Office C A L M

When there's many things in life to consider, and days fill of different deeds that require concentration, it's much easier to find that peace for working when the surroundings for working are somehow in order. 

I have spent some time lately diving deep into the land of organizing videos to find inspiration for my work space at the shop. 

My work space has open shelving under a counter top, and it's all too easy to just let the shelves get filled with junk to get it out of the way for now. I also use a certain number of binders daily at work, and their storage space has been a few steps away from the counter. It has provided me with about five extra steps worth of moving daily, but is becoming a nuisance, because I have to reach for the folders so many times. So I needed a re-do, and I've been working on it slowly, bit by bit, and solution by solution.

I've watched Alejandra's YouTube-videos from her website for inspiration. She's an American organizer who seems to find storage solutions to just about anything. I think I'd personally prefer a lot smaller amount of things to organise in the first place, and shiver at the sight of her pen collection (I don't think I've ever seen that many pens at one go), but her videos are fun and show her enthusiasm and love for color. And who wouldn't be inspired by fun and color?!

I took her advice, and carefully measured the nearest shelf below my desk to fit my most needed daily folders. I found these beautifully coloured and to my eyes calm binders first online, but then found out my local bookshop is selling them for half price, so instead of ordering them and getting them delivered to the door, I put on my winter boots and walked to the bookshop to collect them myself. 

And now I have my four most needed binders right at hand, just when I need them. Before this, one of them lived two steps away in the opposite direction, forcing me to bend over to floor level to pick it up (and because it's the bookkeeping binder, it's used sometimes several times a day). Two others lived on this shelf, along with some miscellany of cd's, wool yarn, hangers, baskets and a cup. The fourth binder (which had kiwi fruits on the cover) lived next to this shelf on the floor, because it had no space anywhere else. I don't have a "before" -picture of this shelf, but believe me, it's probably all for the best.

The wee shelf above this one got a revamp too.

It is the home of the daily most needed things at the shop - the receipts, the calculator, and the back-up drive.

Now it has everything arranged so that it's out of sight, but easy to reach for, even if you're not looking AT what you're looking FOR. All the extra rubbish is gone, and everything on the shelf is needed daily. I also love the way there's no space for the extra rubbish now - the spaces are used for good.

On the counter top live the Stress Tool Cards from Living With Ease - course I did in January. They help me daily. Here's hoping this one is helping you out too:

So is there something where you work/write/play that would need a revamp? Some thought? Arranging? What could be better where you spend most of your productive time? 

January wrapped up

January in the life of this micropreneur has gone by quickly and swiftly. There's been much on the go and a lot of things have been learned and accomplished. I'll gift wrap my January in 5 parcels for you.

1. Living with Ease - course by Sandra Pawula
Sandra's e-course was something I wanted to devote my January - the beginning of a new year - to. I woke up each morning a little earlier than the rest of the family to read the daily lesson and to do my homework. In three weeks I got to know so much more about stress and how it manifests itself in my life, how to deal with it and how to prevent it from invading my life sneakily without my permission. The course gave me straightforward tools to work with, and made me feel much more prepared for what this year has in stock for me. Sandra is doing another round of the course later in the spring, so if this is something that speaks to you, be sure to subscribe to the announcements Sandra has on the course page for when the next round will be up.

2. Creating C A L M
I didn't make any new year's resolutions. I did, however, choose one word to guide me through the year. My aim for the year is to create a little bit of calm each day of the year. It's a broad enough subject to cover most anything, so it feels easy to accomplish daily, but it's focused enough to give a sense of calm as a result of whatever it is I've chosen to do on a particular day. Creating calm has meant I've finished quite a few of unfinished businesses, done a fair bit of laundry and cleaning, taken a good few naps, recycled and renewed things that are no longer serving me as they are without causing stress. Taken a firm hold of things that are left winding by and finding out enough about them to let them have a life of their own again. This word seems really helpful, to me.

