The Lazy Genius Podcast - #34: The Lazy Genius Organizes a Home

Episode Date: October 9, 2017

In this episode, I'll share the five organizing personalities and how you could totally be organizing your home wrong. Ain't nobody got time for that. Let's be Lazy Geniuses about our homes! Stuff Mentioned in the Episode: Decluttering Is a Sham The Shocking Truth About Simplicity Quit Setting Stupid Goals For When Systems Can't Save You The Gilmore Girls Binge Guide THIS WEEK ONLY, I'm releasing a mini-course on how to declutter for life. I want to help you clear a path through your stuff and create a home you love, a home you won't have to purge every year like you do now. It's only available until Sunday, October 15th, so please don't miss your chance! This podcast is hosted by Kendra Adachi and executive produced by Kendra Adachi, Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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The next, you're installing a shelf in the back room. Running a business means moving in many directions all the time. TD's new small business banking accounts are built for how your business moves. It's how we're making banking more human. It's Kendra and you're listening to the Lazy Genius podcast. Here, I'm going to help you be a genius about the things that matter and lazy about the things that don't. Today's episode, episode 34, The Lazy Genius Organizes a Home. I already hear your label makers humming, everybody, but hold on for just a second.

The pitch for today's episode is this. Organizing your home is based more on your personality than on your stuff. In the playbook, we're going to discuss the five organizing personalities and how to see organizing through your lens. This is why not everything works for everybody. Don't forget the Thursday after this episode releases, which is October 3rd. 12. Also my sister's birthday. Happy birthday, Hannah. I will be live on Instagram at 1215 Eastern at the lazy genius to answer any questions you have about this episode. I'll also share a couple

of organizing traps because there are lots. So be sure to follow me on Instagram at the lazy genius to not mess out on that. So we all live in different size homes with different size closets. We all have different amounts of stuff, number of people we live with, all that stuff. We're all motivated by different things when it comes to buying and purging. There are so many variables. And yet, according to real simple and Pinterest, there's only one way to organize, right? Order, color coding, white space, glass jars, closets that only have five shirts inside. Is that your real life? At least for longer than like a week? I am guessing not. But it makes us feel like we're doing it wrong when we see pictures like that.

Spoiler alert, you're not doing anything wrong. you are not the problem. The sham of decluttering is the problem. It's a sham. I wrote a post called decluttering is a sham. How about that? That I will link to in the show notes at the lazygeeniescollective.com slash lazy slash organize.

See, we're led to believe that once we declutter, we'll live in an Instagram-worthy, organized house for the foreseeable future. And the reality is that we're back where we started. So soon. with our failure loudly taunting us as a fun bonus. It feels like a losing battle to organize our stuff, make it look pretty, and keep up with it. It's a losing battle because you're likely fighting against your organizing personality. Okay, so let's talk about those.

I think there are five organizing personalities, and yours makes a huge difference in how you approach putting your stuff away. Bonus, I base these personalities on Gilmore Girls characters. so you're welcome. And if you don't care about Gilmore Girls, two things. One, it won't change how you interpret these personalities, so don't worry. And two, if you've ever wanted to try the show, Gilmore Girls, but feel overwhelmed by the sheer volume of episodes, I'm going to link to my Gilmore Girls' essential binge guide in the show notes. Again, you're welcome. Let's do this.

Type 1. The orderly or the Rory. We'll call her orderly Rory, and I'll try to not trip over it. too much. It's quite a tongue twister. See, I can't even say tongue twister. So orderly Rory, she loves things to be in order. Duh. Did I just say, duh? It's 1987. And not just a functional order, though. It's not just about function. She appreciates aesthetics, too. So items arranged by color, labels with a pretty font, stacks in order of size. The balance of form and function is the driving force for Rory. She might have open shelves to put order on a lot.

display or she might want everything out of sight to create an overall lack of visual clutter. So how that comes out, how this style manifests itself physically is going to be different. But the driving force is logical order, probably with a really strong desire for it to look good as well. Now, here's where the Rory, and if you're a Rory, this is where you're going to get tripped up. The Rory rarely settles into one way of organizing because there's always room to make it better either because she loves aiming at perfection which is not a super great idea or because she feels like she's missing some major piece that she hasn't yet discovered orderly rory sticks with a method for a while but rearranges on a daily not a daily basis but a regular

basis sometimes it might turn into daily because you're like this is not right this is still not right and you keep trying to make it right. That is what you, if you are a Rory, might be doing. But the problem is you're also probably wasting time on perfection that doesn't actually exist. So that means if you are an orderly Rory, you need to be realistic about your own follow through with a system and definitely, definitely be gracious to people you live and work with who will 100% never follow the system exactly. Also, Orly Rory's 100% own label makers. So that's type 1.

