Paper Doll

Use Your Heart, Head, and Hands to Organize During the Slow Times

Posted on: June 19th, 2023 by Julie Bestry | 14 Comments

Most of time, we organize so that we can find what we need, when we need it, so we can zip along to the next thing on our list, lickety-split, so we have more time to get more done.

For most of our days, our weeks, our our lives, we zoom along like video game characters, basically PacMan eating up the dots, just trying to get to the next point in our lives. There are periods where we never feel like we have enough time.

(This video is 12 minutes. Please don’t feel obligated to watch more than a few seconds.)

Of course, there are also slow times, whether in business or in life. They fall during the chasm between Christmas and the New Year, surround long holiday weekends, and make up those lazy, hazy days of summer.

Sometimes, the days are slow because the kids have just started back to school but the rush and hubbub of after-school activities have yet to start; other times, we’ve slowed down because we’re recuperating from illness, and while too strong to take to our beds, we’re too fuzzy-headed to tackle a Zoom call. We don’t often get to pick when it’ll be slow, but slow times do come.

In fact, things might be slow for you right now. Perhaps your department just delivered a big project and is in a “pending” mode until it’s clear what the clients thing. Maybe you work for a company with a big European contingent and they start slowing down as the summer approaches (and pretty much shut down altogether in August), so there’s less (or no) urgent work. On the homefront, maybe maybe your kids are out of school and haven’t started all the activities to which you need to schlep them, like camp or summer classes.

The point is, if you’ve got a quiet slot right now (or one coming up), you’ve got three options: Freak out, give in, or find the middle path.

FREAK OUT ABOUT ALL THE FREE TIME

If you ever feel stressed about the prospect of having too much time, chances are good that you’ve gotten yourself deep into a sense of toxic productivity, a situation where you believe your value is tied to what you create, produce, or accomplish.

If that’s the case — if your friends are always telling you that you work too hard and your family (or even your manager) is pushing you to take vacation — then that’s exactly what you should do. Vacate! Take real vacation, one without email or social media, one away from your home and work obligations, and go where you can just soak up the sun and your surroundings.

So, if you’re agitated by the idea of having a slow period, put in your time-off request. Tell your bestie or your significant other to start planning a getaway. And read (or re-read) last year’s series on toxic productivity with a real accent on the essential cognitive flips (in part 2) and actionable tasks (in parts 3 and 4) that can transform your life into a more balanced, serene experience.

Toxic Productivity In the Workplace and What Comes Next

Toxic Productivity Part 2: How to Change Your Mindset

Toxic Productivity Part 3: Get Off the To-Do List Hamster Wheel 

Toxic Productivity, Part 4: Find the Flip Side of Productivity Hacks

Toxic Productivity Part 5: Technology and a Hungry Ghost

EMBRACE THE SLOWNESS AND VEG OUT

Maybe you are as burned out as the J9 toast in the grid below.

If you just made it to the end of the school year with one last nerve intact, you might feel like you have run a gauntlet. While we often talk about end-of-the-year stress and how people’s lives are overloaded from Thanksgiving up through the New Year, springtime can tip the scales as well. While introverts may be able to cocoon in winter, everyone’s expected to get more sociable as the weather gets warmer. Then there’s the stress of tax time. And, as always, there’s work.

So, if you’ve got the opportunity to veg out, sleep until mid-day on the weekends, and scroll your phone until bedtime, you might be tempted to do so.

The problem? Your summer will be over before you know it with nothing to show for it except a possibly shorter to-be-read pile (nothing wrong with that) and a tan line. Before you give in to giving in, take another look at my post Organize Your Summer So It Doesn’t Disappear So Quickly.

I’m not saying you have to set summer goals, but consider taking some time out to consider whether you want to accomplish something (anything) with your summer, and then absorb the advice in that post to move yourself along.

FIND A MIDDLE PATH TO DO MORE WITH YOUR SLOW TIME

The following suggestions aren’t designed to make you feel like you have to do more — again, we’re not aiming to generate toxic productivity. Do less of the things that wear you down. For example, embrace meals where you can toss fresh or pre-cooked items into one big bowl drizzled with a nice vinaigrette. Eat more cold things on these hot days and feel refreshed. The more time you spend outside, the less mess to be made inside the house, and the less housework there will be!

The following ideas are things you can do during the slow periods so that when work or life ramps up later, you’ll feel more enthusiastic and supported. Let’s look at how you can organize your heart, your head, and your hands.

Organize Your Heart — Show Gratitude

I’m not talking about writing the thank you notes after you get holiday or birthday gifts. (Though, if you owe those, send them now and you’ll feel like you’ve made a huge accomplishment with little effort). Get a cute box of note cards and a stack of nifty stamps from the post office, and the next time somebody does something you appreciate, dash off just a few lines. You’d be amazed what a real piece of mail in the mailbox can do for someone else’s mood and how that delight can spread from person to person. (Be the butterfly!) 

Praise and tag the author of the book you just read on social media, and leave kudos on GoodReads.

Email praise and CC: the supervisors of service providers or colleagues who go above and beyond.

Leave glowing online reviews for the companies and workers who’ve done an excellent job; your praise helps others find them.

Promote the podcasts and blog posts of the friends and colleagues who have promoted things you’ve created — and even the ones who haven’t.

Start, and keep up with, a gratitude journal, whether on paper or digitally.

There’s an abundance of research that indicates that showing gratitude helps us improve our mental and physical health. Actions related to showing gratitude release oxytocin, a hormone associated with positive emotions.

When life is going at full-tilt, you might not feel like you have the time to incorporate gratitude into every day, but if you do it in tiny fits and starts during slow periods (like summer), it will become natural and benefit you (and the beneficiaries of your gratitude) all year long. For more ideas, consider registering for Mayo Clinic’s free, virtual Discover Gratitude program.

