Starters and Finishers
Lia:
I will say there are still a few projects on my list. Mainly photo books and short webinar courses. I’ve mentioned them before, but thought I would mention it as it’s a place here and now…things unfinished. And maybe now it’s time to turn my attention back to them now that the immigration package project is complete. Time to re-organize priorities and challenge myself to go after these projects – remind myself why they are important at all. With the goal and purpose in mind will help to move me along.
Adrienne:
Oh my word. I’m laughing… I’m a “piler”. I pile things in piles. Neat ones. Messy ones. Old ones. New ones. These piles are all the things I want to do, have done, and have to do. Post it notes with random fly-away poetry. It’s ridiculous!
I have it down to 3.5 piles now. It was 3, but one started on the kitchen table on the weekend ha! It’s a terrible terrible habit that seems unbreakable, and at the same time, I know exactly where everything is. I tried a filing cabinet, but it didn’t work. It’s me way.
Anyway, several years of precious strategy, book-learning, blog notes, how-to notes, similar brochures… these 3 piles have been filed on the guest room floor since, hmmm, Easter. I organise and declutter them probably every other day. I know it’s nuts but I’m honestly really proud of having whittled it down to what it is now. All of it is useful and all of it is actionable. The rest has been discarded or transferred to its proper place. Even the business cards have been weeded! It’s quite a stressful and exhausting process, but it’s my process, and I just can’t bring myself to throw it out. I am going through it methodically and the truth is, that task is quite an acknowledgement of where I am now. It feels amazing to acknowledge that. It feels even more amazing to know, with absolute certainty, what is important.
The kicker? Grandpa is pretty distressed with the bathroom reno, and I suggested he come here for the afternoons! It’s quiet, there is a door on the bathroom, and he can have a nap in the spare bedroom if he likes. This meant shuttling all this stuff into the basement. Or did it?! As I stood there and realised how much I’M distressed by the thought of having to start almost all over again with the pile-files, they suddenly were not so large and daunting. It was the weirdest thing! Suddenly, I felt myself really calm, and noticing how little was actually there, looking where I could relocate it in the room, and then did that. It probably took 15 minutes. That’s it! It’s actually neater than when I started tonight.
It feels amazing to feel in charge of that process. Piling is how I have always done things, to spite trying other methods, and I have a love-hate relationship with it. I love that I can process things as they are needed, or not, but I don’t love the stress of having all that junk around. This time, moving it – as I have done probably a million times – was calm, cool and collected. Usually that would be a place where I lose the thread of the plan, and the scatter would cost me a lot of mental and actionable time. This is new to feel this at ease and up to speed!
