What is Holding You Back? Part Eleven

​There is the expression, tighty house tighty mine. In this post I am talking about how becoming organized can have positive effects. Did you know that on average, we spend 2.5 days per years looking for misplaced items?

Piles of things around you may seem harmless enough, but is it?

 There is something to be said about being organized in relation to our cognitive ability to function in an orderly fashion. otherwise, the effect of clutter is unequivocal, there is an increase of anxiety, lack of sleep, focus and productivity will wane. And research has revealed that clutter lends itself to coping strategies such as excessive snacking, TV viewing of others with more of a severe clutter issue, you guessed it, hoarders.

​However, the pendulum can swing the other way, perfectionism.

Growing up, the mantra for us boys that my dad advocated relentlessly was "a lazy man works twice as hard." There for a while, this mantra was an enigma to me, a real head scratcher, but I learned quickly what it meant.

As a boy, I had lots of play in me, I was by no means lazy. I was more interested in jumping in the nearest water hole, playing baseball, or just conjuring up anything that was lots of fun. I remember it as it were yesterday. My dad gave me a chore to do, and I did it, however, hastily, more like just hiding all the clutter. Once I got back from a full day of play, my dad had me to redo the chore again, thus, the mantra, "a lazy man works twice as hard."

I will have to admit, this philosophy of being organized has affected me as an adult in positive ways. For instance, my rule of thumb is, if I am not utilizing whatever it is for more than two hours, I immediately put it back once I use it, and this gives me a sense of productivity and organization. I would encourage you to try it, coordinate the top of your desk, sort out your sock drawer or anything, and you will see and feel what I mean.

  The human brain is always looking for a balance of order, rationality, patterns of geometry that makes sense, it is indisputable. To provide you an example, take a walk outdoors, and as you look up at the billowing clouds, immediately your mind sees configurations of different things in the clouds such as a face or an animal. Or in a dark room, again your mind will search for patterns and shapes that are not even there, such as when a closet door is ajar, you could swear someone is standing there, but it is just your suit. 

We may not know it consciously, but it does have a detrimental effect from a subconscious standpoint. So, what will it be? Pile it or file it?