Organize Your Head — Use Your Slow Time to Learn

I’m surprised I hear, “How did you know that?” from everyone from clients to Paper Mommy, and I’m always perplexed. Certainly, some flotsam and jetsam in my brain gets there by unknown travels, but usually, it’s because I’ve chosen to focus on a topic and read different approaches.

Most often, it’s not about learning a fact, but about understanding how thing interrelate, and I find that the point at which you have read just enough about a subject such that your brain goes, “Oh, right, I know that, and next they’re going to say…” is the point at which you know enough that you could explain the subject to someone else. That’s when you know things sufficiently.

Pick a topic. Google it. (If it’s a fast-paced topic in the news, use the “Tools” button to select only things written in the last year, month, or week.) See if there’s a Wikipedia entry. Ask ChatGPT to tell you the basics (but understand that it’s experimental and only has information from prior to mid-2021). 

Every time another blogger or journalist mentions a book or an expert, write down the title or name. Then get library books on the topic, so you haven’t added to your permanent clutter unless you find the resource useful.

Take advantage of online learning resources. If you want to learn science, history, or literature, jump into the amazing array of offerings at Crash Course‘s YouTube channel. (The World History course units are captivating, but if you prefer anything from botany to business, economics to linguistics, there’s something for you.)

You can learn to code for free at Codecademy or get ahead in the math, science, arts, and humanities your kids will be learning next year by visiting Khan Academy. And, of course, there are always podcasts and TEDTalks.

And all the while, capture your understanding in notes. Keep a notebook or use Evernote, but log the main concepts, the things that aren’t obvious. Whether you’re trying to learn a particular technological tool, or an aspect of history, or a technique for your profession, writing down what you’ve learned will help cement the finer points. Keep a learning journal!

The point is, there’s always the excuse that we don’t have enough time. But if things are (or get) slow, having these kinds of activities in your back pocket will allow you to be intentional with your newly available time.

Organize Your Hands — Tidy Your Tech

OK, technology isn’t actually your hand, but your tech is never far from your hands, whether it’s a phone in your palm or a keyboard under your fingertips. So much of your life is spent dealing with the clutter of these technological giants.

When work is slow, it’s a great opportunity to tackle organizing tasks that often get overlooked during busier periods. Whether you’ve got a quiet two hours while the rest of the afternoon yawns ahead of you or just keep finding pockets of time, the slow bits of your life are the perfect moments to clear out the aspects of your technology that normally slow you down.

Do one or more of these tasks in a chunk of time, or take five minutes when the phone isn’t ringing; it’s up to you!

Clear out your email inbox. 

Mail App photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash  

Do a search in your inbox for “unsubscribe” (sometimes it’s written in white on white, serving as invisible ink to keep you from saying goodbye) and unsubscribe from anything you find yourself never reading.

Create homes for emails. Set up a simple hierarchy of subfolders with names of major projects, client names, etc. Having a place for emails to safely, dependably live will encourage you to manually or automatically route necessary them out of your inbox. Don’t feel like you should save all emails. Unless you have to prove that the sender acknowledged receipt or authorized something, you can delete emails just say “Thanks” or “okey-dokey.”

Set up filters or use the Rules function built into your email platform to automatically sort mailing lists to one sub-folder, anything you’re always CCed on even though you know it’s got nothing to do with you to another, and so on. Get the non-essentials in your inbox out of it. 

Add emails with meeting links to your calendar, then put the email in a “Pending Event” folder in case you need to check something in advance of the meeting. When an email represents a task you have to do, add it to your to-do list or task app, then move the email to a folder related to that project or issue.

The less that’s in your inbox, the more managemable it will be but you won’t be as tempted to keep “checking email” or feel demoralized by clutter piling up.

Organize your digital passwords.

If you’ve got little bits of paper everywhere telling you how you can access your digital life, it’s slowing you down (and not letting you enjoy the slower times)! And if you’re using the same password everywhere, you’re slowing yourself to an eventual dead-stop if you get hacked!

Use a password manager like 1Password, Bitwarden, or Dashlane to centralize and organize your online login credentials. Then use your bits and pieces of slow time to update and strengthen weak passwords for the accounts you do you use and delete the ones that you don’t. (I started this recently and found dozens of login credentials for websites that don’t even exist anymore!)

Organize your digital files.

I’m not trying to suggest a major organizing project for your slow time; remember, the point is to make progress that will make your life easier without overdoing it.

Start with your cloud storage like Google Drive or Dropbox. Declutter by deleting anything that’s outdated and getting rid of duplicates. (I can’t tell you how often I’ve had three and sometimes even more copies of a PDF that was a “free gift” related to some online course because I attended different webinars by the same speaker.)

Once you’ve reduced your collection to what you actually want to keep, think about the categories into which they can be grouped. It’s funny, but no matter how organized someone’s hard drive might be, their cloud storage tends to be a Wild West of loose files and folders with mysterious names.  

Create an organized folder structure that makes sense to you — preferably one that matches what you’re already using on your computer — and when necessary, rename files that are confusing or mysterious.

Update your contacts.

Go through your contacts lists and purge duplicates. Check the accuracy, and make sure to save the numbers and addresses that hold the most information while dumping the ones that have only a partial piece of what you need.

Delete names you don’t need anymore. Going through my phone recently, I found a contact for “Andy Accident.” It took a few moments to realize that that’s how I listed the guy who rear-ended my car at a stoplight in January 2020! I definitely don’t need that number anymore!

The great thing about using your slow time to update your contacts list is that it reminds you of the people you know and like but haven’t chatted with in a while. Make note to call or text or email the people whose names you came across and thought, “Wow, I miss so-and-so!” and then actually DO contact them. They’ll be delighted, and it’s a great way to use those bonus minutes and hours that your slow time makes available.

Once you’ve finished with your contact lists in your devices, move on to pruning your social media accounts (including professional accounts like on LinkedIn). Delete the connections for the company you only followed to enter that one contest or people you linked with two careers ago (and only because you felt obligated). Add new contacts you’ll realize are missing as you remove the outdated or irrelevant ones. 

