FULL-SCALE CLEANING. HOW TO INTRODUCE AN ORDER INTO THOUGHTS, EMOTIONS AND RELATIONSHIPS

The lack of order in life is a good reflection of a hyper occupied mind. Nonetheless, there is a reverse side of the coin: by bringing harmony to your environment, you can put embrace our inner field as well. Let´s get started!

By the side of your bed you probably have a pile of books that you want to read, your agenda looks like Tokyo metro map, your thoughts jumble together and your emotions overwhelm you. Let us stop and try to arrange everything: let us start a massive “detox” and throw away what we don´t need. What you really need is serenity.
 

Psychologists claim that cleaning up can have healing powers. When you instil order in your external world it can project itself into your inner realm. In the first place, you need to stop playing a victim and start taking responsibilities for your own life. By doing this, you can take control of your things, time and relationships.
 

What do we mean by organizing any scope of your life? It means to clear space in order to fill it with the things that are meaningful for you. If you struggle with cleaning, don´t get upset. This skill, like any other skill, can be acquired and improved. Here are some advice that can help you get rid of all the obsolete and unnecessary things.
 

Your house

According to Marie Condo, it is easy to reach harmony in your house if you “only keep the things that bring you joy and happiness”. How can you attain this state? Revise your closets, wardrobes, boxes and shelves regularly. Touch each thing you reach for and listen to your inner voice. Does this thing make you feel good? If you don´t feel it, get rid of it. Before doing that, remember to thank it for performing its service to you.

You´d probably say that you don´t have enough time for doing all this at once. Well, try to practice it one time per day. If you continue doing this exercise by setting up a timer for 15 minutes every day, you´ll manage to get all the things done just in a month of careful work.

Your time

Sometimes it feels like you are completely under water with your routine daily tasks and you don´t know where to start in order to manage them all. No panic! Famous business coaches recommend using the matrix of Eisenhauer, the 34th president of the USA. This approach helps to sort out priorities and increase personal productivity.

Look at the situation from above. This will help you to calm down and understand that it´s not really a big deal. You need to react only to urgent issues. Take your time and think of all the things you should do. Then draw a square on the piece of paper and divide it into four sections. The upper left square will be called “Important and urgent” section, the upper right one - “Important and not urgent”, lower left – “Urgent and not important”, and the last one – “not urgent and not important”. By doing this, you will be able to determine 4 types of tasks you need to get done.

1. “Important and urgent”: should be done immediately, without delaying or delegating them away. It is recommended to have a limit for this kind of tasks: they should not exceed 20 percent of all that you need to do.
   
    
2. “Important but not urgent”: be realistic and include them into your agenda. Plan with precision how and when you will do what you have specified as important. This part may constitute around 60 percent of your entire list. Following these recommendations will enable you to pursue your own rhythm of doing things.
   
    
3. “Urgent but not important”: at the moment you can just eliminate them from your list. You may also consider delegating and asking your husband, your children or your colleague to do one of these tasks for you.
   
    
4. “Not urgent and not important”: for now simply cross them out. You will certainly come back to them later. If it doesn´t happen, you will have saved energy for important things that are worth doing.
   
    

Have you filled these squares with your current tasks? Now analyse it. Which section turned out to be most crowded? Can you change anything by shifting some tasks from one square to the other? Do you feel comfortable with the result? Do you experience a feeling of slight relief and clarity of what needs to be done next?
 

Now you can categorize all the information to your agenda. Start doing things from the “Important and urgent” section in the following days. The tasks should be distributed in such a way that will enable you to successfully complete all the assignments within one or two month. This is a simple but comfortable planning technique that helps to make more free time and redistribute one’s work upload.

 

Keep in mind that your structured approach combined with your positive thinking results in uncompromising success!