22.02.2016
Hi all! Today we’ll talk about how to organize your life. Many years ago my life was a madhouse. Things to do, worries, tasks, calls, running around, chaos, a lot of projects, every day, like the last, in the morning, like a fire...
Each day could not accommodate the entire volume of activities and events, so I lived as best I could. I did what now seemed more important, or what could no longer be put off. All my victories in life were achieved only through a wild amount of work and waste of energy. In principle, I was happy with everything, I even liked it. This feeling of fullness in life is a driving force, always at work.
The problem is that in a disordered life there is a lot of stress. It's starting to get annoying. It is very energy-consuming, you begin to get tired of it.
An orderly life, in my understanding, does not mean that you walk to the line and look like a robot, that you get up only at exactly 5 am and no earlier and no later, that this flower is in the right corner, the bedside table is in the left, exercise from the phone only to this box...
The word that best describes an orderly life is CLEAR LIFE. You clearly understand what you are doing, why, where you are going, what needs to be done. You don’t have the stress of having too much to do but little use; there’s no inner satisfaction.
It all started for me when I first got a management position at my place of work, and then opened my own business. I had to put my time, affairs, and tasks in order, since how the whole organization would work depended on this, but this was not enough for complete victory. It’s not enough to just arrange things in your diary and throw out unnecessary things from life; it’s also important to put things in order in your inner world, routine, and goals.
1) Start with spring cleaning
The KonMari method of the Japanese Marie Kondo can help you with this. Basic principles: throw away non-working, broken, damaged, expired items from the house; get rid of junk that doesn't bring you joy. Literally, put absolutely all your clothes in a pile, take each one in your hands and ask yourself: “Does this really make me happy?” Maybe the dress is still fashionable, and it’s a pity to throw it away, but you failed the interview in it, and now every time you interact with it you wear a feeling of disappointment and universal sadness. Yes, it will not be easy, but only by getting rid of the old will you make room for the new.
Decide on your goals
To organize your life, you need to decide on your goals. Think about what you want to achieve in life and set your priorities correctly. A lot depends on setting a goal.
If a person rushes from one extreme to another, his plans are constantly changing, what kind of organization can we talk about?
You won't achieve anything if you set too many goals for yourself. Your life will resemble chaos.
2) Mental cleansing
Our brain is like a computer, and when you decide to achieve/accomplish/receive/do, you open another “tab” in your head. And you don’t close everything. We got tired, forgot, routine, urgent tasks - anything happens. Lists of obligations, promises, agreements accumulate, overloading your “processor”. The solution is simple - write down everything that is in your head right now, including the “hanging fruits” that have been poisoning your existence for many years. Divide them into three categories: what I can do right now (will take up to 10 minutes); what can I delegate; which is no longer relevant and can simply be crossed out. Large tasks need to be divided into sub-items and ranked again. Voila, your action plan is ready, get started.
Get out of chaos: is it possible to organize your life in a week?
You should not take advice from someone who is completely different from you. It's like a dog learning to be a cat. I might take a polite interest in Julia Morgenstern's time management advice, which has been expounded in various books over the years, including this year's essay, Time for Parents, but I wouldn't listen to it wholeheartedly if the life she describes before the transition to efficiency, would not have been so recognizable. It's like looking in a mirror.
“I lived in chaos for the first quarter century of my life,” she says. - Everything was in a heap. I was always late everywhere, being optimistic about time. I wasn't aware of it. People often lost things in my house - they took off their shoes and couldn't find them when they were leaving."
This touches a nerve. I just dropped £200 on a new thermostat... Who breaks thermostats?
In fact, we ourselves choose this life: if you are always 17 minutes late for everything because you don’t even want to start looking for a vital piece of paper because you never find it, then you feel a sense of triumph every time you arrive on time. “I felt like a conquistador of chaos,” says Morgenstern. “As much as I craved order, I was so afraid of it.” I thought that he would suppress my creativity, turn me into a limited person.”
Her epiphany came after the birth of her daughter, when it took her three hours to get ready for a walk because she had 18 things to remember, all in different places. “I said, ‘I need to get organized. I can be the hero of my own story, but I cannot behave like that with another living being.”
Morgenstern took to the task very slowly: it took her six months to organize the diaper bag, then she moved on to the kitchen, the house and, ultimately, the very matter of time. On the contrary, I want to do all this in a week, implementing one of its principles per day and becoming a functional person who will no longer impose my chaos on others.
