Building Faith in Myself

Hello gentle readers!



Day by day I am building faith in myself. I am beginning to trust myself to follow-through. In a personal growth class we were talking this week about the difference between "false hopes" and "healthy hopes." Our instructor said that healthy hopes are based on history.



If I "hope" to keep my studio and office clean and organizers AND I take action day-by-day towards that goal, then I have healthy hope.


If I "hope" to keep my spaces clean and organized but take no action, then I have false hope. It is false hope that makes the heart sick.

This is one reason that I outed myself about the piles in my kitchen space. I undermine my faith in myself every day that I walk by that stuff without taking care of it. I want to build faith in myself. I want to build a history of taking action. I want to have healthy hope.

What are you hoping for? Is it a healthy hope? What action can you take today to begin to build a history upon which to base your hope?

Yesterday I went into my art studio and created a project for an upcoming retreat. I must be breaking through my creative block...

Here is the mess I created:

Here is the project I created:

Here is the clean space I created:

And my studio is all ready to use for my next project!

Here's to a spirit of healthy hope!! Yay me!

Hugs,

Kelly

Time to Come Clean

Hello gentle readers!



It is time for me to check in.


We went to the ocean this weekend. When we got home I went into my office and dropped a bunch of stuff on my desk. This is what it looked like when I went in Monday morning:

Well, yuck. My flowers are dead, the work surface is covered and I had no room to write my morning pages. I like coming in to a clean desk in the morning. It is wonderful, I feel like I'm getting a fresh start every day. When I come in to a cluttered work space I feel overwhelmed before I even get started.

Yesterday I worked at the computer wayyyy too long. I was past ready to stop. I just wanted to get out of my office. However, no matter how tired I was, I knew that I wanted to come in and find a clean desk in the morning. So, I cleaned up my desk top...you might say I "tucked it in" for the night. Here's the pic:

Now, I need accountability for something else. No, let me put it this way: I WANT (gulp) accountability. (Its funny how using the word "want" instead of the word "need" makes such a difference to my perspective. Try it sometime.)

I have a big pile of stuff in my kitchen that I want to get sorted, given away and cleaned out. It has been sitting there since O 9-1-1. I walk past it over and over again.

I think, "If you cleaned out two rooms in your house in three days, surely you can get this stuff sorted and dealt with. What's going on with you?!?" If nothing else, I want to get rid of it so that I stop passing judgment on my self every time I walk past it.

And so, dear readers, I put myself before you once again. I want to take care of this by the end of this week. I will post pictures of the space when I have it clean.

I'm thinking there may be a few guidelines here for me to consider:

* Flat areas are not for storage.

* If I don't know where to keep it, I probably don't need it.

* If I'm going to give something away, get it out of the house right away.

Thank you for sharing my journey.

Blessings,

Kelly

What a Wonderful Whirlwind!

I am typing this from my computer in my NEW OFFICE! Yay! This is going to be an "off the cuff" posting, dear readers. Can you imagine how tired I am? I know that you will give me grace.

I made 1.6 billion decisions on day one. My wonderful team arrived right on time and set up staging/sorting areas in the kitchen (two tables) and in my living room (one table). We created a pile of garbage in the yard and sorted into two piles on my deck. Did I mention that we did a lot of sorting??? Whew.

The trade agent, Summer, showed up and she is so wonderful! I'll post a link with her info soon. She took all my stamps and e-bay items. Poof! Just like that! She'll do all the listing and shipping labor and she will send me a check. Yay! Sort and sell, sort and sell.


I started sorting goodies to go to a little girl who is starting scrapbooking. Well, there is TOO much to give to this little girl and I need to face that. I suppose I'll box up a bunch of the decorative paper scraps and give them to a school...or two, or three. Sort, sort, sort!

I have boxes and boxes of paper and office supplies to go with Sherry to school. Yay! More sorting accomplished!

I did best when I just kept my head down and focused on what they put in front of me. If I looked up the big picture overwhelmed me. My wonderful team, headed by Linda and Denise, had their sorting boxes all figured out for the big picture. I learned that I can trust them with the big picture. Sort, sort, sort.

