Discussion Forum > Clutter
Hi David,
I think you make an interesting observation in comparing it with hoarding personality. My neighbor and I carpool on shopping trips (she has a truck ...and really needs one). She bought 2 and 3 of everything ... even though that represented a couple of years supply of the item. I could see that it was really a subconscious action, at this point.
I have found that the David Allen concept of "someday/maybe" was liberating. IOW, do NOT throw away those tasks ... trowing them away implies some kind of lack, or surrender, or loss. Put them in another notebook, or another computer file to revisit "someday" ... "maybe". That gets them out of your way but you are NOT losing them. They are there, safe and snugly, for whenever you wish to return to them.
This is Mark's concept of "dismissing" tasks as well. In his AF system, he "dismisses" them, yet they remain in his book, highlighted, on a page marked "inactive" which he visits only when he wishes ... in his daily routine they are not seen because he does not return to inactive pages.
As to guilt and shame ... well, you do not need to feel guilt if you have the task in your book to do "someday" ... "maybe". It is quite the same has having it on your TODO list and rewriting it every week for years ;-) EXCEPT that you are not doing that ... it lives in its own place waiting for you should you wish to visit.
I found that once I grasped the power of "someday/maybe", I felt that I could let go of things I had promised to do in a moment of weakness. The analog to this (clutter) I found yields to something similar. I have trouble letting go of "things" because of "waste". IOW, as you say, I spent money on the stuff so ... My solution is to give things away to others so they can benefit. I have MUCH less trouble if I know that someone will benefit and things will just not waste precious landfill space.
In a word, restructuring how you THINK about it is key to all of these problems, IMO.
The deeper issues probably ought to be dealt with and might make some interesting conversation. One writer (his name will come to me later, I'm sure) talks about learning to stop and think before making promises of this type. He advises adopting a policy of keeping your word to others about what you will do and then when they ask something, looking ahead to what it will entail, facing your limitations of time and resources, then declining right then. He notes that people don't faint dead away but just say thanks and look for some other sucke... I mean victi ... I mean person (yeah, that's the word I was looking for ;-) to stick with the task.
I remember reading long ago some writer comparing this whole thing to having a monkey on your back. People, in his view, had these monkeys on their backs and were continually trying to get you to let the monkey jump from their backs on to yours. Your job, of course, was to remain monkey free.
I think you make an interesting observation in comparing it with hoarding personality. My neighbor and I carpool on shopping trips (she has a truck ...and really needs one). She bought 2 and 3 of everything ... even though that represented a couple of years supply of the item. I could see that it was really a subconscious action, at this point.
I have found that the David Allen concept of "someday/maybe" was liberating. IOW, do NOT throw away those tasks ... trowing them away implies some kind of lack, or surrender, or loss. Put them in another notebook, or another computer file to revisit "someday" ... "maybe". That gets them out of your way but you are NOT losing them. They are there, safe and snugly, for whenever you wish to return to them.
This is Mark's concept of "dismissing" tasks as well. In his AF system, he "dismisses" them, yet they remain in his book, highlighted, on a page marked "inactive" which he visits only when he wishes ... in his daily routine they are not seen because he does not return to inactive pages.
As to guilt and shame ... well, you do not need to feel guilt if you have the task in your book to do "someday" ... "maybe". It is quite the same has having it on your TODO list and rewriting it every week for years ;-) EXCEPT that you are not doing that ... it lives in its own place waiting for you should you wish to visit.
I found that once I grasped the power of "someday/maybe", I felt that I could let go of things I had promised to do in a moment of weakness. The analog to this (clutter) I found yields to something similar. I have trouble letting go of "things" because of "waste". IOW, as you say, I spent money on the stuff so ... My solution is to give things away to others so they can benefit. I have MUCH less trouble if I know that someone will benefit and things will just not waste precious landfill space.
In a word, restructuring how you THINK about it is key to all of these problems, IMO.
The deeper issues probably ought to be dealt with and might make some interesting conversation. One writer (his name will come to me later, I'm sure) talks about learning to stop and think before making promises of this type. He advises adopting a policy of keeping your word to others about what you will do and then when they ask something, looking ahead to what it will entail, facing your limitations of time and resources, then declining right then. He notes that people don't faint dead away but just say thanks and look for some other sucke... I mean victi ... I mean person (yeah, that's the word I was looking for ;-) to stick with the task.
I remember reading long ago some writer comparing this whole thing to having a monkey on your back. People, in his view, had these monkeys on their backs and were continually trying to get you to let the monkey jump from their backs on to yours. Your job, of course, was to remain monkey free.
January 16, 2009 at 9:54 |
Mike
Mike
David/Mike
Excellent observations and very interesting question relating to clutter. Clutter has so much "attached" to it, the "not being wasteful", aspect, learned patterns of behaviour, security, fear, guilt and so many other emotions. As you say Mike "the deeper issues probably ought to be dealt with and might make some interesting conversation" and I wholeheartedly agree. I am actually quite excited about the fact that AF is enabling me to focus to an extent where I personally feel that some of my (and my parents') piles of clutter can be addressed and actually dealt with. And that includes the emotional content attached to each class of clutter!