3. Financial plan
For the first time since beginning the running of the little dance wear shop I made a financial plan in the early days of January. It was a plan to see approximately how much money the shop would need  to make, so I could raise my own salary to meet at least some of the needs I have at the moment, and so it wouldn't mean less money to pay the bills for the shop. I counted the over all gross total I needed to make in a whole year, divided that into months, and divided the months into working days. It isn't a goal to sell your mother for, and there's breathing space there to meet the end-of-the-year goal - so it's a loose plan, which I think is good for being the first ever plan. But for the whole of January I kept a chart going to know where I was with the plan, and come to the end of January I had actually exceeded the goal, which was a complete surprise for me.

4. Work of elves
Every year around Christmastime I feel quite sad that I didn't think of Christmas before the end of November. I would have wanted to make the gifts for my lovelies by hand, and at the end of November I realize it's far too late to make something for most. So this year I thought I'd begin early. I'm in no hurry, and I don't want to create anything in a rush or because I have to. But I'm making a pair of woolly socks at the moment, on my spare time, when the rest of the family's watching TV and I can't be asked. They'll most definitely be ready by December :)
If you happen to still be stressed about The Christmas Past and the gift giving (or are already dreading Valentine's Day), there's a book fresh off the shelves of Amazon that's just been released about the gift giving frenzy and how to escape and avoid it. It's by Robert Wall, who is a fellow micropreneur-blogger, and the book can be found (and purchased for a ridiculously cheap price for the comfort it presents) HERE. I loved the book and Robert's humour. Well worth the investment :)

5. Blog friends
January has also been the beginning month for a wee group of bloggers to get together and support each other's work. It's been a great month of getting to know new blogs and personalities behind the writings. I notice my own writing has had less time to manifest itself in the past month, but I've had so much fun reading other people's blogs and getting inspired by them!

How has your January evolved?
What does your wrap-up look like with big bows and sparkly papers (I know things aren't always sparkly and fun, but if you were to present your most gifted, most glittery, bona-fide awesomeness in a parcel or a few, that would they be like)?

Half-hearted solutions

"I'll just do this for now, and can concentrate on it better another time"

"It'll do"

"It's only temporary anyway"

Do you ever get that? The feeling of not giving something in life your full attention because it just wouldn't fit your life right now, there's so many other things on your plate and it's just not very convenient to be spending time on something as trivial as - whatever it is you're supposed to be doing.

Sometimes it's right, of course, to leave things off your to-do-list and decide not to give them your attention. It's even good to prioritize and purge your to-do-list/home/car/work place to make time for stuff that's really important in your life.

But how about things you bump into time and time again with half-done solutions? How about you having to live with the consequences of half-done, half-hearted, not-really-working solutions because you never gave them your full attention?
They might be everywhere.
*The kitchen counter may be full of glass jars and bottles waiting to be recycled, because it was easier to put them there *for now* than it would have been to find them a good storage space until your next round to the recycling place.
*Your inbox might be filled to the brim with emails that are sort of waiting for your attention but are not the most urgent and needed, so you leave them there *for now* until you can sort something with them at a later date, and so they bug you daily, every time you open up your email.
*Your make-up bag might have a dozen eye shadows or nail polishes, although you know you might need the pinkest one of them maybe once a year at the Christmas do, and nowhere else. But they'll stay there *for now* because who knows if the next door neighbors are having a ball before the eye shadow passes it's sell-by-date and you might just be needing that particular pink.
*You never did the excel-course at school, so you're having to constantly ask for advice from friends and family who know a whole lot more of excel than you do, and you're spending hours at work trying to figure things out for yourself to make a simple spread sheet, because it just is not that important to learn excel (*raises hand* - Guilty!).

In my venture to create calm in life, I found two pieces of cardboard stuck on the side of my work desk at the shop. One of them stated that I need to visit the shop next door (with a mail box right next to it) and I'd be gone for 5 minutes, and the other had the same message but for 15 minutes. I'd written both in a hurry at some point of these 3 years of running the shop. Temporary messages, obviously, and with the best intention of informing the customers that we are indeed open, and that I'd be right back after dropping the mail off to the box next door.