I was so exhausted by the end of day one that all I could do is exercise a little, eat and fall into bed. My back hurt and my brain hurt. I went to bed early and woke up sore and bleary-brained.

After a hot shower, I put on the Thermacare heat pack my hubby brought me home, had a protein drink and some power chocolate...and some coffee...and went back at it! Soon I was engaged in the intensity of the project, fully awake and back to the sorting, sorting, sorting.

By the end of day two the sorting is getting easier because I'm so burned out from choosing what to do with stuff that I mostly just toss or donate stuff. Sort, sort, sort.

It is so amazing how the rooms are taking shape. When I lift up my head and look around I'm not overwhelmed.

Would you like to see some pictures showing the progress over the last two days? Follow this link:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/7742059@N02/sets/72157614947593028/

It's time for me to pour this tired, tired body into bed so that I'm ready to go tomorrow!

Blessings,
Kelly

"Before" video

A friend's husband saw the photos (tiny) of my messy rooms and said, "That doesn't look so bad."

To dispel any question as to whether or not I need professional help (ha) here is a video of my cluttered spaces "before"....

Before organization

Pay Attention

"Tell me to what you pay attention and I will tell you who you are."
Jose Ortega y Gasset

How often have you heard these words used together? “Pay attention.” “I was really paying attention.” “You better pay attention!” This led me to ask myself, “How am I spending my attention?”

Wow, attention as a commodity? I’ve often heard the exhortation that my time is valuable. This is the first time I’ve clearly considered my attention as a kind of currency. When I “pay attention” I’m exchanging my attention-currency for … what? What goods or services am I purchasing with my attention? How am I spending my attention?

"Only when your consciousness is totally focused on the moment you are in can you receive whatever gift, lesson or delight that moment has to offer." Barbara De Angelis

An aspect of this de-cluttering process just keeps knocking on the door of my heart and mind: the analogy between my home and my soul. Clutter is not only physical, like all the stuff I accumulate and save and hoard. Clutter is mental and emotional as well.

“Only one thing has to change for us to know happiness in our lives: where we focus our attention.” Greg Anderson

In my art studio (a.k.a. “The Crap Room”) it is not uncommon for me to have to step over and around piles and piles of stuff. I have actually tripped a few times and I thought, “Great. The paper will read ‘death by crap’.” I would go into the room just to find something specific and get out. Or, I would go into the room to dump something else. I would purposely “try not to look.” What a joke! How could I not look at it? It is everywhere! Nevertheless, I tried not to see it. I didn’t want to pay attention to it.

What piles and piles of stuff and junk and crap in my head and my heart am I picking my way through? What am I trying not to see? If I see this stuff then I am faced with the choice to do something about it or not. Am I avoiding paying attention because then I will have to take responsibility? Ouch.

"I don't care how much power, brilliance or energy you have, if you don't harness it and focus it on a specific target, and hold it there you're never going to accomplish as much as your ability warrants." Zig Ziglar

When I am in the organization process I will go through all my stuff and choose what to keep and what to let go. Part of the inner-organization process is the willingness to look at my inner stuff and decide what value, if any, it has for me; whether it is useful or not. Is it for me now or is it something from the past that I don’t need to hold onto?

“Big Brother isn’t watching. He’s singing and dancing. He’s pulling rabbits out of a hat. Big Brother’s busy holding your attention every moment you’re awake. He’s making sure you’re always distracted. He’s making sure you’re fully absorbed.” Chuck Palahniuk

How am I cluttering my mind? Where are my thoughts? What am I thinking about? What thoughts am I paying attention to? What thoughts am I spending my attention on? I am bombarded from all sides with messages and suggestions and information. Technology alone can feed so much into my mind that there is little room for anything else in there. And, let’s face it; my own head supplies a constant chatter of its own. Will I pay attention to the thought, “I’ll never change”? Or will I spend my attention on the thought, “I will be free”?

