There are times each day that encourages me to pause and notice. These mindful moments prevent me from moving to that next step on my daily to-do list. They remind me that while it’s helpful to be productive and get stuff done, stopping for a gratitude or reflection break is essential too. Have you experienced this?

I have an Anna Quindlen quote displayed on my desk, which says, “I wish I had treasured the doing a little more and the getting it done a little less.” I extend this idea to the quality of my days. The next step often implies taking action that will further our project or goal. That’s essential. However, we can also interpret action to include reflecting, appreciating and noticing life’s treasures.

What made my next step be a stop and notice?  There were several things I’ll share with you. I’m curious about what you’ve been noticing lately, too.

3 Ways to Embrace Mindfulness

Next Step, Spring

It’s still officially winter, but signs of spring are all around. Some days I’ve gone coatless. And considering that only a few weeks ago, we were knee-deep in snow, and with freezing temperatures, a no-coat day feels pretty darn spectacular. But the spring sign that speaks, “spring is almost here,” more than any other, is when outside of our dining room window, the first purple crocus emerges from the earth. From the time our daughters were little, they were always on the lookout for the first crocus. I remember the joyous sounds of squealing and delight when they’d see it bloom. They’d rush to tell me in excited voices, “Look, look! The first crocus is out!!!” We’d run to the window together to appreciate the change. Then we’d go outside to take a closer look at this beautiful flower.

This past week, the purple crocus appeared. I felt just as excited and hopeful to see it as I have all of these years. I went outside to admire and appreciate its beauty and sign that spring is on its way. Life will once again begin to bloom.

Next Step, Hugs

Has anyone else seen the news articles that have been surfacing lately about how people isolated because of the pandemic are spending money to visit unique farms to hug cows? Yes, cows! This wellness trend of cow hugging or koe knuffelen, which originated in the Netherlands, has made its way to the United States. Apparently, cuddling a cow can increase our oxytocin levels, which is the hormone released in social bonding.

While my husband and I have been together during the pandemic and get to hug each other frequently, we have truly missed being with our children and embracing them. This past weekend, our daughter, Allison, visited us, and before the walking, talking, cooking, or eating, we stopped and hugged. It was the best next step ever! It’s not that I forgot. I was reminded how important and meaningful physical contact is to me. It’s the simple exchange of a hug or holding hands that express love, connection, and appreciation.

“Next can mean mindfully appreciating the moment.”

— Linda Samuels, CPO-CD®, CVPO™

Next Step, Inspiration

Walking is part of every day. I love getting outside to move and explore. I tend to be a creature of habit, which extends to my walking routes. I mix it up sometimes, but most frequently choose a path along the Hudson River. When Allison visited us, she wanted to explore another spot in Croton. We ended up at this hidden beach, which my husband and I had only been to one other time. Aside from the gorgeous east river views, the landscape was covered with driftwood, reeds, rocks, and shells in unusual patterns and colors. Visual inspiration was all around as we stopped to capture the images and as I paused to appreciate being together with Steve and Allison.

Your next step doesn’t have to equal accomplishment. Next can mean mindfully appreciating the moment. Was your next step a pause to notice? What has captured your attention recently? I’d love to hear your thoughts. I invite you to join the conversation.

A few weeks ago, I wrote about some of the positive mindset changes my clients experience during their virtual organizing sessions. A common theme is going from overwhelmed to unstuck.

Whether clients are overwhelmed or not, all grapple with “What’s my next step?”  This is the intriguing part. How do we figure out what to do next during a virtual organizing session? What do some typical next steps look like?

If you are curious, continue reading. I will share my latest discoveries with you.

How to Figure Out Next

It’s probably no surprise, but figuring out next begins with asking thought-provoking questions and listening carefully. We check in first before we start organizing. With curiosity as our guide, we discuss how things went in between sessions, discover successes and challenges, and find out what’s happening now. Is a current circumstance affecting their energy, mood, or preferences? All of these discoveries go into finding next. 

Once we’ve talked, I can tell if my client is clear about their next step or need help discovering it. If they are unsure, we clarify and discuss several options. It’s always their choice, which is one of the powerful aspects of virtual organizing work. When clients choose what they want to focus on, they own the process and are invested in the outcome. 

What Next Looks Like

Each client has unique organizing goals and needs. Their projects differ in scope and focus. Clients want a range of help from me, including brainstorming, planning, body doubling, focusing, system designing, resource-providing, list-making, and more. While working, we focus on decision-making skills, letting go, mindfulness, awareness, and moving forward one small step at a time. The organizing work happens in their offices (at home and work,) bedrooms, closets, kitchens, pantries, laundry rooms, bathrooms, dining rooms, living rooms, garages and other areas.

“Taking that next step builds momentum.”