Type 2, the Piler or the Lorelei. So the Lorelei Piler, we're just going to combine them, the Lorelei Piler is the quintessential. There's a method to the madness person. She's messy, but it's not out of laziness. She either knows where things are, is too focused on being productive or enjoying herself than cleaning up something that isn't important.

You know, it's not about just, I'll get to it later. There are other things that are more important, and she really does know where everything is, for the most part. Lorelei Pylers, their sense of organization is the orderly Rory's definition of chaos, but it's still a valid way to do things, okay? The major pitfall of the Lorelei Piler is not paying attention to have, the perceived chaos might affect others in the same home. So that very organized stack of paperwork could be causing tremendous mental anguish to an orally rory. You know, like if you are

a Lorelei Piler and you just have, you like your stacks and you can find the things in your stacks, but it could be that somebody that you live with is like, your stacks are driving me crazy. So if you live with others and you are a Lorelei Piler, consider letting someone who is bothered by some of the quote unquote chaos create a system that's just as good for you, but extra helpful to them. So if it doesn't matter to you, if there's certain things that are like, oh, I'm not going to worry about it. It doesn't really matter.

It might be wise to indulge some of the people you live with who actually makes them a little bit crazy. If it doesn't affect you, you know, if it doesn't affect you, I'm not saying to sacrile. your own needs for them fully, but if it doesn't really matter to you, then, and you don't mind them creating a system for you, it might not hurt to kind of be a little bit more relaxed and letting other people put a system on you if it doesn't make as much of a difference. But if you're a Lorelei Piler and you live with your piles and you live with your mess, I just want you to know that I know it's not because you're lazy.

It's just because you're doing other things, and that's okay. Type 3. The utilitarian or the Luke. So Utilitarian Luke doesn't have a lot of stuff because he doesn't attach sentimentality to most things. Stuff serves a purpose and then it moves on. Now Utilitarian Luke isn't cold-hearted. I want you to hear me, especially if you are this person. Because often this person values people and experiences far more than things. They're usually super generous. Often the utilitarian Luke is the person who takes time to give meaning to stuff that's meant for others. Like when he built Lorelai the Hupa, right? That didn't have anything to do with him. And it was a huge labor of love and this huge, this giant thing, this big piece of stuff that he doesn't necessarily care about. It's not sentimental to him, but he cares about her. And so he's willing to attach meaning to stuff.

That's such a huge quality of the utilitarian loop. they might have a simple wardrobe only the essentials when it comes to living and they don't have to worry about where things go because there's more space than there is stuff that is a magical combination for the utilitarian loop when you have more space than you do stuff and you don't worry about filling up the space with more stuff but the potential pitfall of utilitarian luke is unknowingly communicating a lack of interest in things that are important to other or unknowingly communicating a judgmental attitude towards people who do keep a lot of stuff. I know you don't mean to, but if that's you, just be watchful of how you speak into the lives of

others who simply are different than you. They just see stuff differently than you do. So we have type 1, the orderly Rory, type 2, the Lorelei Piler, type 3, utilitarian Luke, type 4, the stuff enthusiast or the lane. So stuff enthusiast lane gets so excited about the prospect of a new lipstick reading that book everyone's talking about, trying out the newest organizational trend. But those things are often abandoned pretty quickly. It's not because they don't matter, but because those items have served their purpose. The stuff enthusiast lives with FOMO, Fear of Missing Out, in the best sense.

They are excited about experiences. They're excited about what's happening kind of like on a relational community level. They love sharing their discoveries with others. They probably organize in broad strokes. If this is you, you might have like a giant bin for all your makeup. You're not going to be an orderly Rory and line it up by, you know, item and then color code it and all that stuff. You aren't going to be a utilitarian Luke who has like one all-purpose stick that you, you can use for like your entire face.

You're not going to be a laurelite piler where you have makeup in multiple rooms of your house, right? You probably have it in your bathroom where you put your makeup on, but it might just be in one bin. So there is a level of organization, but it's more in broad strokes. Aw, isn't something we need to travel for. It's something waiting for us in everyday life, whether in a city street or a moment with a work of art. I'm Dr. Keltner, host of the Science of Happiness podcast. Join me for Cities of Aw, a special series on how our public spaces can spark awe, wonder, and enhance the quality of public life. You can find us wherever you listen to your podcasts.

