Everywhere I go - my office, my house, my car, my computer desktop - there is evidence of a brain moving so fast that the physical world can't keep up. A jacket tossed hurriedly over a chair; mail ready to be sorted on the kitchen island; file folders in disarray on the desk, floor, conference table.
The quintessential example is a photocopy of an article I share with my clients called "50 Things to Love About ADD." There are a few copies on the floor - remnants of a neatly stacked pile that scattered when the dogs walked all over them for a few weeks; there's one on my desk peeking out from under a file folder labeled "VOCATIV" which is a learning styles assessment developed by a fellow ADD coach and the rest are living comfortably in their original nicely-labeled folder which is ... where IS that folder?
Every time I walk past those blue and white copies, they silently plead with me: I'm still here! Put me away, OK? I want to live with my fellow, matching papers in a neat little file in a neat little drawer. Please, please, please put me away!
Every time I ignore the plea (inevitable, because I have something more important to do right now), a tiny bit of unwanted guilt drills into my brain.
In recent years. I have learned to approach life with an incredibly positive attitude. Negative energy has no permanent foothold, but it's a fairly new state of mind for me. So when I am in the midst of my self-inflicted chaos, I have to continually fight my way back to a mental state of Upbeat and Enthusiastic.
This week, I wonder if I am in denial about the effects of my ADD or whether I am subconsciously using my ADD as an excuse (oh, it's hard to write those words) for the mess I have created and can't seem to correct.
Am I real Linda who is racing from one major project to another and literally too busy to declutter or am I ADDiva Linda who causes the clutter? Either way, the effect is identical: I can't find anything efficiently. I try very hard to look past the surface disorganization (the fluff) to the core of my work (the meat).
So WHY DON'T YOU JUST CLEAN IT UP? screams the linear wanna-be part of Linda. The answer is: darned if I know.
I talk to women all the time who are hopelessly mired in their household chores, their office load, their gardens. We work through a solution that involves accountability, small steps, gradual improvement.
Yet what happens when I don't have time for small steps? I want it done NOW. And there are 57 projects that are all ALL pleading for my attention and my time.
So what will I do about all this? I don't want to use ADD as an excuse. And yet, it is a big part of why the world has caved in on me once again; ADD is the reason I have so much trouble making forward progress. It's kinda like being tied to a post and then asked to get out there and climb that mountain, plow that field, move on down the highway (OK, enough cliques already!).
First things first. That means the ADD gets put back into my awareness, not as an excuse but as another 'thing' to embrace, understand and include as I set goals for myself.
The truth is that is takes me longer to do things than I realize. I am a speed demon in my brain, but when I start implementing some of the fabulous ideas that come up, I have some false starts sometimes. I blast out the door and then need to fall back a bit to recoup from my frenzied activity.
Slow and steady will never be me. I will work in short bursts. I will not allow myself to get discouraged by the enormity of sorting through the piles and the clothes and...all of it,
So, I'll start with the desk. I'll spend one hour (timer set, I promise) clearing the papers, the notebooks, the software and the Post-Its. I'll even take pictures - again.
Why don't you do it too? Send me a picture of your "before" messy desktop, then set the timer for an hour and do NOTHING ELSE except clear your desk. Then send an "after" picture. I'll post them here in the ADDiva blog. Along with mine.
Ooooh... this is scary. But I'm willing, if you are! Ready (to face the desk); Set (the timer); GO (to the bottom of that pile)!
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