Posts tagged overwhelmed
How to Make an Effective Morning Routine that Supports Focus, Energy, & Change

Making a change in your life can be challenging. Have you ever wondered why? Here are some common obstacles you might encounter:

  • Feeling unsure about how to create the change you desire

  • Feeling defeated as the change you desire appears unattainable

  • Feeling a lack of energy or resources to manifest the change

  • Feeling overwhelmed by other responsibilities in your life makes focusing on intentional change seem unrealistic right now

  • Feeling frustrated by the time needed to create change

  • Feeling unclear about the change you want to make

  • Feeling resentful that you want to make a change but would rather focus on less stressful activities

  • Feeling the absence of a support system

Yet, despite these potential difficulties, you still want to make a change. Change is possible when you’re in a negative, stress-filled state, but it’s more challenging. What if you could create a starting point that is more conducive and encouraging?

I recently discovered something that could be a game-changer (no pun intended).

 

 

The Value of a Morning Activation Ritual

In Joseph Nguyen’s book Don’t Believe Everything You Think – Why Your Thinking is the Beginning & End of Suffering, I read a passage about developing an “activation ritual.” While Nguyen applied this concept to reduce stressful thoughts, I can see how the idea of rituals could be useful for facilitating change.

Nguyen says, “Most of us are used to spending the majority of our day in a state of stress (thinking).” However, when you stop thinking and stressing, that energy can be redirected elsewhere. Without channeling it elsewhere, you will likely revert to a thinking and stressful state.

He suggests creating a morning activation ritual that helps you “get back into a state of non-thinking and flow. It can be an activity that helps you feel grounded and allows you to practice getting into a state of non-thinking.”

Consider centering activities such as meditating, exercising, journaling, or making tea. “An activation ritual enables you to build momentum in a positive direction immediately when you wake up so that it’s easier to stay in that state of non-thinking for the rest of the day.” Nguyen suggests that it’s possible to “channel the newfound energy into our goals of inspiration.”

An activation ritual enables you to build momentum in a positive direction . . .
— Joseph Nguyen

Create Your Activation Ritual

Do you start your day gently with a nourishing and grounding routine? Or are your mornings often rushed and chaotic?

You have the opportunity to create a centering morning ritual that will energize you, reduce stress, and enhance your ability to make the change you desire.

Here is one approach to creating an activation ritual:

  • Establish a consistent wake-up time.

  • Select one grounding activity before beginning your day, such as exercising, meditating, or journaling.

  • Do this for one week.

  • Observe what happened.

  • Depending on what you discovered, continue or alter your activation ritual.

Beginning the day feeling grounded and nourished will cultivate an internal state that promotes the change you want.

What change would you like to make? How can a morning activation ritual benefit you? I’d love to hear your thoughts. I invite you to join the conversation.

 

 

How Can I Help?

Do you want support creating routines, organizing, planning, or inviting positive change? I’d love to help! Virtual organizing is an extraordinary path forward – local feel with a global reach.

Please schedule a Discovery Call, email me at linda@ohsorganized.com, or call 914-271-5673. Change is possible, especially with support.

 
 
One Clarifying Question to Help Embrace Change in Your Life

How is it already February? The past few months have been intense, and time has flown by. Based on recent conversations and my own experience, many people want to make changes but feel stuck.

Conflicting emotions include an urgency for change, confusion about what to change or how to move forward, and exhaustion even before starting. Additionally, the desire for change and the fear of the unknown can create further paralysis.

These feelings can show up in many ways, including:

  • You are dissatisfied with the status quo.

  • You want to make a shift but don’t know how to go about it.

  • You’re exhausted from the news, endless possibilities, and uncertainty.

  • You are unable to focus.

  • You feel overwhelmed.

  • You feel stuck and can’t figure out how to move forward.

  • You want things to change but have no energy to make it happen.

  • You want to press pause and postpone change.

  • You want to take action but are afraid of doing it wrong.

  • You don’t want to live this way anymore but lack clarity about changing things.

 

  

The Clarifying Question

Before making any change, selecting one area to focus on is essential. It can be tempting when pursuing change to get overly ambitious. There is nothing wrong with that. However, dividing your attention in too many directions can be overwhelming.

In The Power of Letting Go by John Purkiss, he poses this powerful and clarifying question:

“What do you want to change in your life?”

While you may have a long list of items, I encourage you to choose only one thing at a time. Don’t worry about what change to make or how or when you’ll make it. Release that noise. Begin with the question.

 

 

Which Change Will You Pursue?

You might want to pursue changes in several of the categories below. However, as mentioned, focusing on one area and one specific change at a time is most effective.

Change categories include:

  • Career and Work

  • Family and Relationships

  • Finances

  • Fun and Recreation

  • Health and Wellness

  • Personal Growth

  • Physical Environment

  • Spirituality

Here are some examples:

  • If Fun and Recreation is the first category you focus on, you might add one fun activity each month, such as going to a movie, ice skating, or having a pizza and game night.

  • If Health and Wellness is the first category you focus on, you might establish better sleep hygiene over several months. Establish consistent bedtime, reduce the ambient light, put away digital devices a few hours before bed, and take a warm bath.

  • If Physical Environment is the first category you focus on, you might declutter and organize one area each month, such as the kitchen, clothing closet, or bathroom.

Integrate one change before pursuing additional ones.

Integrate one change before pursuing additional ones.
— Linda Samuels, CPO-CD®, CVOP™

How to Work with the Clarifying Question

You know the clarifying question. Here’s one way to work with it:

  • Find a quiet place to reflect.

  • Close your eyes if that helps.

