Tag: daily prompt

I Have a Dream to be a Supremely Organised Being

Photo by JESHOOTS.com on Pexels.com

Today’s prompt is “What is something you wish you knew how to do?”. I let this one marinate the entire day and, believe it or not, the only thing I could come up with was “be more organised”. My desk is most often full of clutter and so is my inbox and my desktop and my folders. You get the picture. Every day I juggle being a student, a single mum, managing a team and working in a hybrid role so you would think I have this organisational thing down pat by now. But noooo, not me. Every day I am caught by surprise by something I forgot. It’s exhausting. I have tried everything I can think of but the skill of organising stuff well continues to elude me. Here’s a taste of the various ways I have tried to master this skill.

Apps

I cannot believe how many apps there are out there to help you get organised. I have tried a few but none have quite stuck yet. I have tried:

  • Evernote: note bad but things like tables can’t be viewed in full on a screen. I also suspect that I have not investigated it’s full functionality though. I love that I can lock this app with a password.
  • Notion: this is actually not too bad an app. I love that I can organise pages inside pages. I found some of the templates useful as well.
  • Mem: I actually love this one. Talk about organising pages inside pages! You can link so many different types of information in so many ways. It’s pretty cool.
  • Microsoft To-Do: A good every day app to set up reminders if I remember to actually create the tasks🤦‍♀️
  • Any-Do: Not dramatically different from Ms To-Do.
  • Ms OneNote: This one is great on the computer. I am so thrilled that I can “dock to desktop” again. An extremely useful feature that allows you take notes while working.
  • iReminders: same functionality as Any-do and Ms To-do
  • iNote – I probably use this most often to save bits of info that I come across and create the text for an IG post.

I’ll stop there. I know, I know I might have an organisational app hoarding problem. I discover most apps through articles on Medium. I have now learned to scroll past any article that promises the new best app to organise my life. It’s not the apps. It’s me.

Paper and Pen

I love paper and pen. I love writing. I have diaries. I have planners. Heck, I even designed my own planner on Canva to help myself. I write in them about once a month, if I remember. That tells how well that’s working out for me.

Habits/Systems

Soooo…since it’s probably not the tools that I have chosen to try, I decided to try creating a routine that would ensure that I make better use of the tools and thereby become better organised. (Phew, that was a wordy sentence!) Enter James Clear’s Atomic Habits book and course. “If you want better results, then forget about setting goals. Focus on your system instead.” he says. Well I have yet to master putting together a system that works for me.

Maybe being organised is just not part of my identity yet and that is why I have yet to create a system that works for me. Since my word for this year is “Action” and my mantra is “This is who I am now” every time I need adopt a new action to replace an old one (I learned this method of reshaping your identity to change your habits from a David Goggins interview), perhaps this is the year that I finally succeed in being a well-organised person.

Of course I am always open to tips and tricks so please do share what works for you.

My Favourite Toy…Once upon a time

I must admit that today’s prompt has made me think really hard. I fished out my old album to try and jog my memory about the toys I had back in the day. There were definitely dolls in the pictures and I vaguely remember playing dolls house with my sisters from time to time but that’s about it when it came to toys. I do remember treasuring a tartan teddy when I was really little but he disappeared during one of our moves.

My favourite tartan teddy

The things I treasured most when I was a kid was books. I loved reading. My mum had bought us a set of 12 Disney books that I read over and over and over again. I remember The Jungle book and there a few Donald Duck books. There was a donald duck story where they had they had to ask a donkey to wiggle his ears and coins would fall out. It just so happened that my father could wiggle his eye so he would do it whenever he read the story to us. You can imagine how many times he had to read that book!😂 I was very curious so I read our reference books cover to cover as well. One was called Disney’s Wonderful World of Knowledge and I still have it today even though it looks absolutely battered. I just can’t part with it. Once I was old enough to venture to the library by myself, I made sure I was there at least every 2 weeks to swap my 3 books which was all I was allowed. When I wasn’t reading I was trying my hand at slantwords and crosswords and the like. I didn’t do puzzles though and colouring in was definitely not my thing and still isn’t.

One of my favourite books

When I wasn’t reading or doing word puzzles, I was outside playing with the kids from the neighbourhood. We played hopscotch and hide and seek and ‘stocking’. We rode our bikes and skated with our roller skates. I remember being horrified that my parents had bought me these adjustable metal skates with straps over the top while everyone else had the boots. In the end though it didn’t stop me from having a blast everyday with them. In summer I was at the public pool swimming my heart out. It was just up the road from our house so I was there every day. I was so sunburnt and I didn’t even realise it. I found a pic of myself from back then not so long ago and almost didn’t recognise myself. I was burnt to a crisp …lol. I also had ballet classes twice a week so I was a pretty busy kid.

I have actually enjoyed writing this piece. It brought back wonderful memories of being a kid. I am so glad that I grew up when I did. We had loads of fun and barely spent time in front of the TV. Toys were cool but for me books were probably way more important and still are. I am still constantly surrounded by them physically and even electronically. I love reading and I love learning.

Thank you for taking this trip down memory lane with me. Hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.

Comfort zones are overated

“If you’re brave enough to say goodbye, life will reward you with a new hello.”

Paulo Coelho

I don’t know about you but I am not one for New Year’s resolutions. I stopped making them a few years ago when I realised that I will make the necessary changes when I am ready to and not just at the beginning of the year. Every day is a new day and a new opportunity to do or become something different if I so choose. Change requires stepping out of your comfort zone and there in lies the problem. Fortunately I have found myself doing it more and more often of late and it is actually exciting. It’s scary but definitely exciting.

One of the last times I stepped out of my comfort zone was last year when I made the choice to surrender to guidance rather than try to control everything in my life. I had read the book ‘The Surrender Experiment’ by Michael A Singer and his experience just made total sense to me. The quote below from the book really grabbed my attention and I really wanted to find out what if I could do the same.

Image: Readwise

This has not been an easy journey thus far but it been pretty cool as the same time. I am more open to doing things that would never have done before especially at work. I have followed my instincts which has led to me feeling more at peace because I know that I am being guided. The outcomes have generally been better than expected. New opportunities have popped up which I am looking forward to experiencing.

It is pretty cool to see how free will comes into play. We always have choices and by allowing myself to be guided, I am not giving up my free will but using my free will to make the choice. I never ever understood that before. I thought that by saying “Lord, your will not mine” I was giving up my free will and that scared the day lights out of me. Thankfully, now I know better.

I have also made a few errors in choices because I wasn’t paying attention to my instincts, especially of late. As a result, I have seen doors closing but to be honest, the closed doors have actually being a relief. It actually feels like by closing the doors, the Universe is “recalculating” my route to my desired destination. It’s pretty awesome!

So yes, I have stepped out of my comfort zone of controlling everything and it feels scary but awesome. My hands are open to release what needs to leave and accept what is meant for me. Life is for the living after all. I highly recommend this journey especially if you are feeling ‘stuck’ in your life. It’s quite a ride😁