Perfect Mess, Perfect Day

I’ve never been able to look at the world in black and white. I always had to buck the status quo and seek out the new paradigm. Perhaps that is how the rebel in me shows its face, as I have never been one to wear my hair pink or dress in Goth or openly express my own weirdness. But in my own thinking I just don’t accept notions that one way is always the right way; that the commonly accepted wisdom of the masses is always the better way. For me there is always another approach and another way to look at situations and life.

So it is of no surprise to me that a new book “The Perfect Mess” about the actual “benefits of disorder” has come to my attention. I know the neat freaks and the chronically organized among us are likely offended at the notion that perhaps their neat and organized version of the world may not be the best solution for everyone but perhaps it is not. The world inherently has a certain level of disorder and it contributes to the beauty. But commonly accepted ideas of neatness and organization continue to plague us all because there is a cost of time and energy and sometimes even money (think Container Store!) in maintaining elaborate systems of neatness so that even the chronically organized could be missing opportunities for creativity because of their constant need to organize.

Apparently one of the great minds of our time was chronically disorganized according to the deeply accepted and honored paradigm that neatness is always better. Yet even in his disorganized state he is remembered as a genius. People who know nothing of his actual accomplishments still connect Einstein’s name with genius.

Of course there is a level of mess that is acceptable and conducive to greater creativity and it varies with every person. And everyone will agree that at times a mess can get so bad as to become pathological. Compulsive hoarding in no way contributes to creativity but what about a little clutter on your desk? The accepted wisdom that neatness is better makes us feel shame when perhaps some of us actually function better, are more creative and are able to more easily flow with ideas within an optimal level of mess. Optimal of course varies with the individual. I have a friend who has organized her entire spice rack in alphabetical order. Even though she feels compelled to keep this high level of order in her life when she was telling me about it she also had a certain level of shame as she said that she needed to “get a life” and she expressed that “surely I should have more important things to do than to alphabetize my spice rack”.

Perhaps the answer is to just accept ourselves for our own idiosyncrasies. While I have never felt any desire whatsoever to alphabetize my own spice rack I envied her absolute order and neatness. Yet I did not want to pay the same price. For me I would rather play with my kids, write, read, exercise, or most anything at all besides spending my time in an organizing frenzy as she readily admits to spending most of her time.

But either way or whatever works for you and whatever works for me, it is okay. Contrary to what the pro-organizers say their way is not necessarily the better way for everybody. It’s great that it works for them but others should not feel shame for being different.

It’s just another way to deal with the inherent mess and disorder of the world.

This book has also clarified something else for me. A few weeks ago, I wrote about an exercise called “the Perfect Day”. As I have been considering and thinking of this exercise I have found that I have a high level of resistance to actually blocking out measures of time. I can absolutely visualize (that is one of my strong suits, I can always see it in my brain) what I want and how my perfect day is, yet I tend to lean towards the more fluid and adaptable schedule rather than a structured day. I have always been like that. Many years ago I left a structured job to have the freedom of self-employment so this is something I know. I have decided to honor this about myself and to think of it as a good thing. If creativity and inspiration strike me at whatever hour I want to act on it then. I personally do not want to have a structured plan. So rather than having structure in my perfect day I have made my perfect day with inclusions. Certain things are included in every day. The time I do them can vary.

I still accomplish as much as the highly organized and structured people with the plan; sometimes I accomplish more.

But I honor myself and do it my way. It works for me.

And that is the point of this entire post. Find what works for you, honor that and do it.
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For some reason this post did not feel like it would be welcomed in a blog carnival devoted to being organized but the premier edition of the Doing it differently Blog Carnival seemed like a perfect fit! You can see all of the interesting posts on doing things differently over at Today is that Day.