Eliminate app overload.

Your time has given you some breathing room, so why not make some breathing room on your devices?

The Pareto Principle says that 80% of our success comes from 20% of our efforts. That holds true in many ways; 80% of the time, we wear the same 20% of our wardrobe, kids play with the same 20% of their toys, and so on. We mostly use the same 20% of our apps. This is why letting things go from the 80% we hardly ever use makes us feel less cluttered and more productive, even though we anticipate we’ll feel anxious about having let them go, which is why they’re cluttering up our digital spaces in the first place.

Flip through your home screens on your devices and take inventory. (Just be careful not to get caught up in reading notifications or scrolling through social media!)

What apps did you download and never even try because they required setting up a login? What apps did you give up on because they were buggy? Those are the low-hanging fruit you can start deleting. Be like Elsa in Frozen and let them go!

Next, to see where you’re overusing the apps you don’t want to be using as much, check your Digital Wellbeing feature on Android or ScreenTime on iOS. Uninstall the ones that distract or drag you down.

If you’ve still got a pile of distracting apps that you can’t bear to uninstall, move them to your last home screen page to create more friction — you’ll be less likely to happen upon them when looking for your bank app.

Which are the apps you want to use all the time because of the benefits they bring to your well-being? Put them on your first screen.

Finally, organize what’s left. Drag and drop apps onto one another to make folders labeled for shopping, dining, social media, productivity apps, etc. You’re keeping those apps, just making them less obvious. This way, you’ll encounter an app only when you want to rather than when the little notification numbers pop up.

Whatever you do with these upcoming lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer, I hope you enjoy them. But if you do find long stretches of time and aren’t quite sure what to do with them, I hope the above post has given you some options to use your time well and set the stage for the next time life gets busy.

Posted in Paper Organizing, Time Management | 14 Comments »

Paper Doll’s Ultimate Guide to Legally Changing Your Name

Posted on: June 12th, 2023 by Julie Bestry | 12 Comments

It’s June, the traditional month for weddings, and after weddings come honeymoons, “thank you” notes, and at least for some people, name changes. Ms. Jane Independent may become Mrs. Jane United, or even Mrs. Jane Independent-United.

Image by Engin Akyurt from Pixabay

By the rules of etiquette, Mrs. Her-First-Name is only used for widows; instead, women were supposed to be Mrs. His-First-Name His-Last-Name, subsuming her entire identity under his.

Personally, Paper Doll does not think that is cool at all and is glad this has fallen out of fashion. Then again, Paper Doll can’t imagine ever changing my last name to that of any fella, no matter how much he resembles George Clooney, and certainly not making any part of my name disappear until my beloved has shuffled off this mortal coil.

But I digress.

WHY DO PEOPLE CHANGE THEIR NAMES?

The point is that people change their legal names for many reasons:

  • Women, when marrying, often take their new spouse’s last name. They also may append the new name to their old name, with or without hyphens. This ensures that at least part of her name matches her spouse’s name, and if they have children, it creates a new, cohesive family identity.
  • Men, when marrying, can also take their spouse’s names in place of their own, but this is still uncommon. However, men changing to a mutually-hyphenated last name such that Spouse Onename and Spouse Othername jointly take the surname Onename-Othername, is becoming more common. Some couples invent new last names altogether.
  • Women, when divorcing (and, given the above name change experience, men) often change their names. Many revert to what is colloquially called their “maiden” names. (Birth name, or family name of origin sounds a little more 21st-century, eh?) However, a colleague of mine disliked her family name of origin and rather than returning to it after divorcing, chose a completely new last name. 
  • Minors may get name changes when one parent remarries, thereby creating a cohesive family identity; this may or may not be related to an actual legal adoption by the step-parent.
  • Victims/Survivors of domestic violence and/or stalking may change their names to escape danger. 
  • Some people change their names to conform to their gender identity. The Olympian formerly known as Bruce Jenner is Caitlyn Jenner. The film performer Ellen Page is Elliot Page. (Note: referring to a person by a name with which they do not identify is called “deadnaming” and it’s unkind. Please don’t do that.)
  • People change their first or last names because they just don’t like them.

Hippie Baby Boomers born to Silent Generation and Greatest Generation parents changed their names from Ethel and Norman to trippy ones like Energy and Nomad. Kids born to hippie Boomer parents changed Moonbeam to Madison or Space to Spencer. Some parents give their kids names that are so awful, they demand change. And, of course, some folks just want to separate from past connections (e.g., bad parents, bad exes, bad decisions, etc.) and change their full names.

  • Celebrities may legally change their names when they get married while continuing to perform under their prior names, giving them some separation between public and private identities. 

Studio publicity still, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Given that Elizabeth Taylor was married eight times to seven men, it would have been very confusing if her credits had changed after each honeymoon! And I’m dubious that Elizabeth Taylor Rosemond Hilton Wilding Todd Fisher Burton Burton Warner Fortensky would have fit on a marquee.

Cherilyn Sarkisian La Piere Bono Allman had her birth father’s name, her step-father’s name, her first and second husbands names, but in 1978 she opted to simplify things and do the paperwork one last time — and since then has been known as Cher. Perhaps if she “could turn back time,” Cher would have changed her name earlier?

Jennifer Lopez dated Ben Affleck. Later, Jennifer Garner married Ben Affleck and legally became Jennifer Affleck. And then Jennifer Lopez married Ben Affleck, and she legally became Jennifer Affleck. Meanwhile, everyone still knows Jennifer Lopez as J.Lo and Jennifer Garner as America’s Sweetheart. Yet somehow, only Ben Affleck didn’t have to worry about re-monigramming his stationery!

  • People in the Witness Protection program get their names and entire identities scrubbed. Whether they are bad guys getting off easy or good guy whistleblowers or just unfortunate witnesses, people in WitSec have one advantage. The government does the paperwork for them!

WHAT KINDS OF NAME CHANGES ARE ALLOWED?

