Afterthoughts on Personal Organizing

A few weeks ago a blogged about my wonderful experience with a pair of personal organizers who did a complete makeover on my home office. I was so inspired by the transformation in my office that I used the techniques that I learned to organize the rest of my home and the results have been profound.

I'm guessing that many of the same benefits would apply even if I weren't bipolar, but because I am, their significance is probably heightened:

1. Much less stress and guilt. I moved here during my last depression, and although I experienced a slight hypomanic lift from the move, the high was short-lived. In retrospect, I'm not sure that I ever completely unpacked. For months I knew that I needed to get organized, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it. I lacked both the physical and the emotional energy to do it. Yet, I spent immeasurable energy feeling stressed and/or guilty because my office was so disorganized. I remember refusing to plan any activities for the weekends because I needed to organize my office. I convinced myself that I didn't have any business "playing" on the weekends when my office was such a mess. So, I didn't got out much. But then, I didn't organize my office either. So this pattern repeated itself week after week, with the levels of attending stress and guilt growing exponentially. Now that my entire apartment is "clear", those feelings of stress and guilt are gone, and I now find myself looking forward to planning activities for the weekends with all my new-found time.
2. I'm able to find things now. I'm also saving a lot of time, and eliminating a lot of stress and frustration, by not having to spend time searching for things. Now, everything has a place and when I take something out, I put it back. It keeps the place neat AND gives me peace of mind.
3. I'm more focused and aware of the moment. My commitment to keeping things organized forces me to slow down on an on-going basis. I can't do ten things at a time, I can't work up until the moment that I can't keep my eyes open any longer, I can't rush to finish dinner and leave dishes in the sink. Now I try to do one thing at a time. When possible, I "complete the circle", meaning that I try to finish one task, activity or project before starting another. I'm aware of what I'm doing because I understand that living on autopilot has its consequences, and few of them are positive.
4. I'm prepared for spur-of-the-moment guests. I haven't invited friends over in the year that I've lived here. I hadn't really thought about it until now, perhaps because I was so depressed that socializing wasn't a priority. I'm still not sure that I'm up to doing a lot of entertaining, but that'll change. And when it does, I'll be ready.
5. My mental space is more aligned with my physical space. I think there's some truth to the old saying that a cluttered desk is sign of a cluttered mind. The disconnect between my mind's demand for order and organization and the state of chaos in my office was a constant source of distress for me. It was the classic example of my mind writing checks that my body couldn't cash. After a while, I noticed that because the state of my office couldn't catch up with the state of my mind, that my mind slowed down to keep pace with my office. I started forgetting things, letting important activities fall through the cracks, finding myself unable to get focused and just feelings as disorganized in my head as my office looked. Now that my office is "clear", I've been delighted to discover that my mind is too. I've started using a daily planner again, I've completed several previously unfinished projects, and I'm setting goals and plans for the future once again.

This project has not been "cheap", but it's been well worth every cent I spent.