Do I love holidays? I do! I do! I love the family, fun and food of the season. I love the candle light, the music and the way the air smells and feels. I love the way stars seem to sparkle even brighter and simply the change of routine! I could go on listing the pleasures and virtues of the special days of winter, but I do realize not everyone shares my delight.

How about you? Dread or delight? Do you anticipate the time with joy and a sweet inner excitement or…. Do you huff and puff through holiday preparations, feeling overwhelmed with details and stressing over timelines and real or self-imposed obligations and feeling so frazzled you’re just glad when it’s over? Bah humbug!

Not only is it possible to have a pleasant and relatively hassle free holiday season, it is also possible to “enjoy the journey,” that is, the time and process getting there! Christopher Robin hits the nail on the head. The key is organizing our thoughts, time and actions.

Often the great saboteur of a peaceful and enjoyable holiday is our personal expectations. If I am striving for a Norman Rockwell Christmas or attempting to re-create the glories of Christmases past, I am likely to exhaust myself in pursuing an unrealistic goal! Idealism, like perfectionism, is mentally and emotionally depleting, and is one of the shortest routes to disappointment. In an effort to hold on to the past we are in danger of denying ourselves the ability to embrace and enjoy the present!

Many of us find change difficult. The truth is, however, that life evolves and if I am wise I will reframe my thinking about what my expectations should be as those changes occur. My family may not desire or expect all that I am in the habit of doing, cooking or preparing. I happen to be a serious traditionalist, but we often do things just because we have always done them. For example, I have always made seven different kinds of Christmas cookies. Perhaps, if I enquire, my family might only really care about three kinds!

If I have a clear idea of what I hope the holidays to be I am more able (and likely) to allocate my time and energy only to those things that will accomplish that vision. What am I willing, able or unable to invest in time, energy or money to make this happen? Is it worth the investment?

Now that I know what I want*, mapping a plan helps me “download” things I need to remember or do. A plan on paper is half the task! It takes a lot of mental energy to remember things! Think on paper. List things such as guest lists, menus, grocery lists, recipes, timelines, special needs such as stamps, extension cords, candles, traditional treats, gift list and gift ideas, actions needed, such as ordering on line or from a catalog, household chores that need to be accomplished and so forth. No detail is too small to be captured on paper. The idea is to not have to use mental energy to remember everything.

Holiday stress management 101-

Always allow more time than you think you will actually need! Allow extra time for holiday traffic and longer lines in grocery stores and bank lines.

When hosting an event, allow for unforeseen last minute problems or for guests who arrive early. Pretend your company is arriving an hour before they are actually invited. Back your schedule up another hour to allow time for a hot bath and a glass of wine. Enjoy your festive preparations, the candlelight and holiday music for a little while before the activity of company. A relaxed host is a gracious one!

Not just an address book-

Use your address book to make notes all year long about items people collect, clothing sizes, preferences in stores or catalogs, grandchildren’s social security numbers (for savings bonds for example), a great gift idea you want to remember and so forth.

Stocking Christmas-

For a large family or office party a “stocking Christmas” is a fun and inexpensive alternative to gift swapping. Each person provides his or her own stocking. Depending on the number of people participating a price limit is established, for example, it might be determined that no more than a dollar can be spent on any gift. Each person provides each stocking one gift. Stuffers don’t necessarily have to be purchased. Mom might decide to give Susi the faux pearls Susi has always admired. Other ideas: one Godiva chocolate, a bottle of bubbles, a bar of perfumed soap, something that reflects the person’s personality or a hobby item, barrettes, certificates for baby sitting or a favorite dessert, packaged seeds for a gardener or a balloon with a dollar inside! Possibilities are endless!

The August Assignment-

Preparing for holidays is a lot of work! Don’t miss the reward! Early in the year schedule a day off in December to simply appreciate the season. This is not a day to power shop or bake ten dozen cookies! It is a time to reflect and enjoy the beauty of the holiday. Have a special lunch with a friend, attend a Christmas program, curl up in front of the fire and your Christmas tree and read George McDonald Christmas stories, visit a beautifully decorated historic home or whatever other holiday activity brings you pleasure. Remember, an unscheduled appointment more than likely will not happen. Mark a day off, advise your employer or staff, schedule a baby sitter and allow nothing in the day but beauty, enjoyment and reflection!

Only 364 days left!

Get a great start on a simpler holiday next year. We tend to use our favorite decorations and tree ornaments every year. Before you pack away this year’s decorations purge old, squashed or broken items out of storage. Weed out old lights and extra stuff you don’t use and organize what is left. Some items are sentimental but too fragile or …sorry, ugly and old…to actually use. Create a special memory box to keep these safe.

