My Goal Today Is (Tidy)

The goal sheet works for me on the weekend.

Today’s goal is “Tidy Office”; I know it is time to tidy when I can’t lay my hands on the evaluation forms from the May 28th course I delivered. I need the forms, but can’t find them.

Both my ten-foot desks have turned into storage vehicles.

There’s not much floor space left to vacuum.

My objectives read:

1: Clear desk 1

2: Clear desk 2

3: Clear gray shelves

4: Clear 2 bookcases on wall

5: Tidy 3 window bookcases

And no, I didn’t get it all done; I took a lunch break then went shopping for 2 hours (stamps, library, switches etc).

Nonetheless I completed Objectives 1, 2 and 3 and did a great deal of 4.

The basic thing that made it work was “turning off my computer”. When I’m in the office I’m tempted to look up the lyrics for the song that’s playing, check email, the news etc., all those little things that distract me.

So this morning I did all the must-do tasks (publish the blog, reconcile cash receipts from my wallet), then shut down the machine, and didn’t turn it on until after eight o’clock at night.

Here is one end of my working desk. The red tray holds papers I must deal with. The filing box holds scrap paper, used on one side. I’ll use it for penciled notes or for draft printouts.

Here is the far end of my working desk. It really is empty. I decided to re-cover my huge Canadian Oxford Dictionary, and you can see I am using a weight to help seal the glue between the new cover and the hard-cover of the book.

Here is my second work desk. All the electrical stuff is at one end. Also my little vermicomposting separator experiment .

The table cloth is an unwanted plastic sheet for a booth at a trade show. I ought to slide it towards the rear so that I can access the top drawer of the filing cabinet.

Tomorrow! Because that is NOT part of any one of my objectives.

The written objectives helped me to focus on “clearing the desk” rather than “dealing with stuff on the desk”. It was sufficient for me to collect paper and drop it into labeled folders which now hang in the appropriate drawers.

And yes! I found those evaluations during the second hour!

Talk to Me !