The Race is On! Week 1

I am actually doing "it."  

The "it" is the de-cluttering that I have lusted after for so many years now.  In the week since my last post, I have managed to remove one trash bag of junk to throw out every day.  Well, almost.  I had one day that I just simply crashed.  My momentum had been rising and I was so proud of  myself that I went ahead and ordered the Ott light that I chose for my work table.  I found exactly what I wanted from Lowe's.  It is so perfect that I am giddy waiting for it's delivery. It has a 38" reach so that I can have it well out of the way of my work and tools and still provide bright, full-spectrum light.  It's LED and I won't be sweating under it.  When I am working with the Dremel Flex Shaft I can position it so I won't catch it with the cord. On tracking delivery of my light, I see it will arrive on Monday and not Wednesday, as expected, so I really need to ramp up the clearing process because I planned that it would arrive when I was ready to place the table and I am not ready yet.  It's my carrot.

I have had "carrots" before this, but nothing helped much.  I was never able to get past a small amount of organizing one thing and at the same time making another mess in the process.  ...Like the time I organized all my yarn.  I bought hanging closet shelves and stashed like colors in different shelves.  That was great, but I continued to buy more yarn and didn't have room for more.  Then there were boxes and bags piling up and scattered around the floor in front of the closet, making it harder to get to the organized yarn.  You get the picture.

In all fairness to myself, I have not had it easy in this room.  I have a business, my husband has a business and we have yet another between the both of us.  I have several hobbies.  Combine all that in a 10 X 10 room, and have it all organized and I will be awestruck.  In the book,  Organizing From the Inside Out, Julie recommends the kindergarten classroom approach of having distinct areas for each activity.  Well, I decided to boot a few to another room.  I will make it work, and am happy with the prospect of having the business stuff in another room.  The book makes it such a simple vision to hold onto.

I began reading about the emotional aspects of why people hold on to the stuff.  I can relate to many of them.  Our past is often filled with wonderful memories and memorabilia that it is hard to let go of.  Mostly, I go about organizing in a very attention deficit way.  I read one author who described it as the "butterfly" approach.  The butterfly starts out in one spot, then flies to another (perhaps to put something away in another room) and then gets distracted there until the same thing happens again.  The result is I make a mess everywhere I end up and I am totally overwhelmed.

Julie's solution is to begin sorting through the clutter as a first step in the hands on approach.  In sorting, I keep a trash bag at hand to get rid of the all the old papers and junk that has no current or future purpose.  ...As I said, a bag each day is going to the trash!  I am so grateful for this slow but steady progress.  Because I stay in one place, I am not making messes all over the house, and slowly I am clearing both those vertical and horizontal square feet.