Let me tell you, as a former “messy” type, I was stressed. Not finding things, working myself into an absolute tirade over lost keys (yet again), accusing my poor unsuspecting husband of moving lost items . . . it was not pretty.
For me, it didn’t work. I had too much stuff. When I started to go through it all, it was liberating. I discovered a lot about myself, and some of that wasn’t pretty either!
Once upon a time, “stuff” was my therapy. Owning stuff made me feel in secure in some aspect of my life. However, as I healed I didn’t need stuff to comfort me anymore and I realized that all of the things that I’d accumulated were now causing me stress.
More stuff equals more cleaning, more organizing, and more clutter. It was making me feel overwhelmed, disorganized, anxious and stressed.
Organized equals doing what you do, only better.
There are those who believe that organization equals perfection. That only the most over the top, perfect people are able to be organized.
A conversation with someone close to me prompted me to say, “You know, you’d be surprised at how organizing oneself really is helpful. It helps you do what you do better, like getting the important things done.” It’s not about rule setting or shame, or any of that other nonsense. Organizing simply helps you be a better, well, YOU!
It allows you to leave on time, because you know where your keys are. It allows you to immediately grab scissors or a tool you need to finished a project without running all over the house spending hours looking for it.
Being organized doesn’t mean that you have to have all of your spices alphabetized. And it definitely doesn’t mean that your house looks perfect all the time. Trust me, neither one of this things are true for me and I consider myself a fairly organized person.
Perfection, Shmerfection.
The truth is that no one is perfect in the ways we want to think. I mean really, how interesting would life be if it was always “perfect.” It reminds me of a commercial I saw about how nice it would be if we lived in a town called “Perfect.” Honestly, would we really want to live there? Perfection can be inflexible, rigid, and denote an elevated expectation of the unattainable.
Is your perfectionism holding you back from moving forward?
Many of us would consider ourselves perfectionists. I do. And let me tell you, it sucks.
Being a perfectionist can cause a lot of grief internally as we put off doing things simply because we can’t do them perfectly.
When looking around at unfinished projects weighs weighs on your mind, making even small imperfect progress in anything is a vital step to change. It starts us moving in the right direction, and momentum (and revived motivation) is soon to follow!
To paraphrase author Dr. Wayne Dyer, “I am making progress if I am better today than I was yesterday.” Life (and organizing for that matter) are not perfect, but that is what makes the experience we call life an adventure!
