Keeping It All Organized

One of the absolute worst parts about being a creative is that my mind, frequently, is not organized.  In fact, I flit -- I start work on one project when something else occurs to me, and then something else entirely interrupts, but that doesn't matter because on the way to do that third thing, I remember the first thing, start back to it, and get sidetracked by my cat.

You see the problem.

Unfortunately, when you're a creative, you work for yourself first and foremost, so you have no one to blame when your disorganization gets you into trouble.  Even worse, were some well-meaning soul (probably my wife) to come in to my office and tidy things up for me, I'd have no clue where anything was and likely never be able to find it again.

I've got this weird organizational balance going on right now.  Some things are very organized: I keep a very meticulous schedule in a day planner (times I work, times I'm at church, times I teach piano lessons), and I have a very rigorous spreadsheet I use to keep track of submitting my manuscripts. 

Other things, not so much: the closet door in my office is littered with about two-dozen post-it notes, each one detailing a piece of music I'd like to write at some point.  When I open the window on a nice day (such as today), and the slightest hint of breeze passes through, half of those post-its end up out in the hallway.  More than a couple are re-adhered to the door with scotch tape. 

Yeah, it's bad.

This weekend, after having this office for almost seven years, I finally did something I've been dying to do for a long time: I bought myself a white board

(I also, after quite a lot of time writing this blog, added a picture to a post -- shocking!)

It didn't take long (about an hour) before I began to wonder how I ever got along without this amazing thing.  The top left corner is where I've listed my next couple of handbell projects to work on.  Bottom left is other forthcoming music activities.  Top right is anything to do with my Sadonian Chronicles series of books.  Bottom center is my official work schedule for the week, and scattered elsewhere on the board are other to-do things: things to buy, bills to pay, other miscellany that needs to get done.  Different areas and different colors of markers keep it all straight.

Just knowing that I have a place to jot notes to myself (notes that, unless there's a tornado, won't blow away), make (very visible) to-do lists, and keep track of my creative projects frees my mind to focus on the actual work of creating, instead of dwelling and fretting about the minutiae and logistics of remembering it all.  Does this white board organize my entire life?  No (though that would be really cool if it could), but it keeps me more grounded in the actual projects I have to get done.  It makes it far easier to visualize the next step in whatever process I'm working on, and lets me concentrate on that, instead of mulling the entire project over in my head again, trying to see if there's something I've missed.

Do you need a white board to get your life organized?  No (though, again, it's really cool -- what can I say?  I'm an office supply geek), but having a place where you can keep track of your projects and the steps you need to take on them is a valuable tool.  Make it someplace dedicated to that purpose: a tablet of paper at a specific corner of your desk, a list taped to the wall in your office, a bulletin board glued to the door of your fridge.  Wherever it is, let this be a dumping ground where you put all your to-do items (the big, the small, the vital, and the trivial) so you don't have to try to remember them.  I think you'll be amazed how much it will free up your creative energies to work on what truly matters.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go erase something from a to-do list on my white board.  Or pet my cat ... I forget which....