Posts Tagged ‘Office Organization’

Today is National Clean Your Desk Day

Monday, January 12th, 2015
Tidying Up

Tidying Up

Today is National Clean Your Desk Day. It is also National Kiss a Ginger Day and National Marzipan Day, but since a clean desk is relevant to me, and to this blog, I’ll stick with the desk. And, in keeping with today’s theme, I have been following the publishing phenomenon that is The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: the Japanese Art of De-Cluttering and Organizing, the international bestselling book that has sold over two million copies to date. Author Marie Kondo promises that if you organize your home once, you will never have to do it again. (Maintenance is easier than the initial process of organizing and de-cluttering.) I suppose the same principles apply to your office and to your desk. Kondo has an infectious enthusiasm for the calm and motivated mindset a tidy home can inspire. I find it less stressful when the clutter is gone and I do feel motivated to start tasks when I don’t feel overwhelmed by looking at piles of stuff.

So in the spirit of January 12, I cleaned my desk. I also took to heart Kondo’s advice to only keep those items that “spark joy”. My desk and my office have pretty organizing clips, attractive and festive folders for sorting paperwork and my favorite fountain pens. There are a few national retailers that offer name-brand desk accessories that may cost a few dollars more than the generic versions, but they are affordable luxuries. And they make starting work each morning even more pleasant, so I see these items as a good investment. While Kondo surely didn’t have business resilience in mind when she wrote her book, a resilient business is de-cluttered and organized. In an emergency situation, you don’t want to waste time searching for an important file. You don’t want to waste that time on such needless tasks in your normal business day, either. So now that my desk is clean, I will resume work!