Last week, I wrote a blog post in which I confessed that I hide my own business dreams and life dreams under stacks of paper.
Now I’m trying to dig through all those piles and figure out where the good stuff is, and what I can finally give myself permission to let go of.
It’s not easy.
I’ve always been an information hoarder, that’s my personal form of clutter. I suppose it’s better than buying gadgets I’ll never use, or shoes I’ll never wear, but it’s still clutter that weighs me down.
My clutter is not in my closets, it’s all over my desk. Which is sometimes worse, because it can make me feel overwhelmed as soon as I walk in my office!
I keep generating ideas for new marketing methods for my home staging business, or new products or course ideas for teaching home stagers, or ideas to add to one of my nine websites, and they get added to one of the piles.
I know if I took everything and put it into organized files, I would lose all the ideas that are hiding inside the piles. In fact, last year I organized all the paper on my desk into three folders:
- A Priority
- B Priority
- C Priority
Trouble was, I never looked inside them again!
All that stuff I told myself was “A Priority” either wasn’t, or I already had it in my mental inventory of items I really needed to do. So I got to those items and ideas anyway without even referring to all the paper hiding inside that red “urgent, pay attention to me right now” folder.
I’m a visual person. So while I crave order, when it comes to my ideas and work, I have to see everything I plan to act on. If it’s buried in a folder, it won’t get my attention anymore. But I’m realizing that hiding something inside a stack of paper has the same problem. It’s still no longer visible to me.
The other day, I had a realization. All the little “to do” items that are represented by the stacks on my desk are of my own making.
That’s probably obvious to you, but to me it was a bit of a revelation. My To Do’s are only To Do’s because I made them so! I can just as easily make them Don’t Do’s and sweep them all into the recycling bin. It’s not like “my boss” will come in and ask me why I haven’t gotten to any of it.
I have no boss and I have been self-employed since 1989. You’d think by now I would have mastered that negative little voice in my head that says, “why aren’t you doing this, that or the other thing?” To be honest, I used to have that under control most of the time, but these last 6 months it’s really got away from me. Hence the need for a massive “fresh start” clearing of my desk.
There will never be enough hours in a day to achieve all the things we hope to accomplish. It’s critical that we keep a vigilant eye on the things we put on our To Do List so they don’t crowd out the stuff that will really build our business or enrich our lives!
Home stagers, how do you deal with this? What methods have you found for keeping track of the ideas you REALLY want to act on without letting them get buried inside a pile of “should” items that drain you of energy and inspiration? Please share your ideas by adding to the comment section.
Debra Gould, The Staging Diva®
President, Six Elements Inc. Home Staging
Debra Gould knows how to make money as a home stager and she developed the Staging Diva Home Staging Business Training Program to teach others how to earn a living doing something they love.
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{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
Gosh, can I relate to this post! I spent months before Christmas doing biggest spring-clean ever and the last and most cluttered space of all is, you guessed it, my office! With 3.5m of desk space you would think I had ample room, but ideas are the bulkiest things ever
I have started scanning documents and saving them on my PC (AND tossing the original) – that way I can find them via searching for key words if and when I ever need them. I find the biggest drain on my energy and time is feeling I have to read all the interesting stuff in newsletters, as they invariably contain links to other newsletters, products, reports etc that all seem terribly important at the time. So many businesses email EVERY DAY – I have ones in my inbox that I flagged 2 years ago and still haven’t read! So now I go through my subscriptions regularly and unsubscribe. Ah, relief!! Not from THIS newsletter though – the good content and helpful articles are priceless.
Jeanette, thanks so much for popping by and sharing your experiences. I really appreciate it. Glad to hear that as you’re pruning your subscriptions you’ve decided to keep Staging Diva!
Turning your piles of paper into something searchable is an excellent start to getting organized and having things able to be found. Make sure you back everything up regularly however!
Thanks again Jeanette and happy new year!
Hello everyone,
This is exactly me as well. Even the books from courses I take are littered with side notes and thoughts (which seem too good to not write down at the time). Every time I try and ‘organize’ I get inspired by the first few things I read and they lead to – - – yes, another list – of ideas from the ideas. I have discovered that writing it down, leaving it, and then coming back to it later allows time for the idea to either become great, or fizzle.
One way I have found to organize this is with an index card file or a rolodex. I create categories (like marketing ideas, design tips, newsletter article topics, wants, etc.). Each idea gets its own card. Then if I get an offshoot of the idea, I can add it to the card.
This way, the ‘list’ is no longer a list. It is a set if cards, that I can quickly sort through, reprioritize, discard, or reorganize easily. And it is portable. I can grab a stack and take it with me. Its great when I have down time or feel overwhelmed. I can simply ‘sort’ cards and get back a feeling of organization.
I also clip pictures from magazines, and attach to the card (if its bigger than the card, I fold it up and make it easy to open up bu attaching it at the top. I can also add subcategories (like by room or item) if I get too many things in one group.
Its kinda fun to see all the ideas in a box, and know that if I ever get bored (ha!), I can always grab a card and take action on it.
I’d love any suggestions to improve upon this too!
Thanks!
Theresa, I LOVE your suggestion, thanks for sharing it!
Hi Debra,
It was like reading myself described…I, too, jot down ideas on any piece of paper that is handy at the moment. I have to – I know that if I don’t capture that thought, it could disappear forever, and I just have to try it at some point, lol.
One of the things that I’m doing to try to keep it all under control – is a Word document I’ve created, called “Home Staging Ideas.” When that stack of quickly scribbled ideas gets a little too out of hand, I add to the list on that document. It helps me to write it down, which clears my mind & allows me to focus on the to-do’s at hand, yet leaves me a written list that I can refer to if I find myself stymied by a design problem.
Ticia Barnicki
Ticia, I tried that too… dropping all the ideas into a word file. But then I’d often find I wouldn’t really look at it again because it was just one more document in a sea of them on my computer hard drive
Do you find you use yours?
I agree your method is a great way to get unstuck when you’re fresh out of ideas. Just read the list and get re-inspired and hopefully take action on some of them.
Thanks for sharing your idea!
Hi Debra,
OMG you just described me to a T, only my pile is notebooks. Each notebook is designated for whatever the idea/thoughts are about. I have more notebooks, half empty with a few ideas & thoughts than I know what to do with.
I just recently attempted to go through them, with the intention of stopping this clutter bug of mine. No such luck.
I’m still taking notes. If I don’t write it down, my thoughts are gone. One of these days I’ll take more time to figure out a more organized process.
Debi Roskam
Hi Debra,
I too am an information hoarder. Dare I say some how it gives me a kind of comfort. I am constantly using it to inspre me of a new idea for my own home staging business. The result is that I now have a ‘to do list’ as long as my arm. Where do I draw the line? As a sole trader, I’m not flushed with employees I can delegate at least some of this stuff to. This is something I’m going to have to get real about. Thanks for bringing this up.