Don’t End Up Screwed Before You Start — Looks Like You Might Need To Call For Backup

Before we even get started, the answer is “no, you can’t get organized all on your own.” I mean if you could, you would’ve done it by now.

You’d be sitting back, feet propped up, adult beverage in hand, enjoying your clutter-free-sans-stress-zero-debt-tons-of-spare-time-in-a-highly-orderly-home-or-office-environment situation — instead of searching the interwebz for storage and productivity solutions.

Seriously, amirite? Tell me I’m wrong here.

Now before you get your g-string or high-waisters or boy-shorts all in a wad, please understand what I’m saying here.

I’m in no way suggesting you ain’t capable of getting organized — or staying that way once you get there. Lord knows, you can do anything!

But I am suggesting that the long-ass trip from Rural Clutterville to Downtown Anal-Retentive quite often turns out to be a bit more than one might reasonably be expected handle by his-or-her lonesome.

There are lots of different reasons for having a travel buddy.

In some instances, you’re super clear about exactly what needs to happen — there’s just too much stuff for one person to physically sort through. (Unless you plan on devoting the next year of your life to chaos elimination.) And big jobs always go a lot faster when you’ve got more hands in the pot.

(Wait — who actually puts their hands in a pot while cooking? That sounds like it would hurt!)

If all we’re talking is manual labor, then feel free to recruit some toting-hauling-labeling-containerizing “assistants” to help out — consider drafting friends, family members, co-workers, those kids down the street, your mother-in-law, the guy who sleeps on your front stoop most Friday and Saturday nights.

Well, maybe not the last two.

Crank up the music, serve ’em pizza (save the beer for after) — and turn cleaning out into a party.

Who said organizing has to be a chore?

But you may be facing more of an “I don’t know what to do or how to do it” circumstance. Most times when my clients haven’t managed to create order on their own, it’s because they lack the necessary skills.

(Yes, organizing is an acquirable competency.)

Could be that you don’t know how to choose systems/tools to appropriately match your preferences and predilections. Or you have trouble discerning what items might be useful “someday” and which would be entirely okay to pitch. Perhaps you’d like to do something meaningful with those discards, but aren’t sure how to go about selling them or find a charitable organization that’ll accept them as donations.

Whatever the case, you want proven expert advice, rather than “this helped my sister’s-boyfriend’s-uncle’s-boss so it might work for you” suggestions from friends/colleagues. (Plus a little mother-flipping-vested-interest-and-relationship-baggage-free objectivity would be nice!)

What you need more than warm bodies is intel — education, training, practical tips that you can put to use in your own life. Live coaching works. So do books and videos and interactive lessons.

Even the amazing free online advice provided by some redheaded weirdo!

Fair warning — even armed with all sorts of cool paper-space-time-money-kids-data-workflow-and-everything-else techniques, you still might find the whole process too overwhelming to contemplate without assistance. If just looking at those piles of stuff and stacks of paper and overflowing to-do lists exhausts you to the point of paralysis (never mind attempting to actually reduce them), you’re gonna wanna kick it up a notch.

You need someone to keep you on track when you get bogged down with decision-fatigue — to guide you past any organizational roadblocks (logistical or emotional) — to make letting go of the past and embracing an unknown future easier — to cheer your successes and find solutions to your failures.

If this sounds like a big-ass sales pitch for the Professional Organizing industry in general (and Ramona Creel in particular), I promise it ain’t.

I frankly don’t care who you get to help — so long as they meet the appropriate criteria:

• someone you trust implicitly (with your stuff, your info, your secrets)
• someone who can be objective (no ulterior motives allowed!)
• someone who can customize a program for you (no cookie-cutters allowed, either!)
• someone who actively listens (then probes in a way that gets to the heart of the matter)
• someone who’s a creative problem-solver (there’s always an answer, you just have to find it)
• someone with a great deal of patience (no matter how slow you move or how long you take)
• someone open-minded and non-judgmental (about your mess, processes, beliefs, behaviors)
• someone who makes you feel comfortable (and supported and valued and respected)

You can have your mom help, your best friend, your next-door-neighbor, the chick three cubicles away.

The one thing you’re NOT allowed to do is let the fear of looking foolish or weak or incapable keep you from enlisting a little help!

Author Bio

Ramona Creel is a woman of mystery and power, whose power is exceeded only by her mystery. A 20-year veteran Professional Organizer, Accountability Guru, and Golden Circle Member of NAPO, Ramona runs a one-babe cottage industry composed of 27% eyeliner, 13% tattoo ink, 18% dark chocolate, and 44% raw determination. (Believe me, she needs that extra 2%!) As a former Social Worker, Ramona describes her role as ‘resource-finder-and-problem-solver-extraordinaire.’ She plans eventually to take over the world using nothing more than unicorn glitter, cat fur, and movie quotes -- and her proudest credentials are ‘decreaser of world suckage’ and ‘queen of friggin’ everything.’ Ramona has worked with hundreds of clients, and has delivered scores of presentations on getting organized, being a better business person, achieving financial freedom, tin-can traveling, and embracing voluntary simplicity. She leads by example (having radically downsized herself) — traveling the country as a full-time RVer, living and working in less than 200 square feet. Ramona spreads the gospel of simplicity with everyone she meets — teaching others how to have more time and space for the truly important things in life (and be happy letting go of the rest). A modern-day Renaissance woman, Ramona has found a way to bring her many passions together into one satisfying career — as an organizer, coach, writer, artist, and speaker. Feel free to check out her latest triumphs and stupidities (kudos if you can figure out which are which) at www.RamonaCreel.com.