"Attitude is the way you mentally look at the world around you. It is how you view your environment and your future. It is the focus you develop toward life itself."

How am I cluttering my emotions? Am I spending attention on bitterness, resentment, anger, insecurity? If I pay attention to bitterness, what am I buying? What am I getting for my money? What would happen if I spend more attention on forgiveness than I do on holding a grudge? What would I receive in return for such a payment?

Am I spending so much attention on molehills that my store of attention is depleted when I am faced with the mountains?

"In solitude we give passionate attention to our lives, to our memories, to the details around us." Virginia Woolf

How can I give "passionate attention" to my life? How can I invest my attention-currency wisely? What can I do to grow my attention account? Am I spending my attention-allowance as fast as I get it; like a kid in a candy store? I want to conserve my attention, saving it and spending it more purposefully on what is most meaningful.

"Genius is nothing but continued attention." Claude Adrien Helvetius

If I pay attention to one direction/thing does that bankrupt my ability to pay attention to others?

“Bad memory has its roots in bad attention.”

Is my attention a limited resource? Do I clutter my life with less-than-fruitful pursuits/thoughts/people to the point where I have no energy for more valuable focus? For example, if I spend a couple hours “surfing the net” it is quite difficult to pay attention to a good book. Maybe it is because I have spent my attention-currency somewhere else and my attention account is depleted. You could try it and see if you notice the same thing.

"Give whatever you are doing and whoever you are with the gift of your attention." Jim Rohn.

Who do you give "gift of attention?" I suspect we have each experienced what I would call “toxic people.” I want to spend my attention on people who are uplifting and who deposit wonderful encouragement, love and wisdom into my heart/mind account. I want to pay attention to relationships that are most meaningful. It is good to sort through the relationships in my life and notice which are to be nurtured and which are to be released. Sometimes even “good people” can divide the attention I pay to my husband, children, close friends, etc.

"One half of knowing what you want is knowing what you must give up before you get it." Sidney Howard

What has your “undivided attention”? For years I’ve felt that I’m missing what’s most important in the mess of stuff that is okay or good. I know that I have items that are meaningful to me lost in all the other stuff. “The good is the enemy of the best.” I have lots of good stuff; but it is choking out the best. The more stuff I keep, the less I’m able to actually use. When I keep everything it can all come to mean less; if for no other reason than I simply cannot pay attention to all those things. I end up with NSF on my attention account. My attention is not only divided, it is fractured!

"The purpose of life is not to be happy - but to matter, to be productive, to be useful, to have it make some difference that you have lived at all." Leo Rosten

"Past the seeker as he prayed came the crippled and the beggar and the beaten. And seeing them... he cried, "Great God, how is it that a loving creator can see such things and yet do nothing about them?" God said, "I did do something. I made you." Author Unknown

Do you believe that you are here for a reason? Do you believe that there is a purpose for your life? I believe that I am not here by accident. I believe that God has a purpose for me. I believe that Spirit has planted within me passionate focus. I can spend my attention on all kinds of “good” things; but they will deplete my resources and my ability to go after what I’m most passionate about. There will be so much going on and I will be spread so thin that I’ll not able to fully experience even what is okay or good, let alone the best.

“You can become blind by seeing each day as a similar one. Each day is a different one, each day brings a miracle of its own. It’s just a matter of paying attention to this miracle.” Paulo Coelho

I choose a different way. I choose to look at my stuff – mental, emotional and physical – and discard what no longer works, what is from the past, what doesn’t feed my spirit. I choose to spend my attention on the purpose God has for me; I choose to spend my attention following the passion placed in my heart by Spirit.

I'm not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching out for Christ, who has so wondrously reached out for me. Friends, don't get me wrong: By no means do I count myself an expert in all of this, but I've got my eye on the goal, where God is beckoning us onward—to Jesus. I'm off and running, and I'm not turning back. Philippians 3:12-14 (The Message)

Sharing My Stuff

I have a confession. Yesterday I cheated.

