I worked at the Container Store before and after the pandemic, and it gave me insight into people who used that time to organize their homes. It was a great time for sales because "The Home Edit" and "Tidying Up with Marie Kondo" were huge. If they took advantage of the time, Professional Organizers did well, too. Unfortunately, with the volume of customers that came in, you could quickly tell who was organizing or organizing to show or tell people they were organizing but not doing anything, like any other trend.
A regular customer came in at least once a week to buy different organizers from the store. She always seemed to have a project around her house, but it never seemed complete. I honestly didn't have much respect for her because she preferred my colleagues to drop what they were doing to assist her, and she always seemed to come into the store, and my colleagues were tied up helping others. She approached me for help one day; I just told her that I had at least two people I was helping at the time and called another colleague to assist on her behalf. She huffed away to find another colleague. Fast forward, maybe an hour, and I received the call that a customer needed assistance with placing their order for their car. I came up to the cash register and immediately rolled my eyes. The store was on the 2nd floor of the shopping center, so the only way up for carts was the elevator-I didn't want to go through the agony of making small talk with this ornery woman because, at that point, I was ready for my break, my stomach was growling, and I was just trying to get my mind right because the way my mouth is set up if she were to be nasty on the way down in the elevator, I prepared to say whatever to end the conversation.
The ride down the elevator was quiet, and we walked her to her car. She had an older model Toyota Camry, and I was impressed with how the exterior looked. However, when we got closer and saw her car's interior and trunk, I was stunned. She had bins in her trunk from previous purchases and ten years of paperwork, mail, and other documents scattered in her floorboards and the trunk. My mouth fell agape-my face conveys ALL of my thoughts.
"Just slide that stack of papers over and the bins will fit," she said. Granted, these were large bins you might use to store large items in your garage or attic.
"First of all, ma'am, none of these bins will fit in your trunk, and I am not permitted to touch personal items," I said.
"FINE! I'll do it myself! Just leave the damn bins here!"
I hurried off so fast that she didn't have time to say anything else.
She did have me think deeply about organizing. Some definitions of organizing include arranging systematically, ordering, coordinating efficiently, forming, or making arrangements or preparations. To do these things, there has to be a thought process or intention behind the actions. Simply buying bins or organizers does not mean that you are bringing order to a space. Many people around that time were buying bins without much thought to what they would do with them.
This could apply to our lives. Organizing your life means making intentional preparations or arrangements. What things are you collecting but do not have a plan for? I buried myself with too much work, held onto people who were not a good fit for my life, and, in all honesty, lived someone else's dream. Eventually, I concluded that I wanted a simple life, and anything coming into my life has to be put through that filter.
In what ways are you organizing right now?
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