The principle of time is similar to the principle of space
“The biggest obstacle to managing time is how we perceive it,” says Morgenstern. — We consider time intangible, relative, qualitative. But it is impossible to organize if you think of it as such.” Instead, think of your day as an overflowing closet. First, you need to put it in order: for example, organize things by type, get rid of spoiled things, put everything in order, put away things that have no place. This is quite abstract, so it's best to start with a place you actively use. There's no point in dismantling a room you never go to.
It's audacious to start with a room when the founder of the method started with a diaper bag, but I couldn't start with a bag because I never used the same one twice. Perhaps this is part of the problem - the house was overflowing with different bags, at the bottom of each there was one thing lying around (a comb, a portable charger, a passport) that I never needed anymore and, therefore, I never found them again.
I decided to start with a coat, it was supposed to be the “zero mark” of my new life. On Friday I examined him: keys, wallet and phone in his left pocket; electronic cigarette, liquid for it, school blue pen - in the right; In the inner pocket there is a charging cable with lipstick and a tiny mirror. Nothing else, nothing was lost.
Reader, this changed my life. It turned out that every day I always spent the last 25 minutes before leaving the house looking for a vital missing item. Out of nowhere, I had almost half an hour of free time every morning. I started saying yes to spontaneous morning requests—arguing with Nick Ferrari on LBC while making pancakes—that I used to laugh at when out of town. “Research says the average person wastes an hour a day looking for misplaced items,” says Morgenstern. “I’ve been doing this for 30 years, and for a disorganized person, half an hour easily turns into three.” She gave me three watches, one sixth of which I had already discovered.
Decluttering Isn't the Same as Organizing
On Saturday I cut the Gordian knot: I couldn't organize anything more than the coat problem, because I didn't have time, and I couldn't organize time until I organized the space. But I had a deeper hidden resistance - the fear that I would have to throw away a lot of things. It's like calling 911 knowing they'll tell you to come to the emergency room anyway: someone always wants you to get rid of that third beige T-shirt or that second colander.
But this is not what Morgenstern wants. “You can't get rid of clutter if you're not organized: you don't know if you have 17 options for this thing, you don't know which one is the best. “Declutter” by category and organize room by room.”
With this affirmation, I was given another opportunity to organize. Naturally, decluttering is really easy when no one is forcing you to do it. By the end of the day, I had gotten rid of the electric piano, the prunes in Armagnac, and a lot of other people's books.
Break your day into periods
“A day is a limited period of time. We have 24 hours. You sleep eight hours. Let's say you need 10 hours to work; There are six hours of personal time left. By planning more than can fit in that time, you pack things down. As a result, your day becomes like a cluttered closet, chaotic and scary. You don't even look at your to-do list, you just improvise because you know it's impossible to follow a plan."
On Sunday I started grouping things like this. “Work” didn’t want to be grouped, because some of it you want to do, some of it you have to do, some of it scares you, some of it seems distant because no one demands it from you, and some of it is very boring. Don't divide based on urgency. Determine what time of day you feel most creative, when you feel most physically energetic, when you feel slow but efficient. I distributed the tasks according to the mood they required. During the day, I noticed a difference: I had completed travel reports for discounted tickets, but the organization administrators must have already decided that I had completely forgotten about it; completed two scenes in a script about a world where a feminist villain was destroying men who were due to be born in September. I even stroked it a little! I have already forgotten what ironing is.
Give your loved ones attention for a quarter of an hour
“This is a revolutionary discovery,” says Morgenstern. - It is very important; it is based on eight years of research. How much time and attention do children need to feel loved and safe? The answer is: systematic short bursts of truly undivided attention lasting 5 to 15 minutes—random little blocks of time.”
When they wake up, when they come home from school, when they go to bed, when they get home from work (this applies to adults and children alike): stop what you're doing and focus on them, then leave them alone to do something whatever they want. Standing over your kids while trying to navigate Twitter and find a recycling bag will only make things worse for everyone.
Oh, this is a revolution. I can finally give vent to my incessant questions: “How was your day?” “Who upset you?” “Did anything happen that would amuse me?” “What did you have for lunch?” - and no one will object, because everyone knows that these questions have a time limit - and at some point they will stop.
Before bed, I started reading my favorite book to my son. I had been planning for several months, but kept putting it off because of household chores and looking for different things. This book is The Chrysalids by John Wyndham, about people who become telepaths after a nuclear apocalypse and are persecuted for it. My son said, “This looks like a creepy leftist WhatsApp channel.” I guess I missed his best years.
If you learn to say no, you can say yes.