No! I did not go shopping at Michaels!
No! I did not hide craft supplies in my attic! (Not that the temptation hasn’t reared its ugly head.)

My friend Sherry came by and I loaded her down --- yikes, what an expression! Let’s try that again, I gifted her with envelopes, paper, and other supplies that can be used by the teachers and students at her school. It felt good to let the supplies go, especially knowing that they would be put to a good use. Sherry actually seemed to have more anxiety on my behalf, saying, “Are you sure you’re okay with this? Are you sure I can have this?” I was actually energized by the process. I’m just sorry she didn’t take more!

Side note: Linda and Denise, don’t worry. There is still PLENTY of stuff left.

Sherry called me this morning. She has brought just one box into her house from the back of her car and she is already feeling overwhelmed. She shared with me that it has given her insight into how I must feel, how I’ve been feeling for years faced with my own clutter. She looked at all the stuff in the back of her car and thought, “What the heck do I do with this now?” It was all stuff she wanted; stuff she chose. And it is stuff that she took with a particular use in mind. And yet, she --- a “cleanie”, an accomplished organizer ---is overwhelmed by it.

I’m glad that Sherry called me this morning to tell me about her experience. It helps me to hear her perception and awareness. I guess I’m allowing myself to know that I’m not a bad person because I’m overwhelmed by all this stuff and can’t seem to get it together. It would be normal for anyone to be overwhelmed by this much stuff. I’m not a bad person because I chose this stuff, because I wanted this stuff, or because I collected this stuff. It is normal for people to want and get stuff. Many people have eyes bigger than their closets, rooms, homes, garages, storage units.

I think sometimes when we live with something; for example, a particular belief or behavior; we can become numb to the effects of that belief or behavior. Here is an example: I walk around every day carrying an additional 80 pounds of body fat. This is down from 100 pounds. I was amazed by how much of a difference it made to my ability to move and breathe to release just twenty pounds. I've been heavy for so long that I barely notice hauling an extra 80 pounds around. Yet if you gave me an 80-pound bag of flour to carry around I'd be fully aware of how it physically challenged me. Part of growing willing and ready to let go is being willing to be aware of what it is costing me to hold on.


Similarly, I may not fully realize what keeping all of this stuff is costing me until it is gone. When my space is free of the visual clutter; when my mind is clear of clinging to the past; only when I experience freedom will I be fully aware of my previous bondage. So, it is good when we can see our world through someone else’s eyes. In this case I am motivated by the promise of moving out of the land of overwhelm.


I know the experience of the gradual lightening of my load. I know that the more I release the more deeply motivated I become to gain greater freedom. The more freedom I have the more freedom I want.


I thanked Sherry for calling me and then I said one last thing,

“You can’t bring it back.”

"Ah ha!" Moments: The Application

Hello gentle readers...and I do hope that you will be gentle on me as I share my journey with you.

Did you notice the countdown timer I added on the left? Woo-hoo! Count down along with me to O-Day!

Are you feeling inspired? If you check below the pics on the left, you'll find links to the websites of the organizers who are working with me. Are you outside the Seattle area? Go to www.napo.com to find a professional organizer in your area.

Are you curious to know more about the application questions? For me they opened up a deeper conversation between my heart and mind. I've decided to offer you the questions without my answers, in case you'd like to see what comes up for you. I'll share my personal answers in the next blog.

Would you like to see where the questions may lead you? Here they are for your consideration:
1. What do you consider your biggest challenge in becoming organized? (i.e.: managing time, motivation, prioritizing, ability to make decisions, etc.)
2. What room or area(s) of your home, if organized, would make the biggest difference in your life? The types of rooms that will be considered include: family/living room, play room, kitchen, dining room, and bed rooms.
3. What circumstances have contributed to your current situation?
4. How long has it been like this?
5. If you could change only ONE thing in this room or area, what would it be?
6. What kind of difference would organization in this area/these areas make?
7. Please tell us anything else that will help us better understand your need for organizational assistance.

