Yep.  That’s my desk. Actually, it is pretty damned organized for me. I have been working in here for a week, cleaning out files and paperwork which was piled to my waist. I’m one of those people who try and try and try to organize.  I go out and buy all kinds of storage bins and contraptions to help, but I cannot seem to even last a week in organization mode. I forget where I put my keys. I can’t remember what I need at the grocery. I couldn’t remember to take my books to school when I was a kid. I would be ashamed to take photos of my closet and vanity….it hasn’t improved since I was 8 years old, regardless of all the good intentions in the world. Yes, there are clothes on the floor, stuffed into shelves, and hopefully clothes I haven’t seen in a long time might be buried in there somewhere. My desk makes my purse look like a complete mess. It is a bottomless pit, filled with all kinds of items I can never find without emptying the whole thing.

And yet, I’m always on time. Actually, I’m always early. I am a college consultant in private practice, and was formerly a Lecturer at the University of Texas Dallas, and both jobs require planning ahead. I’m very detail oriented when it comes to my students….I quadruple check everything they do, because I am terrified I might let something get by me. I made Lecture notes for all of my classes because I knew if I didn’t, I wouldn’t remember what to say, how to say it, or I would get way off topic. I can write a beautiful research paper (as long as I am taking my ADHD meds when I do it).

So today, I find on the internet, an article about research done at the University of Minnesota regarding messiness, particularly at the desk. Organization is always complimented, messiness is always looked down upon or punished. The article is in in the Elite Daily, written by Dan Scotti. “The Psychology Behind Messy Rooms: Why the Most Creative People Flourish in Clutter” discusses the research performed by Dr. Kathleen D Vohs. I also found an article about the research in the New York Times, dated September 2013. People who work in “disorderly environments” (everyone in my life calls it “a mess”) have been scientifically proven (as far as science can prove anything) to be more creative.

Scotti comments “…it should be no huge shock that messy rooms containing possessions misplaced from their “conventional” locations would promote creativity. I suppose if you prefer to “lay,” and I use that term very loosely, your clean clothes on the floor of your bedroom, when the empty dresser is only a few feet away – you’re certainly thinking outside the lines of conventional reasoning. And that same concept could be applied to more abstract conception. Consider this from Albert Einstein, “If a cluttered desk is a sign of a cluttered mind, then what are we to think of an empty desk?” (It sounds to me like Dan Scotti might be an organized person, I mean, I “lay” my clothes wherever I take them off, or I drop them off on the way to going someplace else. Besides, the drawers are a mess and I can’t fit anything more into them. Why would there be an empty dresser in the room, Dan? It makes perfect sense to me to lay my clothes on the treadmill.)

You have no idea how nice it is to hear that Einstein’s desk was a disaster, so was Twain’s and Agatha Chrisite’s. Dr. Vohs, who was head of the research at U of Minnesota says, ““Disorderly environments seem to inspire breaking free of tradition, which can produce fresh insights.”  I am not very traditional, and apparently am an “out of the box” thinker (I think that is a much nicer way to put it than the way my family has described me most of my life). My husband cannot make sense of most of what I do or say. I admit I do things differently than most people, and I think differently than most people. My husband calls me “kooky”.  He and my kids are always telling “kooky mommy stories”. An example: the drawer in the kitchen which holds dish towels and oven mitts is always too full and hard to close. So, I moved the mitts to the cabinet above the drawer, with the measuring cups. Now the drawer closes. Randy, my husband, told me that putting them there made no sense, that it was crazy and “kooky”.  I think it is a great solution. And so it goes.

You know, I have spent a lot of time trying to organize my stuff. What a waste of time!  I could have been doing so many other things instead of trying to organize. Hm. Well, I need to decorate four Christmas trees, wrap gifts, finish buying gifts, decorate the house………actually, everything is in chaos right now because I’m unloading all of the boxes (about 30) filled with decorations, ornaments, etc. It will be pretty much of a mess around here until I get all of that work done.  Then, after Christmas, it all has to be taken down and put away in boxes. Maybe I should just leave it up all year around. THAT would be out of the “boxes” thinking, wouldn’t it?