Recently, I had the opportunity to help a friend get organized.
Since we all need help on this, I thought I would share the steps we went through.
The first one is to appreciate yourself.
Take the three deep breaths (www.takethreedeepbreaths.blogspot.blog) that let you pause for a moment.
The next one is to begin to create the physical environment within your home that allows you to thrive.
We looked up Flylady’s wonderful site and she downloaded this weeks’ cleaning zone.
It was nice to see that there are only about ten simple steps, very simple ones, to take throughout the entire week in one Zone (There are five zones in every month, which covers the entire house monthly.)
There are also “Missions” to account for special areas or projects.
Then we ran a couple of errands together.
Cooperative living takes away the loneliness and heavy responsibility for everything by yourself, by providing companionship and conversation.
Collaborate with a couple of friends to help you enjoy their conversation while each of you supports the other. Spend time at each other’s house supporting the house-cleaning. We are all in the same boat. No one has to be embarrassed, just helpful to each other.
My friend taped the print-out of the Zones to a wipe board so that each member of the household can participate by doing and checking off the jobs for that week.
When I was raising children, I kept a record on a calendar of the number of jobs each child did and their work was tied directly to a pay-per-job (10 cents/job for the older generation of children, 25 cents/job for the second generation). When they wanted to buy something, we would estimate how many jobs it would take to buy the toy, piece of clothing, etc., i.e. 30 jobs, 200 hundred jobs, depending on the price. Everyone grew up with a realistic sense of the value of their work.
For a couple of years, the two younger kids agreed to put the whole year’s work into a jar to save up for a trip to the local RenFaire. Under that system, each one was able to purchase something which had significant value for them at a yearly family outing.
The next step of organization was to recognize which activities were repetitious.
I contributed that I was able to transform my attitude about repetitious chores when I realized that “dishes were infinite”. I realized that I indeed had infinity in my life and that I needed to manage my assets of infinity better.
The same applies to laundry. Do a load every night and fold it and put it away.
One final act of organization was to recognize which clothing currently fits, and to put everything else, a few items at a time, as they appear, into a box. By moving it out of site and out of the closet, it no longer triggered attention of any kind.
That applies to other “clutter”. We referred back to Flylady’s guidelines on “clutter”. I love her fifteen minute rule.
Over time, it is possible to gain new habits. By building in the routines which support you can free your mind to do what it is for, to create the wonderful ideas that come to you.
You will be able to give your ideas priority and move yourself into the life you desire by giving yourself the routines that free you.
By the way, I keep up in a general way with my house. Regarding that, downsizing was the greatest gift I have given myself. I have much less to take care of, and I am spending almost full time receiving and producing the ideas which so delight me.
© 2014 Kathryn Hardage
www.InspiredPractices.com
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