LiveSlow

Done!

Oops!  I knew I should have posted this right away because my mom sent me an e-mail about wanting to help with my garage and attic.  Shortly after I wrote the 2 Monsters post, I gave myself an attitude adjustment.  I wanted to take a break and stop pushing toward my goal and I wanted to rest because my face was killing me, but I made a decision instead.  I decided to honor the one hour organizing commitment I made to myself.  I've been practicing a new discipline:  the discipline of not yielding to myself.  It wasn't my idea but I was greatly affected by the devotional entry entitled "Yielding" in Oswald Chambers' book, My Utmost For His Highest.  

It's a great entry and I'd recommend you read it for yourself, but the part that spoke to me was this:

"When you yield to something, you will soon realize the tremendous control it has over you.  Even though you say, "Oh, I can give up that habit whenever I like," you will know you can't.  You will find that the habit absolutely dominates you because you willingly yielded to it.  It is easy to sing, "He will break every fetter," while at the same time living a life of obvious slavery to yourself.  But yielding to Jesus will break every kind of slavery in any person's life."  

I struggle with lots of things and God's been dealing with me about discipline, laziness vs. diligence and my thought life, but I think I won this time.  Take a look.

 I pushed through and this took me two hours.....and my face didn't hurt.

This one took only 28 minutes and my face still didn't hurt.

Two hours and 28 minutes and I was practically dancing around my house - quietly though because the kids were sleeping.  I was brutal and threw tons of stuff away, set aside several items (neatly) of things to consign and now I'm done.  I'm completely DONE.  Two years of decluttering is over and I did it before my deadline and now have the entire Spring and Summer to play and spend time with the people I love most.

By the way....as I laid down to sleep, my face started hurting again so I guess God had given me a short reprieve:)

Happy Spring everyone!

2 monsters

They loom and lurk in the shadowy corners of my mind, haunting me even though I try my best not to think about them.  They have shadowy corners of their own..... 

 
THE ATTIC....a place my children recently discovered and transformed into an awesome fort and clubhouse complete with "costumes".  After I force them to put back all of the clothing they pulled out of the bins, I'll turn my attention to  ........

THE GARAGE, which is truly nightmarish.  You'd agree if you could look up at see the mass of spiders already spinning sticky webs.  I suck them out with the extension pole of my central vacuum unit but it's a never ending challenge.  Pretty soon, they'll do battle with the dinosaur sized palmetto bugs that give me the heebie jeebies in the summer.  These two places are interconnected and will have to be re-organized at the same time because of all the shuffling of stuff I have to do.  It will require a measure of brutality as I'm determined to toss, sell or give away the bulk of the possessions stored there.  We'll see how I do.  

I had to go to urgent care today due to a massive bacterial sinus infection, so I'll be laying low for the next few days and will rest before a wild adventure with my family.  Stay tuned for pictures and postings....

Content

"But godliness with contentment is great gain."  1 Tim 6:6 

The paperwork is done, the home is moderately organized and I feel a sense of great contentment.  Oh, that I could linger in this state of mind for a few days, but moderately organized is not the goal.  The goal is to be completely organized so I can gain even more benefits than I've already realized.  I want to talk about gain, because having a well organized home would have been good enough for me.  However, I've slowly begun to realize, hence the feeling of great contentment, what exactly it IS that I've gained:

Time.

Somehow I've gained time!  Now, I know it makes sense that if things are well organized I'd have to clean less, which has always been a point of frustration, but I've managed to clean less and DO more of the things I've wanted.  Things like....

I've started to exercise more regularly (Hip)

I've been able to volunteer more - in my church AND in my community (Hip)

I've been able to spend quality time with my kids AND pursue my personal goals (Hooray!)

I've been able to spend more time in devotions and Bible study (Hallelujah!!!)

There's even more but it's boring so I won't bother posting and as I'm writing, I just realized that my almost 8-year old son has scrunched himself into my kitchen sink and is very happily, "taking a bath", so a break is in order.  He just ridiculously asked me to get him some shampoo. I'll be back after I freak out.....

 Ha. We just told him the little girl in the house next door can see him through her window!

Well, that took more time than I thought it would, so I'll post pictures of the last two terrible places in my home tomorrow.