So you might have a cabinet that holds like all of your home decorating stuff, but there's no order inside those doors, right? So stuff enthusiast Lane can get into trouble a couple of ways, though. one, she's likely to accumulate a lot quickly and have to do major purges more often. Now, thankfully, she's not terribly sentimental, so things get the boot without ceremony, and they often land in the hands and homes of very thankful friends. If you are friends with a stuff enthusiast, you probably get some pretty cool free stuff a lot of the time. And then the second thing that could kind of trip up a stuff enthusiast is unknowingly hurting a friend or family member by dismissing something that was once super important and held in like really high esteem together and is now kind of in that trash or give it away pile. Now, okay, just like with the Lorelei Piler, I am in no way advocating that you only meet the needs of other people.

like you do need to meet your own needs as well. But in this situation, because I don't want you to hold onto things for someone else's sake, no matter what your organizational style and personality, I don't want you to do that because that is when we get overwhelmed by our homes because we are keeping all the stuff that doesn't matter to us, but it might matter to another person. And I don't think that's healthy. I don't think that that's necessary. What I am saying, though, if you are a stuff enthusiast lane, is to acknowledge the love

and the use of something that was given to you or that maybe was shared with someone else, okay? You can still release the physical item, but consider acknowledging the memory of it, like what it represented to someone who might carry more sentimentality than you do. You all remember the episode of New Girl when Coach was moving away,

and he was like, one bag. Everything is going to fit in one bag. And Winston was determined to show him that there was going to be sentimentality to things. Remember they had the crepe pan? And when coach wasn't going to take the crate pan, it was like his and Winston's like special memory. And when he was like, no, I don't need that crate pan.

Winston was super hurt, right? Because the crate pan had been such a huge part, this is a real story, had been such a huge part of their relationship. And so it's not, even though coach did end up taking the crate pan, the point is he didn't have to. He could have acknowledged the value of it and still let them. thing go, right? Because the whole thing about putting sentimental value on an object is it kind of gives you a chance to remember things. It's a physical representation of something that mattered.

If you can acknowledge that it matter a different way, that physical representation might not be as important. Okay. So if you are a stuff enthusiast, if you are a utilitarian, if you are a person who like gets rid of things without sentimentality, just be aware that there is a way for you to still do that, but acknowledge the sentimentality, that's such a hard word to say, that another person might feel. Okay? So that is type four. And then type five, the final type, which I think is a lot of us, is the accumulator or the sukey. So accumulator suki loves to hold on to things for a lot of reason.

Maybe it'll come in handy later. Maybe her kid will totally want all of the books that he read when he was a kid, when he's a grown-up. maybe a neighbor will one day ask if she has a power washer he can borrow and accumulator Suki will take great joy in saying yes yes I do have a power washer you can borrow stuff never loses its power or its purpose even stuff that isn't touched for months or years okay so accumulator sukis love to accumulate it really gives them great life however here is the pitfall It is simply having too much stuff and often know where to put it. Accumulator Suki has packed closets and garages, but doesn't mind too much.

She doesn't mind too much. You might not mind too much except when you can't find something. Sure, you might accept the help of an orderly rollery to get things more organized, but you might be too busy or distracted or lazy to do all the work required to let go of all the stuff, especially stuff that might make a difference in someone else's life down the road, right? Any attempt at decluttering for accumulator Suki is a beautiful and very slow walk down memory lane. If an orderly Rory is in the situation, when that starts happening, she's peasing. Like, she's like, I don't have time for this.

It's just a really slow process because everything is hard to let go of because everything means something. So if you are an accumulator Suki, consider the trade-off of the time it takes to manage all the stuff that's meant for others, rather than spending that time actually with others. It could be that your stuff is getting in the way more than you realize. Also, I just want to give you a little spiritual reminder. You as a person, if you are an accumulator Suki, and you are holding on to things in order to bring life and goodness and joy to, others, but it's kind of causing maybe the people that you live with or even sometimes you more anxiety and stress than you would care to admit. I want to remind you, you are as a person are more important to your friends and family than the stuff you can contribute to their lives.