Excellent observations and very interesting question relating to clutter. Clutter has so much "attached" to it, the "not being wasteful", aspect, learned patterns of behaviour, security, fear, guilt and so many other emotions. As you say Mike "the deeper issues probably ought to be dealt with and might make some interesting conversation" and I wholeheartedly agree. I am actually quite excited about the fact that AF is enabling me to focus to an extent where I personally feel that some of my (and my parents') piles of clutter can be addressed and actually dealt with. And that includes the emotional content attached to each class of clutter!
January 16, 2009 at 12:01 |
Christine B
Christine B
Still wondering whether the use of the Autofocus process is decloaking our clutter or if we are attracted to Autofocus because we want our clutter to be decloaked. Or both? Or what?
Or does our intuition want to tell us something?
Or does our intuition want to tell us something?
January 16, 2009 at 13:29 |
Rainer
Rainer
Probably all of the above - and more!
January 16, 2009 at 15:06 |
Christine B
Christine B
Two angles on clutter that I come back to again and again:
1 - Clutter = postponed decisions. Here we're back to AF helping to make decisions about tasks large and small. I like Mike C's observation that the dismissed tasks are still there if you want to see them. And Mark's instructions do advise stopping to think about why you're dismissing something.
So -- the question about all those tasks and clutter would be -- what decision do I need to make about these items?
2 - Clutter is old growth. It chokes the life out of any new growth you are attempting. It's baggage whose weight increases with the years. Ask how heavily those old magazines, books, tchotchkes, tasks/projects, etc weigh on you and hold you back from attempting new things until they're "taken care of."
I believe you have a higher responsibility to your own happiness, in this case; if tending this clutter isn't making you happy, or isn't advancing your goals or projects, then you need to think about why.
Sorry for the preaching! :) Stepping away slowly from the soapbox...
1 - Clutter = postponed decisions. Here we're back to AF helping to make decisions about tasks large and small. I like Mike C's observation that the dismissed tasks are still there if you want to see them. And Mark's instructions do advise stopping to think about why you're dismissing something.
So -- the question about all those tasks and clutter would be -- what decision do I need to make about these items?
2 - Clutter is old growth. It chokes the life out of any new growth you are attempting. It's baggage whose weight increases with the years. Ask how heavily those old magazines, books, tchotchkes, tasks/projects, etc weigh on you and hold you back from attempting new things until they're "taken care of."
I believe you have a higher responsibility to your own happiness, in this case; if tending this clutter isn't making you happy, or isn't advancing your goals or projects, then you need to think about why.
Sorry for the preaching! :) Stepping away slowly from the soapbox...
January 16, 2009 at 19:37 |
Mike Brown
Mike Brown
Mike, you're absolutely right. Knowing that you need to think about why is one thing - doing that thinking is another. Procrastination can be a great escape route - it allows us to happily stay on the treadmill
I have clutter
Therefore I procrastinate
Therefore I don't do everything
Therefore I increase my clutter
Therefore I get to a state of overwhelm
Therefore I procrastinate
Therefore .......
etc etc
Where does it start?
Where does it end?
I suspect that AF may well provide us with the space to ask those questions
The big question will be whether we are prepared to answer - and more importantly genuinely decide to action the response
I have clutter
Therefore I procrastinate
Therefore I don't do everything
Therefore I increase my clutter
Therefore I get to a state of overwhelm
Therefore I procrastinate
Therefore .......
etc etc
Where does it start?
Where does it end?
I suspect that AF may well provide us with the space to ask those questions
The big question will be whether we are prepared to answer - and more importantly genuinely decide to action the response
January 16, 2009 at 23:39 |
Christine B
Christine B
In another thread, MF questions why I can't simply reject a task. It's an important question: if tasks never get rejected, then the todo list will simply grow uncontrollably (unless one is so productive that one can accomplish everything that ever gets listed). And if one does everything, one isn't auto-focusing on any subset of one's tasks.
Of course, in the long run most people will find that some tasks don't get actioned anyway, so they are rejected by default. Why then is making a more conscious decision to reject difficult? I don't yet know the answer, but I think intuitively that holding on to tasks is the same disease as holding on to clutter in the office or home. That's something I've struggled with for a long time, and I think it has a lot to do with parental injunction about waste. If I throw away a pile of magazines, I feel as if I am discarding the money I paid to buy them, even though I have read them already and don't want to read them any more.
MF has long cited ordering from a restaurant menu as a metaphor for making one's life choices. But I don't feel remorseful when I pick one main course rather than four. By contrast, rejecting tasks is for me loaded with guilt and shame at not fulfilling all the duties expected of me, both by myself and by other people.