What I Figured Out

Hey--so you know I went through that whole habit-shifting project, putting away my clothes each night for 30 days (which really turned into about 45) and writing about it, right? Well, I found out that it actually made a huge difference!

Here's what I think the most important thing that happened is:

I let go of all the negative emotion that was sucking me down every time I looked at that pile of clothes. It was like I'd look at the pile, feel like crap, feel unworthy, feel unable to be organized EVER, feel like it would never get done, and spiral into this tornado of misery and self-pity.

Then I would have no energy to put the clothes away (why bother?) and the pile would get bigger and I'd feel crappier, until finally I'd spend an hour putting everything away, and OF COURSE I would never want to do that job again because it took so freaking long!

But by making a commitment to practice this one new habit each day I kept it small and prevented pileup; by giving myself time to learn a new habit I gave myself permission to be fine just as I was; by letting other people know what I was experiencing (by making it public in the blog) I created a space for accountability and honesty; and by giving room to all those voices in my head I let the arguments out of my brain and encouraged my more nurturing voices to talk, which I think made all the difference in the world.

What I've discovered over the past few weeks is that the anger is gone. The self-blame, the feeling that it's impossible, the disgust with letting it get a certain way is no longer there. It's drained out and I don't need it anymore. I know I can put my clothes away BECAUSE I'VE ALREADY DONE IT. I know that if it piles up I can put it away and THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH ME AS A PERSON. It's just clothing on a chair, not a condemnation of me and all I stand for.

And that's what I figured out. Pretty good for a little organizing experiment, right?