For your signature block in your work email or for friends to mail you birthday cards or to give the Starbucks barista your name, you can give your birth name, your married name, your non-de-plume, or your nickname. (Actually, in the case of Starbucks, it doesn’t matter; they’ll either get it wrong or make up a name for you.)

GoToVan from Vancouver, Canada, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Do you have to change your name legally? In some states, just using your new name makes it legal (enough), as long as you don’t have much in the way of financial dealings or international travel or a desire to make people and organizations refer to you by your preferred name. And if you’re newly married, your marriage license might suffice.

However, when you’re struggling with identity theft, traveling internationally, or dealing with legal or financial matters, you must be able to prove that you’re really you with valid ID: Social Security cards, birth certificates, passports, etc. And for those to be kosher, you definitely need your name change to be legal.

First, know there are rules about when you can’t change your name.

  • Your name change can’t be for a fraudulent purpose or to commit a crime. If you’re on the lam or trying to avoid paying your debts to Big Eddie (or, y’know, Wells Fargo), you can’t legally change your name. You also can’t do it to escape financial or criminal liabilities, or civil litigation.
  • You can’t take celebrities’ names in order to profit off of their identities.
  • If you’ve been convicted of certain types of felonies (in some jurisdictions), you can’t change your name to avoid public scrutiny or requirements to register as a sex offender. 

Next, there are rules about what you can change your name to be. Other than Roman numerals following your name — Thurston Howell III is OK — you can’t change to a name with a numeral in it.

Of course, each state has its own regulations. In 1977, the North Dakota Supreme Court refused to allow Michael Herbert Dengler to change his name to 1069 (pronounced as “one zero six nine”, lest you think he intended something unsavory), so he moved to Minneapolis. The Minnesota Supreme Court was similarly dubious, but ruled that “Ten Sixty-Nine” would be allowable. 

You can’t change your name to a symbol. Yes, I know about Prince. But, number one, he didn’t actually change his name legally. Number two, you are not Prince. 

You also can’t change your name to something that is generally offensive. No racial epithets or slurs, no hate speech, and usually no potty-mouth words (though judges usually have some latitude with regard to that last one).

WHAT’S THE LEGAL PROCESS FOR CHANGING YOUR NAME?

Legally changing your name requires paperwork and patience. Be prepared to locate your essential documents (check out How to Replace and Organize 7 Essential Government Documents to get started) fill out forms (by hand and online), jump through investigative hoops, and then use new identifying documentation to get other identifying documentation.

You’ll also need to tell everyone you know about the change. In the pre-COVID era, the process might take six to twelve; however, courts are still so backed up that in some municipalities, it’s taking much longer.

Name Change By Court Order

Gavel: Creative Commons/U.S. Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Aspen Reid/af.mil

If you’re changing your name for any reason other than a revised marital status, you’ll have to get a court order to do so. (Changing your name because of marriage or the dissolution of one has a separate procedure — of which, more later.) 

In general, this process requires a combination of the following procedures, depending on where you live:

File a petition with the court — This involves completing paperwork which will be called some variation on the title Petition for a Name Change. Different jurisdictions have different regulations — you might have to address a civil, probate, or superior court. The petition explains the name to which you wish to change and the reason for the change.

Submit a filing fee. The filing fees in the United States vary by state, and sometimes county, and range from a low of $25 in Alabama to a high of $435 in California. (Some states have waivers for people in dire financial circumstances, so be sure to ask.)

Submit a form for a Court Order Granting Change of Name for the judge to sign.

Publish a notice of petition to the public. In general, when you change your name, you have to announce the intended name change in a number of newspapers in your community. Most commonly, you can publish these in the classified sections of “penny saver” newspapers to save money. Usually, the notice must be published multiple times over successive weeks.

Note that victims/survivors of domestic violence or sexual assault may request to have the publication element waived. Similarly, some states (including California, Colorado, Maine, and Nevada) eliminate publication requirements for name changes done to align with gender identity. Obviously, individuals in witness protection do not have to publish their notice of petition.

Once you receive an affidavit that the ad(s) have been published, submit this to the court with the other forms. (I must admit that I’m sometimes surprised that putting a notice on your Facebook or Instagram account isn’t considered adequate for this purpose. I can’t imagine anyone but private detectives and bounty hunters reading the classified of these papers that most people let moulder on their front lawns.)

Special circumstances

Fingerprint image by ar130405 from Pixabay 

In addition to the above, you may also have to:

  • File a legal backer form, authorizing notification of creditors re: name change. 
  • Undergo an FBI background check (for which you will pay a fee) if you live in Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, South Carolina, or Texas. Depending on the court you petition, a judge may require a background check in California or Maine.  
  • Have your fingerprints taken if you live in Alabama, Colorado, Maine, North Carolina, and Texas. And yes, there are additional costs.
  • Acquire an Affidavit of Consent, if required in your area. If you’re changing a minor child’s name to match the name of a new step-parent and newly-married parent, irrespective of whether the new step-parent will legally adopt the minor, you’ll need an affidavit of consent.
  • Send an Affidavit of Service of Notification to appropriate authorities if you are classified as an alien resident, a former convicted person, or an attorney. (How’s that for a strange combo platter?)
Next steps for your court order

Got all those essential forms signed and notarized by the court clerk in your jurisdiction? Scan and/or make copies and put them in a safe place (like a fireproof safe or safe deposit box) and submit the originals for approval.

You may have to attend a court hearing to defend your reason for changing your name if a creditor, ex, or busybody sees the publication of your notice and objects to the name change.

If the court approves your petition, you’ll get a court order called an Order Granting Change of Name which serves as legal proof of your name change. You’ll need this document, and usually your original birth certificate or proof of prior name, in order to make lots of other changes.

Important note: In some states, people seeking a name change due to domestic violence have the right to have their records sealed. If this is your situation, please confer with an attorney or a domestic violence agency to obtain information and assistance regarding your state’s regulations.

