Un-mixing it up

Telluride Daily Planet, Friday, February 14, 2025

Organizing is what you do before you do something, so that when you do it, it is not all mixed up.  – A.A. Milne

I have a friend who is an expert at Mind Mapping, which is a personal visual representation of starting with a central idea and branching it outwards, flowchart-style. He learned it nearly 50 years ago from founder Tony Buzan and uses it for everything, from recording events to memorizing groups of pharmaceuticals in his anesthesiology practice. It is a reflection of optimizing a busy life around principles of organization. From my personal point of view, it is positively heroic.

I’m not saying I am a lost cause; but there are moments in life and creativity when things get  messy, ooze instead of march forward, accumulate in heaps instead of self-classify. For those of us whose minds don’t work naturally in rows, stacks, or routines, we nevertheless occasionally are summoned to create new neural pathways via stretching ourselves towards order and systematization.

In general, I find as the days get lighter and longer, winter’s dust and crooked piles of things start becoming self-evident. Emerging out of hibernation, I begin carving my way out of untidy stacks of books or blankets, winter clothes or whatever it is. There is hope in light, and seemingly even more hope in shoring things up, whether those things are material goods, thoughts, time, or priorities.

My personal go-to, number one method for organization — you can call it lazy — has always been to get rid of, and, therefore, simply have less to organize (the one possible exception being art supplies). But in addition to simplifying or a more minimalist approach, taking stock, improving process and categorizing can all give us humans a boost when we feel at a loss, or lacking control, or when we are out of touch with what is ours to take care of.

The health benefits of organization are pretty clear. It can increase clarity and ease and reduce anxiety.  It can boost productivity, enhance creativity (yes, indeed), and create more space for priorities and self-care. It can sometimes open up a personal or professional world that otherwise seems to be closing in. Even small organizational modifications are notorious for bringing satisfaction if not pleasure. If you’re like me, simply observing someone else’s organization prowess can be inspiring and serve as a stepping off point.

Ever seen a tee-shirt folded perfectly in two moves? An entire wall of books arranged by the color of their spines? These small modifications remind us that anywhere is a good place to start. As a matter of fact, micro goals give us a better chance, in the long run, of being successful.

My personal recommendations for organization come from things I have tried and found both useful and not overwhelming. For reorganization of your weeks and months, try using a bullet journal (bujo), an analog — pencil and notebook — system of notating tasks and events that is satisfying, old-school, especially if you are over it with tech, and not difficult to learn.

For organization of a house, start with a single drawer: if nothing else, get your rubber bands and plastic bread things in order. Move on to pantries, then to garages. For organization of a better day overall, download a free water-drinking app and put yourself on a schedule that will give you more energy to tackle even bigger things.

There are multitudes of bestselling books on this topic to inspire us, too, from Spark Joy by Marie Kondo to The Minimalist Home by Joshua Becker to 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos by Jordan Peterson.

And though A.A. Milne says in the above quote that organization is what you do before you do something, it’s also what we might gain from the process after it’s done. Organization can reunite with you with a long lost black-and-white photo of your family where you’re all smiling like fools. Organization can give you a free afternoon to wander the forest, hugging every cherry-cola smelling ponderosa pine to you for dear life. Organization can send a load of winter clothes to people in need; it can help you finally start that meditation practice.

So this year, if you’ve gotten inklings or even conks on the head that a bit more order is in order in your life, give yourself a Valentine, a show of self-love, to take a tiny cloud of chaos and let the sun shine through it. Because you never know what will fall out of the pages of that book you finally got around to dusting and re-shelving.