Set a festive tone for your day. Enjoy breakfast on dark winter days with candles and holiday music.

I am grateful to each of you for contributing to the success and growth of Prescription for Order this year. Mention the certificate below when you schedule to receive one hour free off a regular four hour scheduled visit. You may also choose to share your certificate with a friend.

And don’t forget! A great gift for the person who has (almost) everything is a gift of more time, more space and less stress. Contact me for a Gift Certificate for professional organizing to hang on their tree.

I wish you a peaceful and pleasant holiday season, and a new year abundant with God’s blessing. Savor the season!

Organizerism for June:   The key to organized living is simplicity and minimalization.

Too much stuff!  Whether we are dealing with things, paper, space, time or even mental or emotional energy, this is where the organizational process breaks down.  Consider the cost of this American syndrome:

• Physically, fatigue! Stuff requires cleaning, sorting, storing and maintaining.
  It creates stress.  Even the simplest task seems difficult in a chaotic environment.
  The more things we have, the more physical, mental and decision-making energy we must expend.  Mother Theresa said that her vow of poverty made her life better than that of most people because it freed her from the tyranny of decisions about things.
• Mentally, stuff, which translates into clutter, is distracting, can hinder concentration, lower creativity and production and make it more difficult to focus.
• Financially, the obvious, debt!  We pay late fees, interest and service charges on misplaced bills.
  We make unnecessary purchases because we can’t find what we have. We build larger homes and then pay self storage companies to store what our homes will not hold.

The bottom line is this:  The more things we have the more complicated our lives will be. If my desire for order and all of its benefits is great enough I will be willing, at this point, to learn to live with less.

So where do we begin?

It would be counterproductive to systemize things we neither want or need!  So the first necessary action in conquering disorder is “the sacred art of de-accumulation.”

Review from June:

• Schedule a time.  An unscheduled appointment more than likely will not happen.  Treat it like any other important appointment or it will easily get “bumped” for almost anything else you would rather do.
• Work with your circadian rhythms.  If you are a morning person schedule early in the day; if you are a night owl choose an evening hour.  Choose a time when you are most energetic and least physically and emotionally vulnerable.
• When scheduling, always allow more time than you think you need to accomplish the task.  We often feel frustrated and defeated because we begin the project but run out of time to finish it.
• Enlist help.  This should be an objective person with heart (your spouse is usually not too objective?) who can help you focus, keep you on task, encourage you and help you in the decisions making process. This person can also keep you accountable for the appointment!  Sandra Feldon, author of the “Messie Manuals” says, “I alone can do it, but I can’t do it alone.”
• Break the task down into manageable bites.  Begin with one drawer, one shelf of a bookcase, one small cupboard or one file drawer.  Attempting to conquer a whole closet or file system could overwhelm and discourage and ultimately sabotage the job.
• Begin by looking for the easy, “no decision-making energy required” items such as trash, things that belong elsewhere and things you know you do not need or care about.  Also, look for large, easy space consumers such as furniture you do not want or need or non-functioning computer equipment.  This is usually about 40% of what occupies prime space.
• Limit expenditure of decision-making energy.  Only allow yourself three choices:  Keep, Go or I don’t know.  We often give ourselves too many options!  I either know I want to keep an item or I know I don’t want it, and I also need to give myself permission to decide later.  If you can’t decide on any given item in six seconds move on to the next.  Don’t self-sabotage the project with exhausting indecision, not to mention spend more time than allowed on the task.
• Talk to yourself.  Ask yourself questions about any given item such as-
  Why am I keeping this item?
  Does this item earn its space and upkeep?
  Does this item have beauty, value or function?
  Is this item replaceable should I need it someday?  How difficult or costly would that be?
  What is the worst thing that could happen if I get rid of this item?
  Do these items create tension or negatively affect my family?
  Does it fit me now?  Do I feel good wearing it?
  And so on…

Profile of the Organizationally Challenged for August:  The Perfectionist

Perfectionists often live in clutter and chaos because there is never enough time to do everything according to their high standards.  Perfectionism breeds procrastination.

They often have many unfinished projects because they find themselves unable to complete a one perfectly, so they set it aside and begin another hoping to do it perfectly.

They have trouble determining what really deserves their attention.  They tend to put so much time into trivial or minor details they work endless hours and still miss deadlines.

Jenny spent hours laundering a set of sheets in lavender water, hanging out on a clothesline, ironing them to crispness and meticulously folding and tying the set up with a satin ribbon.  They were beautiful! But you could hardly walk through her home because of the wall to wall stuff.