Legacy - Part 2

"This is how we know what love is:  Jesus Christ laid down his life for us.  And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.  If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?  Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth."  1 John 3:16

During my impromptu dinnertime Bible study, I challenged the kids with this sentence:  "Tell me how you served someone today."  Silence.  In order to get them tracking with me I told them how I'd served in my church office that morning - I told them I'd cleaned the men's room.  They were both disgusted and fascinated.  "Gross!" was one reply.  I asked, "What did Jesus do after dinner?" "Washed feet!" they replied. Little Mama chimed in, "Yeah, that was a job only the servants had to do."  I told them I figured cleaning bathrooms was as close as I could come to footwashing in today's culture.  Jesus said we'd be blessed if we did that kind of work for one another and my family has received more from our church than we've been able to give. The ministry staff pours themselves out for us daily and we benefit from their hard work every Sunday.  

"So." I asked again. "How did you serve someone today?"

"I gave Abby a pencil because she didn't have one!" shouted my son.

Little Mama said, "Oh, there's this girl in my gym class that I don't like because we both have a crush on the same guy.  She wanted to borrow my perfume and I didn't want to because I wanted her to smell bad, but I let her use it anyway."   Now that's what I call sacrifice!

Miss Sassy tried hard to think of something; she was nice to many people (that's to be expected) and responsible for her work (also expected) but she didn't go out of her way to serve anyone.  We had a great time sharing stories and as Little Mama was helping clear the table I commended her for sharing her perfume.  I explained that when Jesus washed the disciples' feet, He even washed the feet of His betrayer, Judas.  She thought about it and said, "That's messed up!".  

About an hour later, all h*%$ broke loose upstairs and I went to see why.  The girls were screaming because Miss Sassy's cell phone battery was dead and she took her sister's cell phone.  As I listened, the warm fuzzies about the privilege of raising children fizzled.  I stopped the argument and went downstairs feeling discouraged. Shortly after, I realized all was silent and when I went to make sure no one was dead, I found Miss Sassy dancing around the room. 

Little Mama said, "I fixed her phone."  I said, "You did? How?!"  She replied, "I took the battery out of my phone and gave it to her."  I commended her again for her generosity and smiling she said, "Yeah.  It was also the only way I could get her to shut up."    Baby steps.  

                                             

  

Legacy - Part 1

Ugh....I'm still sorting through piles.  I was cleaning out one of my desk areas and I found more - it's almost defeating but I have to press through it because this is stuff that's visible and causes me irritation. So I don't bore you with filing details I'll do a post that God put on my heart yesterday:

"....when I call to remembrance the genuine faith that is in you, which dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am persuaded is in you also."  2 Tim 1:5

I wanted to write about how difficult it's been training my children in the area of organization.  They can clean well enough - when I nag - but it's frustrating they don't see how their lack of willingness to help our house affects our lives. I remembered how hard it was to get people to serve in church and realized that being a servant in a success driven, "all about me" culture is completely unnatural.  Serving begins in the home and when we do it in the name of Christ, something supernatural occurs.  As I was praying about it, the Holy Spirit filled me with joy because I realized how awesome it is to be able to train my children. Some women in other countries don't get to teach their own kids - children are sent to labor camps, forced to become soldiers or sold into slavery.  I was reminded that I live in a free society which grants me the ability to stay home, guide them spiritually and train them to live lives of worship.  I'm currently trying to teach them the difference between being a slave and a servant:  slavery is forced - serving is done out of love. I wondered....am I doing a good job?

Parenting is a legacy making opportunity.  They'll remember me for many things, but I want to leave a faith legacy like the one Lois and Eunice handed down to Timothy, so I had a good idea....  

I placed my Bible next to my plate at dinner last night and my daughter, Miss Sassy Teenager, immediately rolled her eyes and said, "Aww mom, do we have to read the Bible at dinner?"  She tried to stall me with rapid fire babbling...."So everyone, how was your day? What did you do?  My day was great, Tyler said the funniest thing...."  "Nice try," I said.  She complained some more but I stood firm.  "If I die tomorrow....." this statement was met with screeching and, "That's a horrible thing to say!!!" replies. (I was actually relieved to know how much they care).  I said, "I'd have to stand before God and accept responsibility for what I did with you during my time on earth."  Miss Sassy tried again, "We knoooow mom, you tell us alllllll the tiiiiiime!"  "Good." I replied, "I'm gonna tell you some more."  

I read all of John 13 out loud.  This story of Jesus washing the feet of the disciples caused my other daughter (Little Mama) to reply, "That's messed up!" 

I'll still be filing tomorrow (remember, only 1 hour a day!) so Part 2 will contain our conversation and the events that happened later.