Name Change By Marriage (or Divorce)

Mazel tov on getting married! (Condolences…or mazel tov, depending on your feelings, if you’re getting divorced.)

Getting married doesn’t, per se, legally change one’s name, though the process is smoother than seeking a court order.

Do, however, decide in advance what you want your name to be. If your marriage license says FirstName Oldname Lastname but you intend to live as First Name Oldname (hyphen) Lastname, you’re going to have to get the license right before you can move forward.

(Honeymoon travel warning: the TSA takes name-matching seriously. If your ticket says Mrs. Madison Newname and your passport or driver’s license says Ms. Maddie Oldname, you’re at the mercy of the TSA. Don’t imagine you can roll up to Security with your the-ink-is-barely-dry marriage license, an embossed invitation, and catering bill and expect to make the flight. Book honeymoon travel under your pre-marriage name and leave the name change paperwork for when you get back.) 

If you’ve divorced, your divorce degree should serve the same purpose as a certified marriage license; be sure the divorce decree covers it if you intend to revert to the name you went by prior to your marriage. (If you decide to give up your married name after the divorce is final, petition the court for an amendment to the divorce decree.)

Name Change to Match Your Gender Identity

For people who are trans, the process involves a getting a legal name by court order, but it’s not quite as simple as described above. It’s also necessary (and sometimes complicated) to change one’s gender marker, the official designation of gender on certain state and federal documents (like driver’s licenses and passports).

Gender markers may be “male,” “female,” or “X” (for non-binary), though only Oregon allows you to petition for a change of gender marker at the time of your name change, and not all states allow a marker change. However, the federal government now recognizes X and you can change the gender marker on your passport; later in 2023, it can be changed on other documents. 

Changing a gender marker may or may not require changing your name legally. Seven states and two territories require proof of surgery, court order, or altered birth certificate to change gender marker on driver’s licenses, while fourteen states require proof of surgery or a court order to change the designation on a birth certificate. And four states (Montana, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and West Virginia) don’t allow amending gender markers on official documents. 

This can get complex, so check with your state and review the incredibly-detailed PDF Identification Documents and Transgender People: An Overview of the Name and Gender Marker Change Process in the United States for guidance. 

WHAT TO DO ONCE YOUR NEW NAME IS OFFICIAL

Once you’ve legally changed your name, there’s still more paperwork to be done — and before you can start,  you’ll have to make sure you’ve got your (paper)ducks in a row.

  • If you got married, obtain official (certified) copies of your marriage license. (You’ll know they’re official if they’ve got raised “bumpy” seals.) Request them from the municipal office where you registered and filed for your marriage license (that is, where you got married, not necessarily where you live). You’ll get one official copy as part of your licensing fee, but you’ll have to pay for extras.
  • If you filed with the court for a name change (or got divorced), obtain certified copies of the court order or divorce decree.
  • Whatever your reason for changing your name, the next steps will require proof of your former name, so before you get started, make sure you have official copies of your birth certificate, too. 

Start with Uncle Sam

Social Security Card — Contact the Social Security Administration at 800-772-1213 or go into a local office; just don’t fall for any emails or junk mail promising to get you a new card for a fee. The Social Security Administration doesn’t charge for new cards due to name charges. (Heck, you get 10 free replacement cards in a lifetime!)

Follow the prompts and the automated system will walk you through the steps for filling out an SS-5 and getting a new card. Alternatively, you can follow the instructions on the Social Security Administration’s web site. Fill out the application and provide official copies of documents proving your legal name change, your identity, and either your U.S. citizenship or immigration status. (You can also change your gender marker.)

*Note: If you immediately move to a new state after getting married or securing a court-ordered name change, the Patriot Act requires that you change the name on your Social Security card before you acquire a new driver’s license.

Passport — The U.S. Department of State has different requirements for issuing passports reflecting name changes, depending on whether one’s last passport was issued within the last year or earlier, and whether you have documentation to prove (via marriage license or court order) your name change. Review the linked page and follow the steps to determine if you can submit your documentation by mail or must apply in person, and whether there are fees associated with your situation.

Now handle state and local documents

Driver’s License — Each state has different regulations regarding how quickly you have to change your name on your license. South Carolina and Wyoming expect you to change your driver’s license to reflect your new name within ten days of your wedding, which might put a crimp in a two-week honeymoon.

Other states have similar, though less urgent, deadlines. Apparently, you can double or halve your weight, dye your hair purple, switch to blue contact lenses, or grow a beard, and their are no requirements to contact the DMV, but if you use your new name, the DMVs of the USA get uniformly cranky! Call or check your state’s web site for regulations, make an appointment (vs. attempting a walk-in), and bring certified copies of your marriage license, divorce decree, or court order.

Voter Registration Card — Contact your board of elections or pick up a voter registration form at your public library or Department of Motor Vehicles. Alternatively, visit National Mail Voter Registration Form to report a change of name on your voter registration. (Note, New Hampshire, North Dakota, and Wyoming do not participate.)

Tell Everyone Else

With the government out of the way, notify everyone else. There’s less urgency to this, especially as “officialdom” wanes; I’ve arrange the list below in declining order of importance and urgency. 

To save time filling out forms, you might want to consider acquiring a uniform name change form, such as Nolo’s Declaration of Legal Name Change. (It’s currently free.) Then notify:

  • The US Post Office — This isn’t legally required, but you’ll be getting mail in your old name and new name for a while, so make sure your mailbox label lists both or that your post office knows about the new identity. (Don’t assume that your postal carrier pays attention.)
  • Insurance companies — Update your health insurance policy and cards first, then automobile, renters/homeowners, etc.
  • Human Resources and/or Payroll at your place of employment.
  • Banks — Order checks and deposit slips bearing your new name.
  • Brokerage houses where you hold investment or retirement accounts. If you’re listed as a beneficiary on someone else’s accounts, encourage them to update their records.
  • Credit card companies 
  • Utilities and other essential services
  • Other companies with which you have accounts, particular those you pay or which pay you 
  • State or other licensing agencies for operation/ownership of firearms, boats, planes
  • Internal Revenue Service and your state and local tax authorities
  • Veteran’s Administration, if applicable
  • Offices of public assistance, like SNAP
  • Professional licensing or certification organizations
  • Friends and associates (so they know how to address you)
  • Doctors, dentists, therapists and other health professionals
  • College alumni associations
  • Clubs, gyms, and other memberships

Contact your attorney about updating your estate documents with your new name. This may include wills, health care proxies, mortgages, leases, trusts, Power of Attorney documents, etc. See How to Create, Organize, and Safeguard 5 Essential Legal and Estate Documents and The Professor and Mary Ann: 8 Other Essential Documents You Need To Create to get started.

