Day 22 - Clear Your Floors

At first read - I thought today's challenge said - cleaN the floors.  LOL  Then I re-read - ok we are going to cleaR the floors!  This will be interesting.   So I googled for images of cluttered floors.  Oh my goodness.  Go ahead and do that and I'll be here. 

So you are back?  Interestingly,  not only are there pictures - sometimes there is a blog attached.  In many cases, the clutter has to do with procrastination, lack of a process or system, and or a place to put the 'stuff''.  Heck sometimes we just get lazy?  Sometimies we can blame the other person(s) in the house, or the dog? 

When I was growing up - I did not excel at cleaning up my room.  Thank goodness there was a door on the room.  When I went away to college, I found that I was the neat-freak compared to most of my roommates over time.  So what was my parents complaining about back then?   

Out of college and dating guys that didn't live with his frat brothers, sometimes I was pleasantly surprised, other times I needed a hazmat suit upon entering.

One of my dear friends wrote a book on procrastination.  You can get it at amazon by clicking this one Kerul's Book .  It is a great book.  So what is the deal with procrastination?  I think Seth Godin said it right "when the lizard brain" get's in the way.  His video about the lizard brain can be found here.  Give it a watch.  It's about all the great ideas - and then failing to follow through.  The internal voice starts with "what if" and before you know it, the idea has passed and nothing seems accomplished.   The mantra I have - 'just do it'.  In the time it took to say 'blah blah blah' in many cases, it would have been done!  Don't think so - then break it down into smaller parts, take out a stop watch / timer and make it a game.

So back to my challenge.... clearing the floors.  My game that I have used for years, thanks to Kerul - do five at five.  It is simple - take five minutes - once in the morning and once in the evening and put five away, sweep through your space!   I confess that the several, several, several months before beginning the challenge - it did not keep to my game.  

Along with that great routine, I have the upstairs / downstairs routine.  This is for those odd ball items that were on one floor and need to go to another floor.  It works well for living/working on three floors.  It's simple - put the items on the steps to either go up, pictured above, or go down.  As I pass by during the day - I'll take one or two of them to their proper space.  Yes - lots of books from the library.  The bottom step is where I put them so I may take them back as they due or I'm finished with them.

First focus - items put in the sitting area upstairs.  I need to walk on the floor.  I need to be able to sit on the love seat.  Okay - pile of clothes - sorted - now there are my yoga/sleep shirts, the special shirts and a pile to give away!  Tomorrow - unseal the space bags with other clothes in them? Lastly - Wednesday through the weekend - move my charity items to the designated place downstairs.

Success for Day 22 - a bunch of stuff has been taken off the floors and for the other stuff, a plan has been made and written down for the balance of this week to take care of those items still on the floor.  Donate box --  stack of tee shirts that I don't need any longer!


Today's Challenge - Day 23  -  Take your Time - and - find one item to put in the donate box.