You as a person are more important than the stuff that you can contribute. So which type are you? Yes, we definitely all have similarities with many or even all five of these types. But the important thing I think to notice is which one is your default, which way do you live and organize without thinking, at least just the broad strokes of it? Because you can't organize your home well if you don't accept how you personally need to organize. If you are not linear, stop it with a label maker. If you don't find items sentimental, stop trying to force meaning and instead find a different way to experience a person or event without the actual item it might represent.

you get to do this your own way. Stop trying to do it the way that Pinterest tells us to. And if you are an orderly Rory, which is definitely the most Pinteresty way to be, let me say something to you specifically. A well-ordered outer life cannot be a mask or an out-of-order inner life. So often, orderly Rory's,

and I include myself in this, I am super an orderly Rory. So often we use organization to distract. ourselves and others from the fact that we really don't have it all together, that we're just pretending. I will link to a post I wrote actually in the show notes about this very thing. It's called Quit Setting Stupid Goals. And in that post, I share thoughts on our attempt to manage others' perception of us through organization and productivity. It's a lie, guys. It is. It's such a shadow of the truth. You can be organized and enjoy your labels and your systems, but remember, systems

can't save you. And that's another post that I'll link to in the show notes that I wrote called Systems Can't Save You. I talk about that stuff a lot, actually. If you are feeling motivated to tackle your house, but you don't know where to start, I have some really fun news for you, especially if you're listening to this, like the week that it releases. I have created a mini course that's available for this week only that will help you declutter your life and for good, truly. Now, I know I said earlier that decluttering is a sham, and yes, it is. I do believe that. But that's because we've been doing it wrong.

We've been taught wrong this whole time. And I want to do it like a lazy genius does it. I want us to declutter like lazy geniuses. So I would love, love, love, love for you to go and take a look at the course and let me help you clear a path through your stuff to create a home that you love. And, of course, we will do it the lazy genius way because that's what we do around here. You can get more info on that course at the lazy genius collective.com slash stuff. I'll also put a link to it in the show notes with all those posts and all the things at the lazygeeniescollective.com slash lazy slash organize.

So remember, please go easy on yourself with this whole organization business. Don't do what's not you. It will definitely never last if you don't do it the way that fits your style and personality. Let's spend time on what matters and what. lasts. Okay, before we go, let's do our lazy genius tip of the week. If you follow me on Instagram at the lazy genius, you might have heard this one since I've shared it there before. One of the biggest pitfalls to getting dinner on the table is having thawed meat, right? We always forget to pull it out in time and then we're left with like frantic options when four o'clock rolls

around. The tip that has literally been the easiest thing and has made such a huge difference is to set an alarm on your phone. It'll go off every day. the same time, I recommend the morning while you're still like not crazy yet. And just put the message like full meat out of a freezer. If you don't need meat that day, just don't get meat. But if you do need it, go grab it. Either way, it is a kind regular reminder that dinner is coming. Dinner is on its way, guys. So go ahead, even if you don't need meat, but go ahead and think of something now before the day gets crazy. That's why I like doing it in the morning. So many of our problems with cooking simply come from not planning or remembering. I mean, they really do. So this is such a

a lazy genius way to remember something that will make the rest of the day so much better. And bonus, lazy genius tip. To speed up falling, put the meat in a container of water inside the fridge, it's way faster than without the water. Right. That's it for today. Thanks so much for listening, guys. Be sure to check out the show notes at the lazy geniuscollective.com slash lazy

slash organize. And again, don't miss out on that mini course. It's available just this week until Sunday, October 15th. So check it out at the lazy genius collective.com slash stuff. If you hear this too late, if you hear this after the 15th, you can still go there anyway and get on a waiting list for the next time I offer it. It might not be until next year, but I do hope to offer it again. For whatever reason, I have gotten so many emails and Instagram messages and like lots

of podcast reviews over the last couple of weeks. And as a person whose love language is words of it, affirmation. You guys, my bucket is so full. Thank you so much for taking the time to encourage me. Thank you for sharing the show with your friends. Thanks for the reviews that helps strangers find the show. I just, hooray for a lazy genius world, and let's just make more people lazy geniuses. I think everything will go better. I hope you have a great week. And remember, be a genius about the things that matter and lazy about the things that don't. I'll see you next time. Have you ever felt like you were living just a B or B plus life?

It's so dangerous to live that more dangerous than a B minus or a C plus life because when you're living a B or B plus life, you don't change it. You think it's good enough. Is it? I'm Susie Welch. I host a podcast called Becoming You. People think, okay, an A plus life is not available to me, but there is a way. We are all in the process of becoming ourselves. Listen to Becoming You wherever you get your podcasts.