Organizing Your Kids Starts With You…Guest Post By Miss-Organized

The following post is brought to you courtesy of Tracy Paye a.k.a. Miss-Organized. Tracy wrote this post recently and it really struck home with me which is why I’m sharing it with you.

Organizing Your Kids Starts With You . . .

The clean house self esteem connection

As a single mother of a very, shall we say, spirited 7 ½ year old, I understand all too well how keeping a house organized is extremely challenging. Not to mention managing their school schedules, homework, sports and after school activities. And that doesn’t even take in to consideration your own life you need to manage. It’s no wonder most moms feel like they are totally overwhelmed and don’t have any time to really enjoy their life.

Although our society has progressed beyond the point of where the only role women were expected to play was to stay home with the kids and maintain the house, there is still, I believe, an expectation that women should always be able to maintain a clean home and instinctively know how. Many women experience feelings of low self worth if they are having difficulty maintaining a clean home. It’s almost as if our very definition of what makes a quality woman is defined by how clean our houses are. It is so engrained in us that it doesn’t matter that we recognize how much more we are taking on today than the mom’s before us, if our houses are not clean, many women believe something is wrong with us.

It’s never more apparent to me that this perception still exists than when the wifey tells the hubby that she wants to hire me to help her organize the house. I always prepare them for the reaction they will most likely get. Here’s how the conversation goes. “Honey, this organizer came to our house today to help us get organized and here is how much she says it will cost and how long it will take.” Hubbies jaw drops, hair falls out and eyes bug out of his head. “What. What the hell do you need a house cleaner for? I don’t understand why it’s so hard for you to keep this house clean and why you need someone to help you. You should be able to do this on your own, I mean you are home all day. If I just took a day off work, I would be able to have this entire house clean by the end of the day. There is no way, I’m going to spend money on something that you should be able to do.” Wifey feels even worse and further believes something is wrong with her that she hasn’t been able to do this on her own. On top of that, she feels unsupported which further adds to her stress. A pretty common scenario.

What both are not realizing is that their current organizing behavior was more than likely formed in their childhood by the households they grew up in. They learned it by either being just like their parents or rebelling against them. It’s more than just carving out a Saturday to get it done. You’re dealing with years and years of conditioning and that’s not something that can be fixed in a Saturday. At least not permanently.

Parents model organizing behavior

Why am I talking about the psychology of disorganization rather than tips to organize a room, the best containers to use, chore charts to implement and how to deal with schoolwork? There are plenty of tips on the internet of how you can get your kids spaces organized, but getting to the heart of the matter, which is the internal world of disorganization is what will make the biggest difference and that’s what I want to talk about with my readers.

Because if you want to learn how to get your children organized, you need to realize it starts with you. You learned it from your parents and your kids will learn it from you. I can write about a lot of really great techniques to get your children organized, but if you aren’t modeling organized behavior for them then the chances of them being organized are much smaller.

Let me tell you one of the most common mistakes I see parents unconsciously make that creates the foundation for disorganized behavior. Projecting our feelings about things onto our children. I see it happen all the time, when I’m in someone’s home going through their kids stuff. The kid will pick up something and say, “I don’t want this anymore.” And the mom will say, “Oh, but it’s so cute. Grandma bought it for you and she would be sad if you got rid of it. You don’t want to get rid of that. It looks so cute on you.” Or how about when a parent gives a non-human object human characteristics like teddy bears. This is called anthropomorphism. You want to be careful you don’t say things like, “You need to take good care of your teddy bears. You’ll hurt their feelings if you don’t. “ I can almost guarantee, now that I’m bringing this to your awareness, you will catch yourself saying things similar to this. I’m guilty of it too sometimes. And then you will see how our parents, teach us, most of the time unconsciously to have emotional attachments to our stuff. When parents project their feelings, then the child will feel that if they got rid of something it would upset you. Instead, ask them how they feel about an object. It may surprise you what their answer is.

If they don’t like it, they won’t want to clean it

Maybe one of the reasons why your kid is having trouble keeping his room clean is because he doesn’t like it. Kids and adults alike, we will make more of an effort to take care of the things that make us feel good. Like the guy that won’t have a problem with the entire garage being cluttered but his tool area is pristine. Or the mother that loves to cook and keeps her pantry well organized but there is paperwork all over the living room. Or the teenager that just got his first car. He will spend hours waxing it and cleaning it to make sure it reflects how cool and together he wants to be perceived but his bedroom is a disaster. So if your kid doesn’t keep their room clean, maybe there is something about their room that doesn’t make them feel good and they are not inspired to do anything about it.

