Back to Baby Stepping Out of the Clutter...Seriously!

Three Rules of Work:
Out of clutter find simplicity;
From discord find harmony;
In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.
~Albert Einstein

It is rather interesting having this online journal we call a blog. I have at times gone back and reread some of my own posts—finding typos and grammar errors that I cannot believe I missed!—but now that I have been blogging for a year, I can go back to the same month a year ago and see what I was thinking, what I was hoping to do, what I had done, and so on. For instance, spring again has been a flurry of pollen; the spring recital program covers I designed last year are again being used for this recital in which my daughter is playing next weekend; I am still baking sourdough bread which I began just over two years ago when my husband was out of work; I began face painting a year ago and am now being asked to do it for fund raisers and special events for church and the 4-H Club regularly; allowance is still the same amount and given each Saturday, which is doing what we intended, and the list goes on.

Then there are posts like this one Baby Stepping Out of the Clutter and I did have my guest room completely cleaned up, but I used it recently to organize everything for the spring consignment sale this last week and now I need to clean it back up again. It should not take that long this time because I really cleaned it up last autumn, since we had my aunt and uncle visiting, and I had a place for everything, so it just comes down to taking things off on the surfaces and putting where they belong as I prepare winter clothes for the fall consignment sale.

Shall I go on to the point I am brutal...?

The craft room...I had put things in nice neat stacks of boxes: things to keep and things to sell and projects to do. The middle of the room was free of boxes and things, it was wonderful! Still, at no time in the last year—I still cannot believe it has been an entire year!—did I clear off the surfaces, though. Why did I not get those surfaces cleared off so I could use my sewing machine or draw at my art table? Why did things get moved around and more things were carelessly dropped on surfaces to be done or put away another day, another day that never seems to come? At Christmas nearly all the things in the under-the-stairs closet came out into the then-cleared-away area in the middle of the craft room, as is always the way it works. Now the Christmas things did get put back away, but afterward things just again began to pile up in the middle of the room. Then we brought some things back with us from his great aunt's place when we went there...MONTHS ago? Yes, it all has been sitting in there since January. The craft room again—that is, still—needs to be completely cleaned up and I need to have a yard sale, maybe even one a month for a few months!

Creativity...although I had wonderful ideas, I have not done any art, crafts, or creative things other than face painting this year. The things that I know in my heart would help me not mind being alone so much and I would even crave solitude, as I do when working on an art project. I have yet to make my first batch of homemade soap, after spending about three or maybe even four years reading on how to do it and getting over my fear of working with the lye.

Living room...we painted it over two years ago, but I have yet to finish the trim around the stairs and stair railing, which I had on my to-do list before my aunt and uncle's visit...just this last autumn. This is pathetic! For two years, I told myself I would do it during the winter when I could not do the outside gardening, which ironically I did not do either.

My gardens...not touched at all in the last year, except one day around the mailbox from which I got sun sick and then I let the grass encroached that area again. I just got out of the gardening mode. For four years we were in a drought with the last two years of it being the worse. I lost many plants, including most of my herb garden. I let the plants that could survive run-a-muck and did not bother with watering and babying the ones that needed it. Why not, you may ask? In our area, we were dangerously low on available water for just daily human use, so I was trying to be responsible by not using water anymore than necessary then and we had no water in our rain barrels for the garden. However, last year it began raining again, even flooding, so why did I not tackle the gardens last year...? I do have a sort-of excuse for this one because of the time my husband is far away. Gardening can take its toll on a back, particularly when my gardens need a serious overhaul, and most of the time I am careful and do well, but I also can get in a locked-up condition so that I cannot even drive myself to the chiropractor's office.

Health...I did not exercise regularly last year, excluding the customary race to the van with my daughter after piano lessons once a week. Actually, I did not put much effort into anything that I know keeps me healthier. I did not juice. I did not do a liver cleanse. I will stop here because the list of "what I did not do" in the health arena is staggering.

At this point, I am feeling a strange intertwining of shame for having accomplished so little, for letting yet another year slide by without doing the things I really wanted and hoped to do, yet there is a renewed determination that this year will be different...and then there is a peculiar assurance that in those same yet-to-be-fulfilled hopes and goals, although pushed back it is not like they can never be achieved.

What did I do in the last year? What were my real goals? I am thinking that my real goals were the ones I did accomplish for the most part, because the other ones were not given the attention they needed to be real goals—sad, but true—as much as I dislike admitting that. Those other things were more like if I have the time I will work on them, not I will make the time to finish them. One real goal was to keep a blog and post to it regularly, as regularly as anything ever is in my life, and so far so good. Another was to stay away from message boards and except for an occasional backsliding, I have limited myself on wasting time with such pursuits; this is excluding a time or two when it was obvious to me that God had a purpose for me to be responding on a forum. I have had quite a few others that I have probably forgotten, I suppose, perhaps because I did not see them as goals, just things I have to do to get by.

I have read a couple of other blogs of late where people have set real goals quite publicly; I admire their bravery. One that particularly has caught my eye is Persuaded's commitment to buy nothing for a year. This is her latest post in the series at her blog Tomato Soup Cake. I don't know if I would/could/should even attempt at being so transparent on my blog. She admitted to slipping by buying three pairs of flip-flops for a dollar each and I realized that I would readily forgive another person of such things, but when I give my word I cannot stand the shame I place on myself when I slip up. I am not one who so easily laughs at myself. I am not comfortable with making it so easy for people to identify my weaknesses (perhaps residual from an abused childhood), which is really illogical thinking because when you try hiding your weaknesses you are actually revealing them...I know this! I know it well! I even know how much I admire when people do the exact opposite and reveal their own weaknesses so I can identify with them...but, I have not been that brave. So why the confession now, you may be wondering? There is a point where I get truly disgusted and rant on my myself...well, I think I am there.

What to do now...I have noticed that when I place things to do on a list or on the calendar, they tend to get done. I have only remembered to do allowance every week because it is marked on my calendar on each Saturday and I mark other things off that I have done there. I have considered a chart or planner, seeing some ideas that the well-organized Persuaded had, a planner and a daily schedule, however I also know from past experience that planners need to be personalized to work well, so I again have been considering my own planning system. My schedule needs a great deal of flexibility, so I have been tossing an idea using index cards on a rotation system of sorts. This would also give the Princess more structure as we begin stretching those developing self-reliant and independence muscles in a positive way. The problem is I have habit of try making everything so...so...uh, overwhelmingly comprehensive, I suppose would be the the nicest way to say it. I am thinking the best way to begin would be to list everything I do each day so that I can devise my planner from that.

I am also going to work on clutter for at least twenty minutes each day (using a timer) to start for a week or so until I am really comfortable with that routine and then adding something else or beginning a project.

The question is if I will be brave enough to chronicle my progress.

Not so sure about that....

~ My Lord, if it is your will, please give me the desire to accomplish these goals. I am ever so aware how my lifestyle is teaching my daughter and I need to be an example for her to want to follow. Help me to be more of what she needs me to be so she will be more of what You want her to be. ~