Check your credit report at AnnualCreditReport.com to make sure nobody has fraudulently opened accounts in your old name.

If the thought of doing this all on your own gives you a headache and writer’s cramp, help is available. Many professional organizers who specialize in paper management (like me!) will sit by your side and walk you through filling out paperwork. You can also avail yourself of specialized services:

Disclaimers

Note to Canadian readers: The process in Canada varies by province, but appears to be similar (with the exception of there being no publication requirements); there are special circumstances for reclaiming an indigenous name. Please confer with legal experts in your province.

Paper Doll reminds readers that I am not a lawyer and nothing in this post should be taken as legal advice.

Posted in Legal, Lost and Found, Paper Organizing, Vital Documents | 12 Comments »

Organize Your Summer So It Doesn’t Disappear So Quickly

Posted on: May 29th, 2023 by Julie Bestry | 18 Comments

When I was a child, each July 4th as the music in the bandshell would stop and we’d pack up our chairs and blankets to the post-fireworks hubbub of people making their way to their cars, my father would always say the same thing. 

As Independence Day would ebb away, he’d say, “Well, it’s the 4th of July. Summer’s over.”

And this would always annoy Paper Mommy.

It didn’t make sense. In New York State where we lived, school had usually only let out about two weeks earlier. Summer didn’t even officially begin of June 21st, and wouldn’t end until the third week of September. How could summer be over?

As an adult (and likely to Paper Mommy‘s dismay), I understand what my father was getting at. We all struggle through dark, dismal winters of our lives (literally and figuratively), holding out for the bright energy of the summer. I contend that it’s not spring we ever really eagerly anticipate. Springtime is rainy and windy; it contains the misery of April 15th and paying taxes, and after all, as T. S. Eliot said, April is the cruelest month.

But as May is ushered in, we finally get warm weather. Early graduations, while signaling the end of schooling, also bring new beginnings. And though the holiday is meant to pay tribute to those who died in service of protecting our nation and democracy, Memorial Day is nonetheless the marker we all use to signal the first real refresh of our lives and plans since New Year’s Day.

January 1st puts us on notice (or has us put the world on notice) that we have the power to make changes in who we are. Of course, we experience these changes every day, and don’t need holidays or permission to make ourselves new, as I wrote in Organizing A Fresh Start: Catalysts for Success.

And remaking ourselves and renewing our outlooks doesn’t have to take the shape of a resolution, as I’ve shared for many years, most recently in Review & Renew for 2022: Resolutions, Goals, and Words of the Year. 

That said, we’re five full months into the year, and we may not have accomplished what we’d hoped. June is still a few days away, but if we’re not careful, if we’re not intentional, July 4th will be here in the blink of an eye. The week after the July 4th holiday is usually spent recovering from either revelry or obligatory travel to relatives. The heat of the summer builds up and our motivation wears down, and then suddenly it’s August.

For European friends and colleagues, life comes to a stop in August and entire nations turn their backs on toxic productivity and go on holiday. On this side of the Atlantic, we trudge on, working on what we must and shocked at the brevity of weekends when there’s fun to be had at barbecues and pool parties. And then there’s a shocking moment when someone asks what we’re doing for the holiday and Labor Day is one flip-of-the-calendar away!

To Paper Mommy‘s chagrin, my father was right. By the time the smoky scent of the fireworks retreats on July 4th, it’ll be a merely blink, two at most, and summer will be over.

But it doesn’t HAVE to be that way. We can take our summer back. We have 98 days from Memorial Day to Labor Day. What if we make a pact to make some of our plans, perhaps even actual dreams, come true?

UNDERSTAND WHY THE SUMMER DISAPPEARS SO QUICKLY

Way back in March 2020, in Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is? 5 Strategies to Cope With Pandemic Time Dilation, I talked about how the oddness of the COVID lockdown made us lose track of time. I compared it to how in the first few days of a vacation, we’re hyper-aware of the strange stillness of not abiding by our usual and strict minute-by-minute schedules. But by a while into the vacation, we let our guards down and allow ourselves to drift off into the seductive haziness of having too few obligations.

If your work has “summer Fridays” or your kids don’t have scheduled activities (camp or lessons or clubs), you likely know what it’s like when summer makes your schedule feel more amorphous. Mealtimes, bedtimes, worktimes…summer time, in general, lacks structure.

When we aren’t careful about adding structure, we sink. (And while most TV-viewing GenXers have been shocked by how little literal quicksand we encounter in our 21st-century lives, we’ve nonetheless found that summer, like a mini-version of our early pandemic lives, causes us to sink into a malaise.)

MAKE YOUR SUMMER SCHEDULE SERVE YOUR GOALS

What I said in Struggling To Get Things Done? Paper Doll’s Advice & The Task Management & Time Blocking Virtual Summit 2022 is still apt. While much of that advice was envisioned for accomplishing things when there’s too much going on in your life, it’s surprisingly useful when the summer’s vagueness and low expectations melts our brains and our aspirations.

1) Put structure in your life. 

Create daily rituals so you have a real sense of the start and end of your workday, and develop buffer habits so your brain gets the same benefits of a commute even if you’re walking around the block instead of driving to work while listening to your favorite podcast.