Last week I started teaching an organizing class at The Winston School in Del Mar. When I asked the students how they felt about their bedrooms, coincidentally each one of them that had problems with organizing also said they “hated” their rooms. They complained about the colors of the walls, that the carpet “felt like glass” or that they even had to share a room. I then started asking them how their rooms effected their emotional state. One felt depressed and had insomnia. Another was very frustrated and worried about the constant nagging and criticizing from her father. Once I got them to start imagining what they wanted their rooms to look like from the color of the walls, to the type of furniture, their eyes lit up and it was as if they couldn’t wait to get back to their rooms to start drawing up a design plan for their new room. Because these kids now started to feel more like they can make a space of their own, they will also feel more motivated to keep it clean.

Respect and honoring differences to increase cooperation

One of the biggest sources of conflict that I see in a household when it comes to disorganization is a lack of respect for boundaries and not honoring the differences in individuality. You may love someone very much, but every human being needs space. It doesn’t have to be a whole house, a piece of land or even an entire room. Nonetheless, everyone needs a space in the home that they can claim as their own. If someone doesn’t get their own space, no matter how small it is, it starts to breed resentment. They start to feel like their needs don’t matter, they aren’t important and that will create un-cooperation. The thought process is “They don’t care enough about me to respect my needs so why should I care about their needs?” And if one of your needs is to have a clean space, you may get it from them, but chances are it will require a lot of effort to get their help and it could possibly set them up to be future clutters just to spite you. I see resentment clutter ALL the time. So do your best to allow each member of the house to have their own space, no matter how small it is, where no one else’s stuff can go and they have more of a say, if not total say, over what it looks like.

Not honoring the differences in individuality also causes big problems. When a person feels understood, they tend to relax and creates the space for them to feel like they want to be more cooperative. It is very common that one member of the household is organized and another isn’t, especially in marriages. That is not the problem. What the problem is when one person attempts to impose their ways as the right ways on to the other person without realizing that maybe they are more of the creative type who processes information different than a linear thinker and needs their environment set up differently too. What will happen is the non-organized person will start to think something is wrong with them and their self esteem will be affected. When really it’s they just do and see things differently. Not right or wrong, just different. So in this case, recognize that even if you are a structured, organized and linear thinking, your child may not be and rather than continue to attempt to make them do things the way you want them done, work together with them as a team to determine how they would like to go about getting things done. The end result is the same, but how they go about it and how you would like them to go about it will be different. If you focus more on the end result rather than how it gets done, your child will feel more listened to, more empowered and you will get greater cooperation.

Along those lines, set very specific expectations for what you want done. Rather than saying, “I want this room cleaned today” say “By 4pm today, I would like all of the laundry to be picked up off the ground, put in the hamper and brought to the laundry room. I would also like all of your Barbie dolls to be put back in the pink plastic container with flowers on it. Please also vacuum the carpet.” By giving them specifically how you would define clean, they know exactly what it will take to meet your standards of clean and they will feel accomplished when they get done. Teaching them how to define expectations is also an invaluable skill that they can apply to the workplace. The biggest source of stress in jobs many times is employees attempting to do what they think their bosses want but never really being sure if they did and always being worried they have failed. Set your kids up for success by defining what a successful cleaning project in your eyes looks like. You might even ask them what they would consider to be a cleaned room. Again, they may surprise you with their answers.

Make staying organized easy for them

And finally, set up their room so they can easily keep it organized and clean. If you expect them to change the sheets on their bed, don’t put the sheets up so high in a closet that they have to do the extra step of getting a step stool to get them. Have containers where items are separated out and it’s easily identifiable what belongs in there either with labels, pictures or color coded containers. Make sure they have space to store their items back easily rather than having to shove and move things aside in order to make it fit.

The simplest way to handle your children when it comes to organizing is think of how you would like to be talked to, listened to, asked to do something, and shown how to do something and treat them with the same respect and consideration you would like. And be aware, they may think differently from you when it comes to organization. If you can honor that, you will get a lot more mileage out of them as far as cooperation is concerned because they will feel like you care enough to understand them and let them be who they are. Let them have more creative control over their space and make sure if they don’t have their own bedroom, there is a space in the house they can call their own. Remember, that being organized is a learned skill for most. Be patient with them, model organized behavior and your home will feel a heck of a lot more peaceful.

