks and doubles as a place to keep spinning tools and supplies. It’s a cube with an open side. Old trunks and wooden crates can make wonderful coffee tables with storage for games, pillows and afghans. You can make a lovely ottoman with storage by upholstering a cube and constructing a hinged lid with a cushion on top. Old piano benches make wonderful family style seating around a four-sided table and have storage space for tablecloths, placemats, and napkins!
- Embrace your inner file clerk. It’s a tedious chore, but someone has to do it – even at home. It helps if you sort your mail as soon as you get it. Set up an area that has a recycling bin and a couple “in-boxes.” Make some snazzy ones – it can be as simple as taking the tops of shoe boxes and wrapping them up in pretty paper (don’t use the actual shoe box because you’ll be tempted to let the stuff pile up). Then when you get your mail, sort it into Junk (the bin), Bills, Magazines, Letters, etc. – whatever categories work for you.
- Label your stuff. We unconsciously label everything in our lives (people are labeled by their jobs, cars by their manufacturers, clothes by their designers, etc.), so why not put Sharpie to cardboard and label all those miscellaneous boxes in your closets? It forces you to actually look in those boxes, recycle what you no longer need, and allows you to continue to horde what you cannot bear to part with.
- And, for heaven’s sake, make a list of what you need to accomplish! This for me is key to organization. We are all multi-taskers (even those of you thinking you can’t multi-task, you can – you breathe and talk at the same time, right? There, you are multi-tasking!). While the human brain has a great capacity to retain information, something is always forgotten. Create a daily, weekly, or even monthly list of goals. Make it specific or keep it vague, but just write it down.
Brainstorm more ideas and post them in the Comments section.