Time block to create boundaries in your day. By blocking off specific times in your schedule for overarching categories (passive work projects, creative/active work projects, self-care, self-education, entertainment) you’re guaranteeing that there’s a place in your schedule for each. Knowing this gives you a sense of security, a system upon which you can depend. 

Someday is not a day on the calendar. Whether you schedule 15 minutes in the morning or two hours on each weekend day or a chunk of time on Tuesdays and Thursdays, nothing gets done unless you assign a place for a task or behavior to live (in your schedule). For help, revisit:

Playing With Blocks: Success Strategies for Time Blocking Productivity

Highlights from the 2023 Task Management & Time Blocking Summit

Surprising Productivity Advice & the 2023 Task Management & Time Blocking Summit

2) Enhance novelty.

During the summer, the weather tends to offer a delightful and dreamy sameness. With the exception of rain, the weather tends to offer little variance. The temperature tends to be the same, daily, and it requires fewer precautions on our part. So, we have to create opportunities for novelty.

If you work from home, especially on days where you don’t have to Zoom into a meeting, work at least a few hours a day from a different venue. Set up on the patio or your balcony before the day gets too hot. A friend often posts a photo of his laptop balanced on his outstretched legs in a hammock! Even moving to a different area in your house with a different view from the window can refresh your energy and give you the spark to tackle new opportunities.

Don’t stop with work. Make a point of eating different foods the usual, and consider dining al fresco in your backyard. Without a lot of advanced effort or admin, invite friends over to picnic after dinner without planning. They bring their meal, you eat yours, and maybe you share, but the point of the conviviality (beyond the loveliness of their company) is doing something different.

Author Laura Vanderkam‘s Tranquility by Tuesday: 9 Ways to Calm the Chaos and Make Time for What Matters, has a good handle on overcoming the sameness of our days.

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As a result of her research on the tracked time use of 150 of her study participants, Vanderkam posits that to get out of the ruts our lives inevitably fall into, we need more novelty, texture, and richness in our time and our tasks.

I’ve talked about Vanderkam’s nifty idea before. She encourages people to identify one “big adventure” (lasting perhaps half a weekend day) and one “little adventure” (lasting an hour) each week to introduce novelty. Why? As Vanderkam noted, “We don’t ask where did the time go when we remember where the time went.” 

As @LauraVanderkam noted, *We don't ask 'where did the time go?' when we remember where the time went.* Share on X

3) Create vivid sensory clues for the passing of time!

You’ve heard this from me before. Go analog!

Digital time just doesn’t provide the same sense of the passage of time as analog wristwatches and clocks. You don’t have to chuck everything out, though.

Identify which of your digital clocks you can change to an analog appearance.

  • Car — This weekend, I couldn’t figure out why my car was playing a podcast over Bluetooth when my phone was plugged into the charger. (Short answer: the charging cable worked fine for charging but decided not to be helpful for CarPlay. Apparently, that’s a thing that happens.) But while I was trying to figure out what the heck was wrong with CarPlay, I tapped on literally every function on my Kia’s screen. And I learned that the default screen has ALL SORTS of different display options, just like you can change the wallpaper on your phone. And one of those options let me me change the default screen to an analog one.
  • Trackers — For example, my FitBit has multiple clock faces, from plain digital to an avant guard look to a lovely, old-fashioned analog clock face.
  • Phones — Android phones allow you to change your lock screen from digital to analog easily. Things are a little murkier on the iPhone; the clock app icon is a working analog clock (Yes, really! Watch the red second hand sweep the clock face), but the lock screen stays digital. Sigh. 

Invite physical analog clocks into your space to make the passage of time more visible and real, and shake up your relationship with time.

4) Remember self-care! 

It’s no secret that I’m not a morning person, but it’s only been in the past few years that I’ve learned that our bodies need daylight in order to set our internal clocks to that we’re able to sleep at night. (This explains so much!) So, while there’s more daylight in the summer, it does you no good if you’re stuck inside your office or home and toiling away, missing it. 

At work, your fellow staffers may take advantage of smoke breaks. (Ugh.) That’s paid break time of which you may never have availed yourself. So try it. No, don’t smoke (seriously, don’t), but take the break time and go outside. Here are some good moments to take a fresh-air-and-sunshine break:

  • When you’ve come out of a meeting
  • If you’ve just finished a virtual call on Zoom or Meet or Teams
  • When you make three mistakes in a row. Everybody makes booboos, but if you mis-speak three times, or get confused about a concept, or just have a series of oopsies, that’s a sign that your brain is getting fuzzy and you need to refresh.
  • If you’re angry, frustrated, hurt, or disappointed. There’s a reason the “Taking a stupid walk for my stupid mental health” TikTok trend has become so popular. It works!
  • When you’ve just finished a chunk of deep work. Whether you’ve done a series of 25-minute pomodoros and are ready for a longer break, or you’ve tried the 52/17 Method and you’re ready for 17 minutes of sunlight, get the heck away from your desk. (More more on this, re-read Frogs, Tomatoes, and Bees: Time Techniques to Get Things Done.)

You also need sleep (aim for multiples of 90 minutes, so try 7 1/2 or 9 hours rather than your usual eight) to make sure you’re getting complete REM cycles.

Remember exercise. Whether it’s gentle yoga or power cardio, your body needs strong muscles, flexibility, and stamina.

Hydration and good nutrition are also essential. And no, this isn’t a wellness blog. But all of these things require good organization and management of your time. Set an alarm on your smartwatch or use an app to remind you to drink water. 

5) Take a Technology Break, or a Few 

Our dependence on technology can prevent us from noticing the real world all around us and the passage of time. I’m not saying to send letters by carrier pigeon instead of using email or scribbling numbers on the wall instead of using a spreadsheet. (Though it might be neat to receive a letter via the Owl Postal Service in the Harry Potter books!) But consider some options for reducing your dependence on tech when it’s not serving your productivity needs.

Keep the phone out of your bedroom. You’ll be less likely to doom scroll into the wee hours, and the blue light of your device won’t wreck your ability to fall and stay asleep.