Help for the perfectionist:

• Heavily pad the time frame you schedule to complete project because you will frequently estimate less time than your high standards require.  Also, establish a personal deadline on any given project and don’t allow yourself to begin another until the first is finished.
• To avoid getting sidetracked in minutia, set a timer at 20 minute intervals to remind you to get back on task.
• Reframe your thinking.  Consider:  Is the amount of time I am putting into this project worth it in terms of what the final product or payoff is?  Time is an irreplaceable commodity.  Do I really want to spend it striving to be perfect?
• Modify your standards.  Excellence is attainable; perfection is not.  Strive for excellence

Parting thought: What must we do before we breathe in?  Breathe out of course!  With material things we tend to breathe in (bring in) and never breathe out (send out).  We are asphyxiating our lives with stuff!

What’s Happening?

Saturday, September 27  8:30 AM to 2:30 PM
“Applying God’s Order to Your Chaotic World”
Winding Creek Community Church, Stafford VA
Cost:  $18 (lunch provided)
All proceeds to support missions
Contact:  Ruth Braun RuthABraun@comcast.net  or
Brenda Fansler  rickfans@juno.com

Saturday, October 18  9:00 AM to 2:30 PM
“Pure and Simple”
Ferry Farm Baptist Church, Fredericksburg VA
Cost:  contact FFBC for information
Contact:  Sherry Lust  sherryandterryl@verizon.net

More classes will be offered in the fall.  Stay tuned!

Savor the rest of summer!  And look for the special holiday edition in October.

Organizerism for June:   The root of organizational weakness is indecision.

We are not born organized.  Organizational challenge is not a disease traceable to a virus, nor is it a genetic defect.  Organizing is a skill we learn if our desire (which comes out of need) is great enough to compel us to make a decision to invest our time and energy in it.

How many psychiatrists does it take to change a light bulb?
One, but the light bulb has got to want to be changed.  (grin)

Think of reasons you believe you struggle with organization.  Some familiar ones are:

• I can’t decide if I want it.
• I can’t decide where to store it.
• I can’t decide to let it go.
• I can’t decide to act on it rather than procrastinate.
• I can’t decide to ruthlessly change my habits, such as to “just do it,” or put it away now and prevent piles.
• I can’t decide to manage my time differently to allow time for ordering my life.
• I can’t decide to stop the incoming.  I can’t decide to resist buying more.
• I can’t decide to delegate or to enlist the help of my family, or to give up control or micro-managing.
• I can’t decide how to store things, what systems or containers to use.
• I can’t decide to settle for less than perfect.  I can’t meet my own expectations so I just don’t do it at all.
• I can’t decide to live with less; to be courageous enough to lower my standard of living to raise my quality of life.  …and so forth.

Once you identify reasons you cannot get organized, take them one at a time and work on reversing them.  For example, if you feel you don’t have time to get organized:

• Schedule a time.  An unscheduled appointment more than likely will not happen.  Treat it like any other important appointment or it will easily get “bumped” for almost anything else you would rather do.
• Work with your circadian rhythms.  If you are a morning person schedule early in the day; if you are a night owl choose an evening hour.  When scheduling, choose a time when you are most energetic and least physically and emotionally vulnerable.
• When scheduling, always allow more time than you think you need to accomplish the task.  We often self-sabotage because we begin the project but run out of time to finish it.

We have established that indecision is the beast that de-rails us, so:

• Enlist help.  This should be an objective person with heart (your spouse is usually not too objective?) who can help you focus, keep you on task, encourage you and help you in the decisions making process. This person can also keep you accountable for the appointment!  Sandra Feldon, author of the “Messie Manuals” says, “I alone can do it, but I can’t do it alone.”

It is also helpful to identify my organizing style, so I will present a profile each news note.  We begin with:

Profile of the Organizationally Challenged for June:  TheThinker.

We all know one or more, or you might be a thinker yourself.  The thinker’s gift is the ability to focus on things that require intelligent, introspective or analytical processing.  They are able to turn out a brilliant dissertation, or come up with profound thoughts, ideas or solutions.

For the thinker, much of life goes on in the mind so they don’t like to be disturbed with (or don’t even notice) the day-to-day details of life.  As a result, they put up with dripping plumbing or broken appliances because getting them fixed is just not that important to them or doesn’t even occur to them.  They live without enough light in strategic places because correcting the problem is more of an effort than living with it.