Day 11 - Piles

"It is hard to fight an enemy who has outposts in your head."  Sally Kempton

One thing that's always been a particular problem of mine is the mounds of paperwork my family seems to collect: school papers, mail, bills, coupons.  You name it, we collect it!  Until I started reading David Allen's book, "Getting Things Done" subtitled: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity, my habit was to pile things up. Inevitably, most of the flat surfaces in my home were cluttered and since I like clean lines and spaces, I'd start to get irritated.  Now, before I go on about the piles, I have to say that whenever I mention this to people - particularly people of the male species -  someone invariably chuckles, "Piles!? You've got Piles Disease!" That irritates me too particularly since I don't know what Piles Disease is.  However, now I do because I Googled it before typing this post.  They're hemorrhoids and now I know how to respond to goofy snickering boys.  One Indian website says they're caused by "unhealthy eating and lack of physical work."  My piles are caused by lack of physical work too - it's called laziness.

Enter "Getting Things Done" (see sidebar for a picture of the GTD book cover). Now I'm not nearly as frustrated because I'm learning his system of handling paperwork.  I'm not perfect, but I'm trying to correct my stacking habit and the tool that's saving me is this guy:

It's the brother P-touch Electronic Labeling System AKA my buddy. 

I got it at Office Depot for around $ 30.00 and the tape costs $ 25.00 per spool. I also purchased a $ 12.00 plastic file box and it's been well worth the investment.  Of course, any system is only good if you implement it and I admit to getting behind.  The other night, I collected all the loose papers around my home - also part of the GTD system - and spent 3 hours sorting and labeling.  I remembered why I bought this book in the first place....

Again, I'm not perfect but I am progressing and thank heavens I don't have piles disease anymore.

 

Day 6 - Irritants

"Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity.  Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone."  Colossians 4:5-6

As I mentioned in my last post, decluttering is not just about cleaning, but about taking advantage of opportunities God places in front of me.  It's amazing how much of my conversation with my property manager was altered by the thought that she and the owner were going to be walking through the house - his house.  I thought about what they might see:  They might see this.....

you can only imagine what's on the floor.... 

They would definitely see this laundry room because it's on the other side of my master bedroom closet. When the plumber came, he had to push the door open and wade through the hampers and piles of dirty clothes on the floor.  I didn't think anyone would go in there so I just closed the door, I wasn't going to risk that again!  Was my phone conversation with her full of grace and seasoned with salt?  Yes, because I really like her, want her to know God as a loving father and experience church as a life giving place. However, I could have easily gone the other way, reacting negatively or blowing her off because of my own failure.

Still, the laundry room was an irritant for me and knowing they might stop by, moved it to the top of the priority list.  What's an irritant?  Anything that gets under your skin or constantly hovers negatively around the fringes of your conscience.  Irritants can wreak psychological havoc. It might be a pile of un-ironed items, clutter on a workstation, or disorganized garage.  David Allen, author of the bestselling book, "Getting Things Done", explains that once we think we ought to do something, our brain stores it in our memory.  He says, "Everything you've told yourself you ought to do, it thinks you should be doing right now." This causes a constant mental stress that helps to create a feeling of being overwhelmed.  I spend a lot of time in the laundry room and wash, dry and fold a minimum of two loads a day, every day.  The humming of the machines soothes me and the rhythym of the sorting and folding settles my spirit.  It makes sense that I would want it to be a calm and peaceful environment, so I tacked it.  One hour and fifteen minutes later....

TA DAH!!!!  I even took time to make it pretty......

It also smells pretty because I found some air freshener in the pile of mess and decided to create a nice environment for myself.  It took me an extra fifteen minutes because I covered an old oatmeal container with pretty scrapbook paper.  All my random laundry supplies and my iron are in the floral box and we use the oatmeal container to collect small recyclables for the kids' school.

All around, I feel much better and my son, inspired by my recycled container asked me to help him make one for his school so we got to spend some good quality time.  Then he decided to use it for a drum and bang on it until I yelled at him.....oh well.

Urine my prayers....

This is not a potty blog, but that was a comment on a prior post from a friend and it was so funny to me that I nearly wet my pants.  It's perfectly timed because I was wondering if I should tell you what happened the other day and that prompted this post.  God is so awesome that He can even work in the midst of pee.  I promise.....this will be the last urine blog (assuming God is not taking me into new territory).... 

