Archiving calendars

I've had a weekly calendar to keep track of appointments and important dates since high school, and I've kept most of them for sentimental reasons. I just recently switched to using iCal exclusively instead of a paper calendar, and I went back to look at the stack of calendars I had been keeping in a drawer.

They were fun to glance through to remind myself of the classes I took in college, the concerts I went to, the trips I've been on. But I realized that was the first time I'd looked at many of them in years. I decided to give my lovely ScanSnap S1500M a workout and turn each calendar into a digital file, then recycle all that paper.

Of course, the ScanSnap didn't break a sweat, the results were beautiful scans, and I have that data should anyone care to know what I did back on March 18, 2000 (apparently I went to Magic Mountain).

I also freed up an entire drawer for some more useful purpose. But I'm leaving it empty for now.

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Clearing the decks

My mother-in-law is an artist and she recently sent me photos to illustrate her newly organized studio space. Previously, she had a work space that had a lot of tools and other items always stored on top of it. With the addition of shelves within arm's reach, the stuff has been removed, clearing the surface for her to work. She writes, "Now that the surface is clear, I have so much more energy (and workspace!)."

Before.

After. Shelves in place, work space totally clear!

This is a wonderful achievement, and I'm grateful for her permission to share her experience, and happy that some of her inspiration came from me and this blog.

For many of us, having a clear space on which to work is vital, no matter what type of work it may be. Empty spaces like desk tops, dining room tables, and counters are wonderful places to attack all sorts of projects, but they are also magnets for the detritus from the day to be dumped upon.

Having a regular (small) dump spot that you frequently sort through and clear off is sensible. Keeping a large open space always clear and ready for you to begin to use is imperative to creativity and effectiveness when at work.

Do you have a work space that's currently home to odds, ends and whatnots? Take a few minutes to clear it off, and resist the urge to put anything on there other than your current project. Feel the energy flow through the space and into your mind and hand.

Lelah Baker-Rabe is a Los Angeles-based professional organizer. To discuss your organizing needs, call her at 818.269.6671 or email lelah@lelahwithanh.com. Sign up for Lelah's News, a once-monthly newsletter.

A year ago: Carry-on, organizer.

Last year in June I shared all the various ways you can keep in touch with me online. I also wrote about my transition from a checked-bag-person to a carry-on-bag-person. I'm still exclusively carry-on, and the two trips I have planned this summer will be a great test to that. Heads-up readers, in July I'll be away for three whole weeks! I'm going to try to have some content scheduled, but for the most part I will be well and truly on vacation. And I'm only packing a carry-on. For three weeks. I'm pretty excited about the prospect, actually. I will be able to do laundry at almost every destination, so that helps a lot, but I'm also managing three fairly distinct climates, so that will be interesting. I'm thinking layering. Anyway.

This is a Zuca carry-on suitcase that I've been coveting for years. Photo from zuca.com

I love these next two posts. One is about seeing our living spaces with fresh eyes and figuring out how we can pare down. That feeling of possibility and freshness that you get when you first move in somewhere and it's completely empty is a feeling that I like to recapture every now and again in my own spaces. Try it out! The next post encourages you to get help when tackling difficult organizing tasks, particularly garages, clothes closets and going through a deceased person's stuff.

Lastly, here's a review of the book Organizing Outside the Box by Hellen Buttigieg and Sari Brandes.

Lelah Baker-Rabe is a Los Angeles-based professional organizer. To discuss your organizing needs, call her at 818.269.6671 or email lelah@lelahwithanh.com. Sign up for Lelah's News, a once-monthly newsletter.

A year ago: Happiness, freedom and empty space

Last year on Helping You Organize, I reviewed the book The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. The Happiness Project Blog is still one of my favorites and I've thought repeatedly about many of Rubin's tenants of happiness in the year since reading the book. The book is now out in paperback.

One of my all-time favorite posts was from May of last year about how the best things in life aren't free. I'm talking about stuff you get for free from friends, relatives, businesses and the like. Most often these free items come with the steep price of figuring out where to put them, how to take care of them and how to dispose of them and you are better off not accepting the thing in the first place!

Another great post (if I do say so myself) was on the virtues of an empty box or shelf. Just because there is an empty space in your space doesn't mean you have to fill it up with stuff!

Creative Commons free junk photo posted to Flickr by cogdogblog

Lelah Baker-Rabe is a Los Angeles-based professional organizer. To discuss your organizing needs, call her at 818.269.6671 or email lelah@lelahwithanh.com. Sign up for Lelah's News, a once-monthly newsletter.

Empty space

One of the basic organizing principles that I really enjoy sharing with my clients in the concept that just because a space is empty, a shelf, a drawer, a section of a room, what have you, it doesn't have to be filled. I've blogged about this before, and lately I've really come to believe that it's a fundamental thing to understand about the spaces we inhabit.

Remember when you moved into your apartment or house, and there was nothing there when you walked in the door the first time? Remember how good it felt to see the new space as an clean slate, with nothing but hope and possibilities for the future inside?

Why do we promptly take all that nice, empty space, and fill it chock full with furniture, books, electronic equipment, clothing, knick knacks and art? Well, we need some of it to live our lives, earn our livings, be comfortable. I like to lie on my couch and read a book. We need pots and pans to feed ourselves. We have to wear clothes. Paintings and photographs make us think and remember. But so often the sense of hope and possibility fades as we move layer upon layer of stuff into the space and is replaced with feelings of oppression and anxiety.

We can do something about it. We can have less stuff. We can even have less furniture. I'm not advocating that a pallet and basin of water is all you need or the best way to live. But what about saving some room in your rooms for just empty space? That space is a monument to the idea that things don't rule your life, you do.

If you think it's impossible, just get up right now and walk to your front door. Go outside and come back in. Pretend you've never been there before. What do you see that strikes you as out of place, useless, or just plain ugly? Why is there a broken printer in the corner of the living room? Why are there three copies of the same book on the bookshelf above the TV? These are easy things to let go of. Start with those, and then keep going.

Creative Commons photo posted to flickr by aforero
Lelah Baker-Rabe is a Los Angeles-based professional organizer. To discuss your organizing needs, call her at 818.269.6671 or email lelah@lelahwithanh.com 

An empty shelf

Whenever I'm working with a client and we empty a box (during the sorting and purging stages of organization), I always stop and do a little cheer. An empty box is a sign of progress. It means things are moving, changing, and the stuff is no longer in a box where it can't be used or loved.

Gretchen Rubin, of The Happiness Project, talks about always having an empty shelf. The emptiness of the shelf implies room for growth, a symbolic invitation for new ideas, inspiration and riches to come into our lives.

For some people, an empty shelf or box makes them nervous. They might have a desire to fill the box or shelf up. Maybe they think they need to be using up all their space. But there is nothing wrong with an empty box, shelf, or drawer, or even closet (assuming you don't have stuff strewn across your living space). The empty space is a promise of growth, change, of new possibilities. If all your surfaces, drawers and boxes are full, how can you accept new things into your life?

Clear off a shelf or clean out a drawer today. See how it makes you feel.

Creative Commons photo posted to Flickr by surekat
Lelah Baker-Rabe is a Los Angeles-based professional organizer. To discuss your organizing needs, call her at 818.269.6671 or email lelah@lelahwithanh.com