If you don't know what you should do next, it's hard to give up on something. And—this is just a far-fetched observation from me, not a time management expert—if you've never known what you're supposed to do, you don't even have the vocabulary. So borrow it from Morgenstern: “I would love to do it, but my time is scheduled by the minute.” If saying this makes you sound like a robot with an American motherboard, take comfort in the fact that at least you're responding to people quickly rather than making them wait six weeks by saying yes and then backing out at the last minute.
On Tuesday, I knew what was planned not only for that day, but more or less for the whole week: I knew that I was free to go on a school trip with my daughter. When we were at the National Gallery, I took five minutes to show her the skull in Holbein's The Ambassadors, explaining from what angle the image could be seen.
She said, "It's not a skull, it's a towel."
“They are ambassadors. They would have very clean, luxurious towels. Besides, who brings a towel to a meeting?
"It's in the bedroom and he just took a shower."
I'm deviating from the topic of time management here, but if you think that Holbein's main message is that all things will turn to dust and that the only eternal truth is death, then we neatly return to Morgenstern: “The way we spend our time is it's how we spend our lives. Nothing is more important."
Self-care is important
This phrase is disgusting, it demonstrates our fragility, along with the smells of hippies and meditative idleness. But if you put all that out of your mind and set aside 20 minutes twice a day to do something you enjoy - looking out the window, taking a quiz about how well you remember the 90s, sorting mini marshmallows by date - you will experience a heady feeling: “I’m doing this because I want to, and I’m recharging myself,” rather than: “I’m toiling because I’ve had too much going on.”
This is the hardest thing to do: if you still haven't organized your living space, if you still waste 10 minutes after you start doing something, it's not so easy to lose yourself in a novel about an ice sculptor who runs a kebab shop and accidentally cuts off his finger.
Time management work - for life
You can spend two years creating the perfect system, but the work will never end because everything will change: work will change, priorities will change, children will grow up, pets will die, and you will get new ones, which is even worse. “You will never achieve perfection; you will hone and refine it for the rest of your life,” says Morgenstern.
So a week has passed and I don't blame myself for asking: what is the point of a quest that never ends?
“The way I look at it,” Morgenstern says. “I can make a more unique contribution to the world.” With more time, clarity, and peace, I can live my life more fully. Without order, all my talents and skills are only used to 20%, because they are mostly working their way through chaos.”
Source
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3) Digital detox
Clear your mail and bring the number of inboxes to the coveted “0”. Open all unread SMS messages on your phone and instant messengers, and then audit all correspondence, groups, and chats. These are attention and time wasters; here the “delete” and “switch the chat to silent mode” button will help you.
Carefully review the entire information flow on your social networks, unsubscribe from irrelevant and annoying topics, blogs, people, news channels, and mailings. The best thing to do is stop watching TV.
List of things to work on:
- Managing your time. Diary, planning, time wasters, priorities of tasks - the simplest and most mundane.
- Daily routine, diet, lifestyle - the basis without which you can’t go anywhere.
- Putting things in order in your goals, desires, and deciding where you are going in this life is probably the most difficult thing
- Control your mind. Calming him down and learning to live with him so that he doesn’t turn your life into Hell is a very difficult task.
- Cleanse yourself. Mentally, physically. There will be no clarity in a dirty body and dark thoughts.
- Recognize that the reason for the desire to streamline life is the desire to become happy, which means directing your focus in this direction.
Understand where your energy goes
In positive psychotherapy there is the concept of “balance model”. Its meaning is that a person only has 100% of the time (energy/attention) that he devotes to four areas. These areas are as follows: 1) Body: sports, health, nutrition, sleep; 2) Activities: science, work, training, career; 3) Contacts - communication with family, colleagues, friends; 4) Future (Meaning) - intuition, self-development, plans for the future, faith, values. An equal division is considered normal - 25% for each of the areas, otherwise the area that receives insufficient attention will remind itself in the form of a problem. Analyze your life to understand where you are too much and where you are not at all.
Learn to put things back in their place
You will only have a little time if you try to save the labor of cleaning, that is, learn to put things back in their place.
If you have a family, you will have to put in a lot more effort. If all your family members are accustomed to throwing clothes and things wherever they please, we can only sympathize with you.
The main thing is not to despair. You can teach them a few lessons, for example, to hide an abandoned item.
Of course, before you train your loved ones, start with yourself. Perhaps after you set a good example, they will happily begin to live by the new rules.
Learn to say no
A significant portion of your time is spent doing small things that are not related to your main activity? Most likely, you also don’t have a single free minute at home; everyone is asking for help.