Last week my pastor found me standing in the middle of the men's room shaking my head.  Now don't get me wrong.....he was not in the men's room with me, he was just walking by the door.  When I'm in the men's room, all the men have to use the ladies room.  Further explanation required: I'm part of a weekly team that cleans the church office.   The offices are in an old bar so there's a large restroom with rows of urinals and everything!  Anyway, I was cleaning the bathroom (with rubber gloves) when my phone rang and it happened to be the property manager of the house we're renting.  We've all been mystified as to the smell (see "Get me out of the closet!" post) and she's upset we can't figure out where it's coming from.

I explained what I was doing because there was an echo in the bathroom and I didn't want her to think I was "going". All of a sudden we were talking about God, church and life.  She began pouring herself out to me - fears, frustrations and more, and I looked around and thought, 'Huh!  Here I am in the men's room of a bar and God's obviously shown up."  I spent years on the staff of my church praying about reaching unchurched or de-churched people for Christ and now, when I'm not looking and just serving, God sends them my way.  I fully expected the urine smell to disappear from my closet after that conversation, but it's still there - guess we've got some more talking to do.

To me, decluttering is not just about cleaning, it's about having time to take advantage of God given opportunities.....see next post!

Day 3 - Stupid Stuff

Do you ever hang on to stuff for the wrong reason?  Sometimes I look at something I have and think, 'I paid a lot of money for that ...12 years ago, so why do I still have it?'  I realized there are some things that "represent" periods of time or special people.  I'll take a look at a skirt hanging in the closet and memories of my brother's wedding rehearsal dinner sprout up.  The marriage has been over for two years now, but I still have the skirt - and it doesn't even fit.  What's that all about?  The other day I found a tube top in my closet.  It still has the tags on it because I'm almost 42 freakin' years old!  Who buys a tube top when they're over 40?!  Obviously me because I was having some sort of midlife crisis or period of serious denial.  Anyway, I've got some stuff I've got to get rid of - things that represent whatever...people, places, memories, money.  Here's one - this is awesome.....

buh-bye

That WAS my Dyson vacuum cleaner.  Someone gave it to me for free - because it was broken - but I rigged it up with tape and a special hose to force it to work for me (never mind the fact that I have central vacuum).   I didn't want them to throw it away because I know it was expensive.  Before I moved I accidentally dropped it down a flight of stairs (I fell with it) and it broke some more, but I didn't give up because it cost a lot of money (for someone else).  More tape......but now I'm ready to let go.  

I'm still keeping the tube top though, you never know when it might come in handy.

HELPFUL TIP # 1 - Throw away all broken and worthless items - it's ok.... they won't feel a thing.

Day 2 - Get me out of the closet!

"The wise woman builds her house, but the foolish pulls it down with her own hands."  Proverbs 14:1

I love that scripture and have applied it to many situations over the years, but this is the first time I've applied it to myself.  It occurred to me that the condition of some of the rooms of my house have been neglected as a result of defeat.  It's going to sound silly but hey, I'm not afraid to embarrass myself if it helps someone else!  This is my closet.  This is my mess.

The urge to defend myself is tremendous, but resist I must because this is the result of neglect. 

I can't stand this room.  It's cramped, inconvenient and smells like pee.  Pee?  Yes, pee!  And not animal pee either - human.  About 4 months ago an odor started wafting out of this closet which is in the master bedroom bathroom. Think overripe baby diaper smell.  We've had 3 professional contractors in - plumbers, handymen, etc. and no one can figure out what's causing it. Before you make helpful suggestions, yes - we've checked the floor, under the carpet, changed out plumbing parts, etc., but nothing makes a difference.  Our best guess is that during the building of the home, the contractors thought that one particular corner would make a good urinal and it's actually in the drywall.  The pipes behind the walls, heat it up and well.....if you've ever been in an unsanitary nursing home, you'll get the idea.  I have room freshener in there so now it's a little less nursing homey. 

Because it defeats me and makes me want to move, which makes me say..."what's the point in making it nice, I'm moving anyway".....I tackled it.

40 minutes later.... 

I can't believe it only took 40 minutes but it did which just goes to show that perception is not always reality.  That includes moving out all of the winter clothing, dusting and vacuuming.  My 7-year old son walked in and said, "Whoa, this place is clean - I didn't see that coming!"  He also offered to help me in the kitchen for an entire hour.  I used the extra 20 minutes to watch a show with him afterwards....we're already experiencing some benefits.  Yay God!