— Linda Samuels, CPO-CD®, CVPO™

During each virtual organizing session, they experience change and progress. Taking that next step builds momentum. Below is a small sample of clients’ next steps and successes they experienced during their one-hour virtual organizing sessions:

• Created a goals list of organizing tasks and projects for every room in the house

• Edited and cleared papers from the office floor

• Brainstormed ideas for the most effective use of the space

• Edited expired make-up and personal care products

• Edited and decluttered items on the bed

• Sorted and organized backlog of mail

• Created a filing system

• Drafted a project to-do list

• Edited and decluttered the pantry

• Cleared out old files 

• Edited and organized a box of papers

• Created a to-do list

• Edited and organized memorabilia

• Organized books

• Edited a stack of magazines

• Edited and organized clothing closet

• Organized mind clutter

You may wonder why I shared this list. It’s simple. Next begins somewhere. While your goal may be huge, big can be overwhelming. But with focus, small blocks of time, and some guidance, you will get there, one paper, box, or decision at a time.

Where did your next step bring you? Did it create the momentum to continue organizing? I’d love to hear your thoughts. I invite you to join the conversation.

Have you ever felt stuck moving forward? Maybe you felt challenged with decision-making, figuring out the next step on a project, or making a significant life change. Over the last few months, we’ve talked about the influence and motivation boost that a fresh start brings and how to embrace change through thinking and actions. Many of you have done fantastic work around those concepts. But now what? You have ideas, energy, and motivation, but next feels elusive. It’s as if a fog has washed over you, and you’re waiting for it to lift.

Getting unstuck and finding next is a regular part of the work I do with my virtual organizing clients. It’s also something I experienced recently. Without going into the specifics about a new project I’m starting, I felt stuck with figuring out my next step. I will let you know more about the project at another time. (It’s not ready for prime time just yet.) For now, I will share three strategies, which helped me move forward, and can help you too.

Three Strategies to Get You Unstuck and Clear About Your Next Step

1. Capture the Ponderings

Our mind is the vessel that holds all of our ideas. Isn’t it incredible how it expands to house an infinite amount of thoughts? However, while our mind is vast, it is useful to download ideas to another container. We often call this a “brain dump.” You can write in a journal, capture notes in an electronic document, or talk into a voice recorder. The idea is to transfer your project ideas from your mind to a specifically designated location or home. This helps you isolate and organize those thoughts from the other million swirling ideas in the vessel.

I found this tremendously helpful for my project. I thought a lot about it but overwhelmed myself with all of the possible ideas and directions to take things. I could almost visualize the bullet points in my head, but it was too much to organize. So what did I do? I opened up a Word doc, created headers with bullet points. Seven pages later, my download was complete. I captured the project ideas on paper, and my mind felt freer. But even on paper, it was still a lot to assimilate. Next wasn’t obvious yet. That’s when I paired this with the second strategy.

2. Talk With a Gifted Listener

We have different processing modalities. For verbal processors, like me, writing and talking aloud helps me make sense of the world. It’s not just talking but conversing with someone who is a great listener and reflector. I recognized how helpful it would be to discuss my project with someone who asks great questions, listens deeply, provides valuable feedback, and was objective. I reached out to Marcy Stoudt, the very generous and insightful Executive Coach and Founder of The Executive Mom Nest. She helped me distill things so that by the time we finished our conversation, I felt more focused and clear, less overwhelmed, more energized, and ready to embrace the next steps. I used one additional strategy that helped bring everything together.

“Walking helped me define my essential next step.”

— Linda Samuels, CPO-CD®, CVPO™

3. Walk in Nature

Research exists on the benefits to our mental health and well-being for walking in nature. Think forests, water bodies, gardens, grassy knolls, and mountains. Walking is part of my daily routine. I walk to shift my energy, stretch my body, and clear my head. To help me figure out the next steps for the project, I was specific about this particular walk. I wrote my notes and talked with Marcy. Walking helped me define my essential next step. Just as walking loosens and frees-up movement in the body, it has a similar effect on the mind. While I walked, I thought about what I wrote along with Marcy’s insights. I breathed in the fresh air, appreciated the beautiful Hudson River, and allowed my thoughts to simmer. My hope was by walking, my actual next step would magically appear.

Incredibly, it did! By the time I returned home, I knew what my next step was. You might be surprised by my choice. I decided to take a few days off from thinking about or taking action on the project. I needed balance at that moment. The project had been consuming my thoughts and creating undue stress. I needed some distance to move forward with clarity- not years or months, but just a few days.

There are many ways to get unstuck and figure out the next step. These three strategies- capture, talk, and walk helped me. I hope all or some of them will help you when you’re feeling challenged by next. Have you felt stuck recently? Has finding next been difficult? What helps you move forward? I’d love to hear your thoughts. I invite you to join the conversation. 

Another week has passed as we navigate and adjust to the rapidly changing COVID-19 world crisis. More schools, local stores, restaurants, and industries have shut down, and additional closures are coming. We’re learning how to stay in place as we manage the new realities of family, health, work, or the lack thereof. Each one of us will be touched if we haven’t already, by loss of loved ones, income, and life as we knew it. People have described the “brain fog” and a general sense of anxiety they’re feeling. Others have shared how essential their need to stay connected to “community” is, especially at this time.

Each day brings a new awareness about how to cope with next, given all the uncertainty. I continue to learn and be inspired by you and the ways you are facing each day of unknowns with grace, compassion, and humor. None of us know how long this pandemic will last or in what ways our lives will be changed. We only have today. It is what we do today that matters.