Thinkers often are not very quick on visual uptake.  They can tolerate a great deal of clutter and remain focused on what they are doing because they are not as sensitive to visual things as organized profiles who are visually alert and need to see clear, uncluttered lines to concentrate.

Helps for the Thinker:

• Don’t overload yourself with too much information.  The more choices we have, the more difficult the decisions will be.  Resist the compulsion to keep every resource or bit of information that you most likely can find later, especially in today’s electronic age.
• Get an assistant to change the burnt out light bulb, to file or to take care of other life details that get missed.
• Take the time to set up user-friendly, easy, places to hold thoughts and information.  If a system is easy and available we are more inclined to use it.  Thinkers often find well labeled stacking bins helpful as they can simply drop items in the appropriate tray to be found, sorted and/or filed later.

I am committed to limiting these news notes to no more than two pages, so until our August edition, happy summer and I wish you success in ordering your life!

What’s Happening?

Saturday May 31- 9 AM to 3:00 PM
Fredericksburg Parks and Rec
“Disorganization:  The Cost and the Cure”
Dorothy Hart Community Center on Canal Street
To register:  www.fredericksburgva.gov or 540-372-1086 Ext. 217

Saturday September 27 – 8:30 AM to 2:30 PM
Winding Creek Community Church Stafford Virginia
“Applying God’s Order to Your Chaotic World”- The seminar
Save the date and watch for further information in August.

More classes will be offered in the fall of 2008.  Stay tuned!

Next edition-
The first step in getting organized; The Sacred Art of De-Accumulation

Organizerism for April: We do what we (most) want.

A common thread runs though the lives of some of the world’s greatest spiritual teachers: Jesus Christ, Mohammed, the Hebrew prophets, the Catholic saints, the Quakers, the Shakers, the Amish…None of them had junk drawers! The all embraced simplicity and lived lives of beauty, function and harmony. The brilliant Albert Einstein said, “Out of clutter, find simplicity.” Henry David Throeau was able to focus on his great work abiding by his remedy for chaotic life, “simplify, simplify, simplify.”

We pay a price for disorganization; the physical, emotional, relational, spiritual and financial havoc it can create in our lives. It also costs us time, which is an irreplaceable commodity. And then there is the problem of space. Many of us think we don’t have enough of it and as a result Americans build bigger homes and still pay self storage companies to hold things the big homes won’t. Do we really not have enough space? Or is the truth perhaps that we just have too much stuff?

I emphasize the cost of disorder because the truth is, we invest our life energy in what we most want. That means that my desire for order (and all of its benefits) must be greater than my unwillingness to do what it takes to get organized and stay that way. Organized living is a skill we learn. If I want to play piano I must want it badly enough to find a teacher, invest in a piano and dedicate time for practice.

Ordered living does require work, but let’s weigh the benefits against the investment.  Establishing order is the means of gaining control over time and task rather than the other way around.  It reduces stress, saves us money, time, and space.  It increases our productivity, promotes harmony in relationships, and brings beauty and clarity to our lives.

I hope you find the organizing principals, ideas and systems in the upcoming News Notes to be helpful as you practice the vital discipline of organized living.

What’s Happening?

Saturday April 26-  8:00 AM to 4:30 PM
North Star Women’s Network presents “Deeper Still” Conference
First Baptist Church, Alexandria Virginia
Sue Marie presenting workshop “The Sacred Art of De-Accumulation”
To register:  703-941-6822  or Conference@NorthStarWomensNetwork.org

Saturday May 3-
Antioch Baptist Church, Fairfax Station Virginia
Women’s 2008 Spring Conference – WOW! Women of Wisdom
Location: Fairfax Marriott at Fair Oaks
11787 Lee Jackson Memorial Highway, Fairfax VA
Sue Marie presenting 90 minute session “The Sacred Art of De-Accumulation”
To register:  www.antioch-church.org or Janice George 703-542-8861

Saturday May 31-  9 AM to 3:00 PM
Fredericksburg Parks and Rec
“Disorganization:  The Cost and the Cure”
Dorothy Hart Community Center on Canal Street
To register:  www.fredericksburgva.gov or 540-372-1086 Ext. 217

Saturday September 27 – 8:30 AM to 2:30 PM
Winding Creek Community Church Stafford Virginia
“Applying God’s Order to Your Chaotic World”- The seminar
Save the date and watch for further information in August.

We regret that all other classes are currently filled or closed.  More classes
will be offered in the fall of 2008.  Stay tuned!

Next edition-
The first step in getting organized; The sacred art of de-accumulation.

“I am learning…that a man can live profoundly without masses of things.”
Admiral Byrd alone in the barren Arctic