Flaws in the Organization System

From outward appearances this blog may appear to have been forgotten! Oh, how can this be? Simple, it’s an illusion. Over the past several weeks, amidst the inevitable chaos of my life, I hunkered down and made a plan for what I wanted to do with this blog. I made schedule of days and which topic types should be addressed on those days. I also spent some time developing a few ongoing columns for Artistical Exploration. The system is flawed and I aim to do more than slap a band-aid on it.

Couldn’t forget about this blog if I tried. In some strange way I really love this blogging thing. Events of the past several months have been of the sort that point out, in harsh contrast, the most extreme fatal flaws of my organization system. Not that I’m complaining. Not at all. I really needed that flashlight shone on those flaws, because I was wanting to know what they were. Without the events of late, I would not have found them as quickly, nor would I have had the chance to spend a bit of time working out a way to resolve so many of them.

Among the things the organization problem affected was the rate at which I could put out new art and writing, as well as just about every other thing in my life. I simply was not taught in school, nor at home how to organize things properly. My mom showed me much about general organizing, sure, but not how to set up filing systems, nor how to untangle my belongings properly after a move. Growing up and until very recently, we moved around a lot. This is not an exaggeration, more like an understatement. The last place I lived, I broke the “2 years at one address consecutively” mark for the first time in my entire life. But I was only able to break it by about 7 months. Where I live now, as I approach the one year mark - some 4 months away, I’m doing everything I can to unravel the mess that our sudden move caused. The cause for the sudden move this time was an extremely positive one, however it took the two & a half years of the last place and the ton of moves before it and scrambled the snot out of my belongings in a way it never had before.

So since we moved here I’ve been trying to re-train myself in my organizing, and well the things that piled on me this year, so many of them I just didn’t expect to clash with that at all. Yet there they were all tangled up. Which I guess, in the end, is lucky. Now, I can see more clearly what needs to be done regularly with what, and which kinds of files I need most, which as it turns out were not the files I already had going. At least my head will not explode, as I thought might be around the bend if I didn’t figure this out well enough by now.

What obstacles do you face in your creative endeavors, especially when it comes to organization?

Did anyone show you what to do with index cards?

I would hear all over the place, oh index cards they’re so useful but no one would go into to any details about what they did with them, so I guess I’ll just have to write a little book about my discoveries with that.

Have you got a proper calendar system for your art, writing, crafting or other such things?

Took me a long while to get my calendars to work with my stuff, they’re just now starting to fall into place. And now that they are I sorta wonder how I kept my head from rolling off in frustration before they started to work right.

Wish they taught life management classes in school, ahh such a pretty dream…

Well, I’ve got to go now lots more to do today, and the day is pretty well gone.

1st entry in the Organization for the Creative column.