Embrace Your Clutter. . .Release The Guilt

A lot of my clients have a lot of stuff. Some are really motivated to let things go and lighten up their life. They see the benefits in having fewer possessions weighing them down – less to maintain – less to clean. But some of my clients really do love their stuff.

And frequently what they feel is shame. This shame comes from those around them criticizing their decision to hang on to their stuff or picking on them for not having surfaces free of perceived clutter or harping on them that their garage is full of “junk”.

Sometimes I find fear from my clients. Fear that I’m going to “make” them get rid of things. Fear that they will have to change everything about their space. Fear of “forgetting” things because the memory triggers of the possessions aren’t there in their sight anymore.  Fear that others won’t like them if they don’t change.

This fear and shame often results in guilt.  Guilt about not making the right decisions.  Guilt about not living up to expectations.  Guilt about not being perfect.
So I tell them . . . these are YOUR things. It’s your decision whether to keep them or not.

But here are the questions I ask:

• Does all of this stuff around you make you truly happy?
• Is everything here important or are there some things that are more important than others?
• Can you find what you need when you need it or do you spin your wheels trying to get things done?
• Does your space reflect who you are now, at this time in your life?
• Are your possessions holding you back or guiding you forward in your life?
• Are these things around you causing you problems in your life – with your family, work or relaxation?

Depending on the answers, it may not be a case of getting rid of a lot of stuff.  It may simply be a case of creating a system of storage for those important items so that they are accessible or visible depending on the client’s needs.

In that case, please release the shame.  Release the fear.  Release the guilt.  Keep your stuff.  I know this sounds counter-intuitive to my profession but once you let that go, you can look at things more objectively.  When people are pushed, the natural inclination is to push back.

By setting free the fear and shame, it often becomes easier to acknowledge the real reasons for hanging on to things from the past or continual purchasing of new items.  I encourage my clients to look within themselves and determine what THEY want to do.  Not what others tell them they should.  When they can do some internal examination of their feelings, thoughts and beliefs – it’s amazing what progress can be made.  I’m not trying to be a therapist but to help them figure out what is really important to them so we can make progress towards whatever the end result may be.

My goal when organizing is to create a space that my client is happy, content and productive within.  If that means storing & displaying 400 Russian Nesting dolls, well, so be it.  But what I find is that when some inner peace is found, those Russian Nesting dolls don’t have quite a strong of a hold as they may have once had.

Friends Don’t Give Friends Clutter For Christmas

An off the cuff tweet has morphed into a full blown post about clutter and the holidays!  In fact, my tweet “Friends don’t give friends clutter for Christmas” was Rubbermaid’s “Tweet of the Week“!

I was at TJ Maxx today looking for some tights to go with a dress for an upcoming holiday party and was watching people rush around clutching ceramic Santas, festive candles, holiday Barbies and other gift-like items.  And I have to wonder – where does it all go?   And is the recipient really, well, thrilled?

How many presents have you received that you just wondered what on earth you were going to do with it?  Or wracked your brain trying to find that perfect gift and ending up with a tie and sweater or a weird tchotchke (that’s any small knickknack that some people really think are cute and most people think are hideous and annoying)?   And how much stuff does your kid get that ends up broken and discarded within a week?

This is a hard subject because I don’t want to come off sounding sanctimonious or “holier than thou”.  While I’d prefer to reduce or eliminate the incessant trading of stuff at every drop of a hat, this isn’t likely to happen nor should it always be so.  Sometimes, a gift is just the right thing in a situation.  But just think, for a moment, what kind of gift would truly be appreciated.

One that doesn’t have to be cleaned or maintained.

One that doesn’t take up space.

One that will not end up in a landfill, thrift shop or only brought out when you visit.

One that really shows the giver that some thought was put into the choice of gift.

In that vein, here are some ideas to get you started:

• consumables like wine, or locally produced foods such as chocolates, honey or fruit
• tickets to a movie, concert or theatre production
• dining gift certificate to a favorite restaurant (preferably a locally owned one)
• gift certificate for a massage or some other sort of pampering
• gift certificate for a task that the recipient keeps putting off or isn’t able to do themselves: a handyman service to fix the gutters, a car detailer that comes to the house, a house cleaner to scrub from top to bottom
• gift certificate for time – with a Professional Organizer, a fitness coach, a wardrobe consultant, an appraiser, whomever might be someone whose service could be really used and appreciated
• family pass to a zoo, science center, children’s museum, art museum, etc.
• for parents – a free night (or more!) of babysitting so they can go on a real date

For myself, I am gifting my husband two hours with a master gardener for Christmas this year – he loves to root plants and salvage half dead ones.  The man has an amazing green thumb yet doesn’t know half of what he’s got.  So this time will be wonderfully spent where he loves to be with someone who knows his stuff.  And I badgered my husband hinted nicely for a spa package that includes a massage, facial and pedicure.  Not that I’m being particular or anything.  Just, you know, precise.  But it’s something that a. I wouldn’t likely do for myself, and b. would actually get used, and c. doesn’t need dusting.

