Sudden Simplicity: What To Do When You Are Losing Your Grip

Photo by Solar Ikon

When tasks explode and get out of hand, often times we are left floored, and desperate to get a grip on things again.

Getting a grip is equivalent to exerting control over the situation. Yet often times there is no control to be had. After all, if we all had our druthers, we would never experience an overwhelming load of tasks.

It has been my experience that when I am desperate to get a handle on things that are completely beyond my control, I can control my reaction and order a small part of my world. My solution: clean a drawer.

Cleaning a drawer doesn’t take very long, and the satisfaction from knowing one piece of your world is orderly can soothe a battered psyche.

As an example, I will walk you through cleaning our kitchen junk drawer.

How To Clean A Drawer

1. Realize there are three types of things in any drawer. These are things that belong there, things that you want to keep, but don’t belong there, and things that are trash. The trick to cleaning a drawer is to divide the contents into these categories and deal with them appropriately.

2. Separate the contents into their respective categories. In my case, the things that belong included the masking tape, transparent tape, 3 working pens, 3 working permanent markers and 2 working dry erase markers. I also chose to keep in this drawer the tools needed to clean/disassemble my Roomba. In the stuff I wish to keep but belong other places went: the instruction manual to the bread machine, my Weight Watchers information and a ball of wool (don’t ask why the last was even in there to begin with!). The last category, the throw away, contained the most: 2 piles of paper scraps, 3 broken rubber bands, and various plastic bits that belong who knows where.

3. Clean The Drawer. Wipe down the drawer. As long as you have it empty, you might as well get the icky bits out. My kitchen drawers always accumulate crumbs like my entire family ate dinner of crackers standing over open drawers. It’s a mystery.

4. Replace the stuff that belongs. You don’t need anything fancy like drawer organizers, but I find that in a pinch zipper bags help keep stuff together.

5. Put the other stuff where it belongs. If you choose to keep it, it must go in its place right then. If it doesn’t have a place, either make one, or re-evaluate if this object has a place in your home. Throw the trash out.