When I began to answer these questions it was as though the contest aspect dropped completely out of focus. I connected with the questions and I wrote the first words that came to my mind/heart in that moment. Will it be the same for you? I don't know. Do you feel led to spend time pondering the questions? Go for it. Are you even interested in answering the questions? If not, that's okay. I'm just honored to have you along for the ride.

Do you want to know my answers to the questions? Tune in to the next post!

TTFN,
Kelly

Wow. I'm in shock.

Be careful what you ask for....

"Ask and you shall receive."

...you might just get what you ask for!

I'm tossed between conflicting emotions. On one side: Elation, excitement, joy, gratitude, thrilled to my toes and fully on board. On the other side: Shocked, nervous and not quite sure what I've gotten myself into.



Inside I keep hearing, "If you want big change, take big action." Well, this is sure some big action!



Organization 9-1-1 is an event sponsored by the Seattle chapter of the National Alliance of Professional Organizers. I met Linda Deppa at a networking event and immediately knew I wanted to hire her to organize my office. She is so encouraging and passionate about what she does. I love to watch her brain work. She has this great balance of compassion and firmness. What I do as a life coach, Linda does as a professional organizer. She's an organization coach!



Linda and I had actually set an appointment to work on my office. I mailed her pictures of my office. She contacted me by phone and told me about this event. I was in a rush and went to the website and printed the application. Then I was off about my day. I didn't look at the application until the following day. That's when I discovered that I had 24 hours to submit my application.



I sort of wonder if this worked in my favor. Instead of pondering over the application and honing every word I answered the questions quickly, from my gut. The questions on the application are so wonderful and I had a great process just hearing the answers of my heart. I gained deeper understanding about some of what has blocked me in the area of clutter.



For example, one question asked, "What circumstances have contributed to your current situation?" My answer: I keep too much and then I get overwhelmed by all the stuff. I keep shuffling the overflow from room to room. When it is out of hand, I feel like a failure and then I just close the door on it. I’m creative and I see potential usefulness or art or fun in so many things. It is hard for me to let go because to let go would mean that potential (what could have been) is lost.



Wow. Where did that come from?!? The truth of this was less like a light bulb moment and more like a punch in the gut.



Perhaps I'll share more about my process with the application later....



The next step was a home visit from Linda Deppa and Denise Allen. Denise is the Special Projects Coordinator for Seattle NAPO.



I have to tell you that I went through a roller coaster ride of emotions surrounding that home visit. Even before Linda and Denise arrived I began to see my home through their eyes. A layer of dust that I hadn't noticed moments before now seemed glaringly obvious.



My kitchen table is covered with stuff...and if I were to "clean it off" because "people are coming" it wouldn't do me any good because I'd just shuffle all the stuff into one of the two rooms they were coming to look at! Oh me.



I had a sudden rush of anxiety. What if I expose myself and I'm rejected? What if I allow myself to be vulnerable and I'm judged? What am I doing?!? I'm going to let these professional women, women I network with professionally, see my private mess. I felt a rush of shame and I wished I could escape somehow.



I am quite sure that I'll experience all these emotions and more during this process. I'm observant of my emotions, I express them as part of my experience.



Back to the home visit: Linda and Denise walked through the two rooms. Denise is so compassionate to my process. Together she and Linda began to weave a creative vision for my office and my art studio. Meanwhile, Denise is earnestly trying to prepare me --- as much as she can --- for the reality of the process.



The process:

Six professional organizers for six hours a day for three days.

A banner across the front of my house and a yard sign out front. (Sure hope my neighbors love me.)

A garbage truck in front of my house. (Sure hope they really love me.)

Donations from Rubbermaid and Storables.

Oh, and did I mention a news crew from KING 5? (Wayyy coool!!!///Horrors!!!)

Press releases to print news including Voice of the Valley.



Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow.

I'm gonna get free! This is my year of freedom! No more bondage!



Kelly

(Oh, yeah. This means I've got to get rid of a bunch of stuff. From here on out I'll refer to it as "releasing anything that blocks my creativity/freedom". It's time to let go in a big way! Please God, help me.)