And every time I took one of the notes to be put on the door, I'd get a feeling that this is a temporary arrangement. And every time, the notelets would be a bit more run down and ugly and - temporary, and I'd feel a little guilty about closing the shop because I'm serving some customers who live further away that the one who's coming to the shop while I'm visiting the mail box.
And then I thought again.
Three years of running the shop on my own has proved there is nothing temporary in running to the mail box. It is, and will be, a permanent deed, to be executed about twice a week for as long as I'll be running the shop on my own. It is a part of my way of serving my customers, and there is no need to feel guilty about it, and no need to diminish the action by run down cardboard uglies.

So as a part of my Friday "creating calm" -action last week, I took the run down cards and placed them to forever rest in the paper bin. Here's what I made instead:

From this   -   to this

Three note cards from scrapbooking card stock with properly printed messages - all laminated to stand strong in wind and snow and sun and rain. And I found them a drawer space to live in, other than constantly in sight on the side of my work desk.

It's a small project, and not that special, if you think about it. But it's one less thing in life that's half-done. It took me about half an hour, and now I never (or at least for the next few years) have to think about them again, so they make me extra happy, and bring some extra calm to the shop.

Where are the half-done things in your life that you keep bumping into? Challenge yourself this week, and tackle one half-hearted solution head first. What will yours be? How will it help life?

C A L M 2014

As it is the beginning of another round around the sun, I thought of spicing this round up with something to concentrate on. It looks like new year's resolutions are completely out and everybody's choosing a word for guiding the year ahead, which I'm only noticing now. I'd chosen my word in early December and heard of nobody else's words, so I had no idea I'm in there with everybody else. But I have a word to guide me too. My word is

C A L M

with big, spaced out capital letters to let it all sink in, slowly.

And the way it might manifest itself - I thought, might be that instead of me sitting still and doing nada and *being* calm, I might try to actively produce calm, to *create* it. The being calm might just happen miraculously once I've created some space for it to exist.

I'm a master of beginning things, and it's super easy for me to leave everything half done (see my previous post). So there's about a million half-done things laying around in my life, and I tackling those, in a calm manner, one by one, and with concentration and some deeply breaths, is my plan for the beginning of the year. I'm intending to *create* some calm every day, especially at work.

And this is what I've done so far:

1st of January

I was at home, and sewed some half done products for the shop that were laying around the sewing table waiting for "the right moment". It took about an hour, and now they're one step closer to becoming finished, 3/4 finished. 

2nd of January

The first day of work for this year. I decided to begin the calm-creating by tackling three little drawers on my desk at the shop. I decluttered them and left only the direly needed stuff there, so they're easy to find when I need them. I also found there are business cards that are sort of half done (I scrapbook them from card stock and printed recycled paper), and some elastics and satin ribbons for the ballet pointe shoes that need packaging and restocking. I had none left in the shop although I have all the materials for them, so they clearly needed some crafting.

So as well as cleaning the drawers, I finished the elastics, made some 20 packages of them for the shop, and sorted out their pricing and the restocking options from the manufacturer.

3rd of January

The second day at work meant more finishing business. I packaged the pointe shoe satin ribbons, and finished one roll of ribbon completely from the storage shelves, making sure I have a reminder in my calendar to order another roll with the back to school -orders in March. This is how many there are now - they should last us until next autumn. Oh, and the packaging is from an old book that I salvaged from the local University Library. It's an early edition of the three musketeers. SO much fun to read as I chop the pages :)

4th of January

This was the day of packing at the shop (were taking the shop to another town for a day), so I didn't have as much time for the finishing business as I had in the previous days, but I did finish most of the business cards I had half done. Now there's plenty again, and my little watering can looks so cute with the cards in :)

Although there's still a few business cards let to finish next week when I get back to work, the three drawers are looking pretty calm already. This is the bottom one of them:

So the year is off to a good start.

What's your word - and how have you manifested it in the first few days of the year?