Several things happened this week that helped me cope with next. I hope some of these will help you in the weeks ahead.

7 Uplifting Discoveries That Will Help You Cope With Next

1. Be Compassionate

Extending compassion to others comes in many forms, from offering a listening ear to sharing a smile with a stranger, to bringing groceries to someone who is homebound. One of my girlfriends told me about her friend that just started the initiative, Million Gallons. Their goal is to provide food security for restaurant, hospitality, and other workers that have been displaced by the coronavirus in Westchester County and New York City. A Million Gallons hopes to make and distribute one million gallons of soup. I am in awe of how quickly they mobilized with compassion and purpose to help those in need. To learn more about their compassion-driven cause, watch the video. What act of kindness have you experienced?

2. Identify Feelings

You might be feeling all kinds of emotions. Some of them you can easily name, while others are harder to identify. One of the feelings that surfaced in several conversations this past week was grief. On a Zoom call with my organizing colleagues, after listening to them share how they were feeling, it was clear that a few were experiencing grief. Their grief was not over the loss of a loved one. Instead, it was from their loss of purpose, of working, and of helping their clients. Later in the week, both my yoga teacher and Rabbi referenced the Harvard Business Review article, That Discomfort You’re Feeling Is Grief. In the article, David Kessler, the preeminent grief expert, explored how to acknowledge, manage, and find meaning in the pandemic-induced grief you could be experiencing. It’s an insightful piece that helped me feel gentler towards others and myself. What are you feeling right now?

3. Find Humor

In this time of social distancing and isolation, we are finding different ways of being engaged with the world. I’ve become more aware of how institutions such as museums, aquariums, and zoos are keeping us connected through video. One segment I saw this past week made me smile from ear to ear. Two penguins from the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago were allowed to run loose as they wandered around and toured the exhibits. It was so much fun to watch! What added humor to your day?

4. Notice Indicators

Being that I live in New York, which is one of the current COVID-19 outbreak hotbeds, my husband and I have been staying put. We only go out to get groceries, pick-up food from local restaurants, go on walks, take a drive to nowhere, or do yard work. When I’m out, I notice changes, especially at the grocery store. Several weeks ago, I saw shortages of toilet paper, hand sanitizer, and disinfecting wipes. As the weeks continued, additional items came into short supply like hand soap, dish soap, paper towels, tissues, cleaning supplies, ice cream, eggs, Tylenol, chicken broth, and chicken. And this week, when I went to the market, the chicken and ice cream had been replenished, but the entire supply of chocolate chip morsels had been ravaged. Those shelves were completely empty. I realized that one of the home activities parents were doing with their kids was baking cookies. A happy feeling ran through me, as I was flooded with love-filled memories of baking with our daughters. What indicators are you noticing?

5. Get Creative

It’s been fascinating to watch how companies and individuals are using the pause to get creative with projects, how they do business or infuse creativity in their days. Baked By Susan, one of our local bakeries, put together “decorate your own cupcake” kits. One of my friends is busy knitting a complicated cardigan. I’ve been testing out some new recipes, writing, taking photos, and creating organizing videos. One of the recent recipes I tried from the Yotam Ottolenghi’s Simple cookbook that my daughter, Allison, gave me was mashed sweet potato with lime salsa. It was so delicious and easy to make. If you’d like the recipe, let me know in the comments, and I’ll share it with you. What creative outlets are catching your attention?

6. Seek Connections

You might be isolating, but you are not alone. There are different ways that we connected with people before the pandemic. And temporarily, many of those intentional and casual points of contact have now been cut off. But we are social beings. We need one another. One of the things that have kept me sane is finding new ways to connect and “be with” the various communities and people in my life. Zoom has been a positive and satisfying way of staying connected with family, friends, colleagues, yoga, organizing, and spiritual communities. I recognize that not everyone feels connected to a community. If you are struggling, feeling alone and isolated, the COVID-19 Emotional Support Hotline is 844-863-9314. What way has connecting changed for you during this time?

7. Explore Nature

We experience many positive benefits for our wellbeing when we spend time in nature. Can you recall a recent time when you walked in the woods, felt the fresh air and sun on your skin, or dipped your toes in the sea? Being surrounded by nature can be restorative for our minds and bodies. Lately, I’ve mostly been walking in the woods since the path is less crowded than other local spots. But this week, I walked along the Hudson River path. I loved being by the water, hearing the birds sing, and seeing the spring foliage just beginning to bloom. I know that not everyone has access to or the desire to be outdoors. One of the other discoveries I made this week was from the New York Botanical Garden. Like many institutions, they too have temporarily closed. However, you can take a virtual tour of their magnificent orchid exhibit. So if you love seeing, but not being in nature, try a remote viewing. In what way does nature improve your wellbeing?

When we are experiencing grief and other strong emotions, it’s hard to think about next. In this time, next might need to be a big dose of self-compassion. Or, perhaps it will be you reaching out to someone else that is hurting. Regardless, there are ways to cope and simultaneously uplift yourself and others. What have you discovered? What has inspired you? I’d love to hear your thoughts. I invite you to leave a comment and join our conversation.