Conduct an experiment, during the day say “no” to those things that do not fit into your plan. You will get much more done in a day than usual.
Of course, at first it’s not easy to refuse people’s requests. Take into account this phrase: “I would love to help, but my time is scheduled in minutes.”
Don't go overboard and don't refuse to help people who really need it.
IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO REDO EVERYTHING
First, admit that it’s true that everything cannot be changed.
I tried to complete everything on my list, but at the end of the day I was only frustrated that I didn’t have time to do much: the house was a mess, and my email inbox was full of tasks that also needed to be completed. And yet the next morning I wake up and for some reason unknown to me I again think that today I will definitely cope with all my affairs, but in the end it turns out the same thing again. Coming to terms with the fact that some things will never get done, or will get done but someday later, is an important part of our attempts to organize our lives. This may be a hard pill to swallow if you're a perfectionist like me, but that's life.
Secondly,
After coming to terms with the idea that you will not be able to complete all the planned tasks,
it is important to come to God and ask Him to help you understand which tasks and responsibilities really need to be done daily and which ones do not.
Every morning we should come to God in prayer and ask Him what should be on our to-do list today. I admit that I don’t always do this and sometimes I pay more attention to my to-do list than to God. And I noticed that on such days I am more tired than usual, I am exhausted and exhausted. And when at the beginning of the day I come to God and ask Him what I should focus on today, then even if I have not completed all the things on my list, I will still experience inner peace and satisfaction that I did what I wanted to do. God showed me this morning. I stopped looking for satisfaction by checking how many things on my list I was able to accomplish, and I stopped considering what I thought was important, and began to focus on what God considers important to me and my life.
Give attention to your loved ones
Set aside some time every day to connect with loved ones. Let it be 15 minutes, but you will devote this time completely to your husband, son or daughter.
Children suffer the most from lack of attention. Such small time blocks will establish contact and they will stop feeling abandoned.
Set aside 15 minutes in the morning, 15 minutes in the evening - on weekdays this is quite enough. No one is suggesting that you abandon your child to their fate by limiting communication to a quarter of an hour.
Of course, he won’t go anywhere, he will get in the way while you prepare dinner and clean up. It’s just that at this time you are busy with other things, so you won’t be able to fully focus on your child.
Allow yourself to rest
Give yourself 15-20 minutes every day. During this time, do what you want, what inspires you. Look out the window, meditate, think about the future, dream. Allow yourself to stop.
If you have a family, it is better to do this in the evening, when no one will disturb you. If you prefer to move forward without pauses and stops, life will still force you to “rest.” You may get sick, or other circumstances may arise that require you to take a short break from work and achieving your goals.
Get good habits
At first glance, it may seem that healthy habits will take up time, which you already don’t have enough. Morning exercises or a run in the park, a healthy breakfast, a swimming pool - these are the things that will help you stay in shape.
You will feel cheerful and energized. To do this, it is not necessary to exercise for 1.5 hours in the gym. You can limit yourself to morning exercises or an evening walk.
These habits will calm you down. No matter what happens, there will always be constants in your life. Let it be just exercise, breakfast or meditation.
MAKE A SCHEDULE
Whether you work outside the home, work from home, or home is your job, it is advisable to create a schedule
, this will help you deal with everything that needs to be done. It is important to schedule housework, time for entertainment, time to socialize with other people, etc. Personally, I create a schedule for the week, which helps me stay organized and meet my obligations. I also include daily workouts at the fitness club, cleaning in one or another part of my house; I don’t clean the whole house every day, but only some part of it, thanks to which I don’t get tired. I also schedule times when my child can have other children come over to play; I plan time for different things and time to catch up on what I didn’t have time to do.
You won’t have time to complete some of the planned tasks due to unforeseen circumstances, for example, children get sick, problems arise, etc. If, just in case, you include time in your schedule to catch up on things that suddenly happen If something prevents you from completing it, you will save yourself from unnecessary stress, because you will know that if something unexpected happens and distracts you from your planned tasks, then you have a special time allocated to make up for them.
Don't panic if something goes wrong
It often happens that all our plans collapse. For example, today you wanted to finish a report, buy a new table, swim in the pool. All your plans had to be canceled due to a child’s illness or a flood in the apartment.
Don't panic, calm down. In life there will always be a place for accidents and surprises, and not always pleasant ones.
Think about how you can get out of this situation. Maybe you can finish the report at home, order a table online, and take a bath instead of the pool.
If nothing can be done, just adjust your plans for the coming week.