And on that vein, when did all this gifting (especially for kids) get so out of hand?  Think twice before purchasing stuff, and really give thought to whom should really be on the receiving end.  And be mindful about what you are gifting – is it useful and welcome – or just another dust catcher?

Personally, I don’t want or need any more crap stuff in my house – I like it the way it is – and if I really love something or need it desperately, chances are, I’ll get it myself when I need it.  So do yourself a favor and don’t do so much shopping for stuff – but do some thinking about the spirit of the season.  End of rant.

bizarre happenings at the dog park and you just never really know who people are, do you?

I go to the dog park 3 or 4 times a week keep our 2 year old lab busy and occupied so I can actually get some work done in my home office. She usually perks up around 3:45 because she knows our daughter gets home on the bus and there’s a really good chance we’ll be heading over there.

I’ve been going there for over a year, since we got LuLu, and have met some great people. You know – you stand around watching the dogs play – or in my case – continually throw a tennis ball with the Chucker (if you don’t have one of these – get one NOW!). I never really knew the true meaning of the breed of “retriever” til LuLu showed up in our house. But I digress.

I had met a lovely woman at the dog park with a delightful and well mannered golden retriever named Molly. We’d see each other often and chat about what’s going on in Franklin and how’s life. She even hosted a dog park Christmas party at her house this year. A huge house too – 5000 square feet plus a 3500 square foot finished basement in a pretty exclusive neighborhood. We had a great time – and she was a delightful host. Bunch of dogs came – imagine 25 people and lots of food with 2 enormous yellow labs and 2 enormous golden retrievers, plus one frisky kitten, running around checking out the munchies.

Anyway, I’m reading the paper a few weeks later, and who do I see but Molly’s mom under a heading of “Franklin woman sought in embezzlement case”. Apparently she is accused of defrauding a bunch of people and something about mortgage fraud as well. I saw her picture and thought, I know this woman! At least I thought I did.

I brought her up (not by name) in my recent seminar about time management and setting priorities. I used her as an example of being true to yourself because no one really knows who you are – only you do. Too many people worry about what others might think or imagine others as being better at everything than they are – and use it as an excuse not to achieve a goal or make a change in their lives. Well, you just don’t know what others do in their private life, do you? Everyone puts on a show and a facade. I have made it a goal of mine to have my outer persona match my inner self. This is really tough to do. This woman did a great job concealing who she really is. I guess my point is – don’t try to live up to what you THINK others are – be yourself, and be the best self you can.

This experience of meeting her, thinking she was a lovely person, then finding out what was behind the image she portrayed really hit me and a lot of others at the dog park. It’s been a hot topic of conversation as you can imagine but no one knows where she is or all the details. I could be completely wrong about her – I never like to assume the worst. Most of us are primarily worried about her 2 kids, Molly and the kitten to tell the truth. I hope it all gets sorted out.

stealing website content – not cool

I’m reading blogs on Active Rain this weekend while I’m out of town visiting my family, and come across a blogger who was furious about having some of her web content lifted and used without permission by another blogger. She mentioned a website called Copyscape where you can go and check to see if your web or blog content has had this happen. I did this, and on my website (A Fresh Space) I found that 2 paragraphs of mine from my home page appear to be being used by an organizing/staging company in Tampa which is annoying, but on my husband’s website (Skyline Home Inspection) it was basically hijacked by a company in Ohio. Since I personally wrote and designed both websites, I was a bit perturbed by this, as you can imagine. The inspection website used my text almost word for word on every page. I’m still waiting for calls back – I left messages and didn’t exactly say why I was calling. So we’ll see what happens.

I put a lot of effort and time into designing and writing both websites, and it is just not cool or proper – or legal – to use my words and claim them. This is plagiarism, and theft, as far as I’m concerned. Granted, in many fields, there are some standard things you say about your business – and when you are researching to make a website – it may be an inadvertent and honest mistake to copy a few things. I’m willing to give the organizing/staging company a bit of the benefit of the doubt, but the inspection company – not so much. It was blatant and outright copying. So very not cool.