  • Sit with John’s question: What do you want to change in your life?

  • Notice what arises.

  • Capture your thoughts.

  • Scan your list.

  • Note which categories your changes are in.

  • Select one category and one specific change from that category to focus on first.

  • Allow the other ideas and chatter to recede into the background for now.

  • Once the change is well established, revisit your list to select the next change you want to pursue.

Do you feel more prepared to embrace change? Was the clarifying question helpful? What are you considering? I’d love to hear your thoughts. I invite you to join the conversation.

 

 

How Can I Help?

Do you want support organizing, planning, or clarifying changes to pursue? I’d love to help! Virtual organizing is an extraordinary path forward – A local feel with a global reach.

Please schedule a Discovery Call, email me at linda@ohsorganized.com, or call 914-271-5673. Change is possible, especially with support.

 
 
How to Lean into an Absolutely Imperfect Fresh Start

Artwork by Jean-Michel Basquiat from Luna Luna exhibit

What is it about the complications of a fresh start? You might put extra pressure on yourself regarding how to fully embrace, in a certain way, the clean slate that a new month or year offers.

Perhaps you’re waiting for all the planets to align so you can begin again in a particular, “perfect” way. Maybe you feel overwhelmed sorting through endless possibilities, have difficulty making decisions, or fear you won’t do things “correctly.”

 Guess what? Perfect isn’t necessary. Instead, consider what becomes possible when you lean into an imperfect, fresh start.


Why Imperfection?

Oliver Burkeman, a bestselling author and columnist, publishes “The Imperfectionist,” a newsletter that explores “productivity, mortality, the power of limits, and building a meaningful life in an age of bewilderment.”

In last month’s newsletter, Burkeman described himself as “prone to overthinking, borne of a perfectionistic desire to do things right, or in the right order, or in the right way, which erects a barrier between an idea and its natural expression in present-moment action.”

 

 

The “Ultra-Simple” Approach

Burkeman went on to share a favorite productivity strategy. This technique helps bypass perfectionistic tendencies and encourages bold, imperfect action.

His instructions are:

  • “Get a lined notebook.

  • Write one task on the first line of a page.

  • Complete that task.

  • Draw a line through it.

  • Then write a new task on the next line – and repeat.

  • There’s no messing around here. You think about what to do, and then do it.”

What action could you simply decide not to hinder today?
— Oliver Burkeman

Your Imperfect, Fresh Start

I love the “no messing around here” part. Instead of stressing, questioning, and delaying, the idea is to get out of your way and do something. Don’t make a big deal about the fresh start or allow perfectionism to derail you.

Go for it! Do one small thing, cross it off, and repeat.

Burkeman asks two inspiring questions:

  • “What’s something you could do, right away…merely by stepping gracefully out of the way, with all your usual overcomplicating nonsense, and letting action happen?”

  • “What action could you simply decide not to hinder today?”

How can you simplify your fresh start? What can you do right now? I’d love to hear your thoughts. I invite you to join the conversation.

 

 

How Can I Help?

Do you want support organizing, planning, or making the most of this new year? I’d love to help! Virtual organizing is an extraordinary path forward – A local feel with a global reach.

Please schedule a Discovery Call, email me at linda@ohsorganized.com, or call 914-271-5673. Change is possible, especially with support.

 
 
12 Promising and Best Loved Organizing Ideas of the Year

As this year winds down, I appreciate reflecting on the past before moving ahead to the future. For part of the year-end review, I selected my favorite organizing concepts from 2024, one from each month. I hope you discover or rediscover a seed idea that will bring inspiration and balance to your New Year.

Where will you focus on creating organization and balance? Which people and projects will receive your time, energy, and attention? If you’re ready for a fresh start, embracing change, taking your next step, letting go, decluttering, enlisting help, and more, this is for you.

 

 

12 Promising and Best Loved Organizing Ideas of the Year

It takes courage to move forward when you’re overwhelmed.
— Linda Samuels, CPO-CD®, CVOP™
Yes starts the process of change. Yet keeps it going.
— Sharon Saline, Psy.D.
One small step in the face of fear is enough to dispel its hold on you.
— Todd Henry

 

One of the simplest ways to let go is to notice the things that don’t belong.
— Linda Samuels, CPO-CD®, CVOP™
Clutter creates chronic inflammation.
— Oh, So Organized! Client
Progress is noticeable when you make a time investment.
— Linda Samuels, CPO-CD®, CVOP™

 
What’s a quick completion?
— Cameron Gott, PCC
You don’t have to do everything yourself.
— Linda Samuels, CPO-CD®, CVOP™
Virtual organizing is a flexible, creative, collaborative process.
— Linda Samuels, CPO-CD®, CVOP™

 
Bringing possibilities to fruition is gratifying.
— Linda Samuels, CPO-CD®, CVOP™
We don’t have to be perfect.
— James Clear
There’s immense power in knowing which things in our lives we can and can’t control.
— Mikael Krogerus and Roman Tschappeler

Grateful for You

Thank you for being an integral part of this vibrant community. I am deeply grateful to you. We’ve had an incredible year of conversations and sharing. You bring learning, growth, support, and inspiration to every exchange. Thank you for participating and sharing the best of who you are.

What inspired you this year? Which organizing concept resonates most with you? I’d love to hear your thoughts. I invite you to join the conversation.

How Can I Help?

Do you want help decluttering, organizing, planning, or creating more balance? I’d love to help! Virtual organizing is an extraordinary path forward – A local feel with a global reach.

Please schedule a Discovery Call, email me at linda@ohsorganized.com, or call 914-271-5673. Organization, balance, and ease are possible, especially with support.