The 15 Minute Organizer (For the Oganizationally Challenged)

Character traits can either help or hinder our homemaking. I think that, in my own case, there have been many days where I've looked around at about 2 o'clock in the afternoon only to find that I can't really account for what I've accomplished. Either there have been interruptions, I've gotten busy doing something I didn't plan to do, or I've just felt too blah to get things done. I can honestly say that I've accomplished the least when I've felt completely overwhelmed. My nature is to shut down and push things off until the next day when I feel that I have too much to do. Well that doesn't accomplish anything!

When training my children, I see their character qualities, good and not so good. I work diligently at molding those not so good character qualities into the good ones and helping them to use the good ones in great ways. So why can't I do this with myself? I'd love to be able to get up in the morning and follow the suggestions of so many other homemakers with their nice schedules and their organization tactics but I'm me and I wasn't born the Queen of Clean or Olivia Organized. I have to work really hard at it and it can wear me out mentally! That's not an excuse. I'm just saying that this is an area in which I'm not a natural. So I've been training my character to become more diligent in my homemaking skills.

To start off realistically, I bought Emilie Barnes' "The 15 Minute Organizer." This book is really helping me to do things that I've wanted to but just haven't known where to start. The chapters are very short, which I find great because I can read the chapters in small snippets of my time. Emilie also uses scripture in the chapters to keep her readers in tuned to what the Bible says about things like procrastination, having a vision, a time for everything, and even not doing what you say. I've been really encouraged as I've read through the first few chapters, and I really want to keep reading.

I'm determined, not to have the perfectly orderly home but to have the comfort that I, and likely my family, long for. It'll be interesting to see where the rest of this book takes me.


                                                      M