When you do wake up, don’t grab your phone right away. Instead, do something intentional that will help you achieve your goals for making these hazy, crazy days of summer something more productive (or relaxing or dream-fulfilling). Why not:

  • Meditate or explore silent devotion?
  • Read a few pages of a real book?
  • Visualize your goals for the day and embrace some positive affirmations?
  • Get moving? Do some yoga stretches, go for a brisk walk, or do a short workout, or any tiny movement that won’t feel like labor but a nice blip of activity!

Start your day calmly and in control so you have a much better chance of achieving whatever it is you’d like to do with your summer.

When you’re working (or playing), keep your phone in your drawer or your bag. You’ll be distracted and interrupted far less often, allowing you to focus on what you’re doing and get into a flow state.

And maybe consider a digital detox where you put your gadgets and gizmos away after a certain time in the evening, or a technology sabbath where you eschew those pings and whooshes and curated feeds for 24 hours a week.

IDENTIFY WHAT YOU WANT TO ACCOMPLISH THIS SUMMER

Only you know what you want to achieve this summer. Once you’ve got an overarching goal, you can consider how you’ll implement it in small, manageable ways.

Write a book? If you do want to write a book, check out the sixth year of acclaimed author Jami Attenberg‘s 1000 Words of Summer challenge. It provides accountability and motivation for getting a jump start on your writing. And maybe you could follow it up in November with NaNoWriMo?

[Editor’s note: Jami’s series of challenges led to the 2024 release of 1000 Words: A Writer’s Guide to Staying Creative, Focused, and Productive All Year Round

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Get in shape? Pick just one thing. If you’re intrinsically motivated, block time to swim in the morning before work instead of scrolling social media and hitting your snooze alarm, or after work to give your brain a complete refresh before having a “part 2” of your day. If you need external  motivation and support, explore joining a summer workout program. Many cities and communities have outdoor sponsored by the Parks & Recreation departments for free or at minimal costs, and it’s less pressure (and cost) than joining a gym.

Maybe you don’t even know what you want to do this summer, but you just know you want this summer to be different and not whoosh by in a series of passing strangers on the street and saying, “Hot enough for you?” over and over. Peruse these posts for ideas:

102 Summer Goals That Are Perfect For Overthinkers

31 Best Summer Goals to Set This Season (2023)

45 Summer Goals: A List to Set for 2023

25 Summer Goals to Make the Most of the Season

Your summer plan doesn’t have to be a big thing. It doesn’t have to be a thing at all. Not everything has to be a big enough deal to make your family’s holiday newsletter. You could decide to eat more seasonal produce (rather than letting it turn to glop in the back of your fridge).

(I don’t know why this man needed so many bananas, but I applaud his enthusiasm!)

Maybe decide to set aside your spare change all summer and then donate it to charity…or splurge on something fabulous Labor Day weekend. (I won’t judge!) You could even strive to do some the things you missed out on during COVID, whether that’s seeing your favorite band on tour or traveling to a far-flung place.

Maybe you want to spend more time with your children to build memories, or have more quality time with your Significant Other or your BFF (not that your best friend isn’t also extremely significant)! Follow Laura Vanderkam’s suggestion and plot out big and little adventures for the summer weeks. By Labor Day, you’ll have stacked up a series of adventures that will make the summer memorable.

FIND A PARTNER

As I mentioned briefly in Paper Doll To the Rescue: How To Save Wet Books & Documents, a few summers ago, after a lifetime of trying (and failing) to read Anna Karenina, I partnered with my college friend and pre-COVID traveling buddy to read the book together. She’s a pediatrician in Upstate New York; I’m a Paper Doll in Tennessee. But through email and texts and phone calls, we were able to explore the characters and how we interpreted their behaviors through a modern lens. (Honestly, we gossiped about them as if they were Grey’s Anatomy characters. Just very, very Russian.)

We’ve decided to do it again, knowing we’re less likely to give up at a boring point if we’re doing this together. We agreed on reading another classic — we’re both fans of Jane Austen, but I already reread all six novels annually, and we wanted something new to both of us. I suggested Middlemarch, but she’s anti-George Eliot due to an unfortunate high school Silas Marner experience. She countered with Frankenstein, and while I appreciate Mary Shelley’s under-appreciated talents, I’ve read it before and it’s a downer.

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And that’s how we ended up starting reading Vanity Fair this weekend. Mr. Thackeray, do your darnedest!

Having a partner in crime is always a great way to stick to your goals, large or small. As a reminder, you’ll find lots of suggestions for getting support and accountability in:

Paper Doll Sees Double: Body Doubling for Productivity

Count on Accountability: 5 Productivity Support Solutions

Flow and Faux (Accountability): Productivity, Focus, and Alex Trebek

ESTABLISH BENCHMARKS AND CELEBRATE  YOUR SUCCESS!

Whatever you want to do this summer, whether it’s a big, honking deal or just a plan to find more time for your bliss, formally noticing that you’ve made strides toward your goal is a great way to honor your effort (and your magnificence).

Formally noticing that you've made strides toward your goal is a great way to honor your effort (and your magnificence). Share on X

Whether you choose to notice your successes by posting updates on social media or just calling your mother (or my mother — she’s great for building up confidence), the point is that you take time to pat yourself on the back and say, “Yay, me!”

Enjoy your summer!

Pulitzer Prize-winning Mary Oliver‘s oft-quoted poem, The Summer Day, has a profound message. After pondering the nature of nature, prayer, and mortality, and debating whether one even knows how to do what they’ve already been doing all day, the narrator asks with passion and reverence what we might want to ask ourselves as we set forth into the summer:

Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

You’ve got 98 days. Whatever your answer to the question, go for it!

Posted in Paper Organizing, Productivity, Psychological, Task Management, Time Management | 18 Comments »

Paper Doll on How to Celebrate Organizing and Productivity with Friends

Posted on: May 22nd, 2023 by Julie Bestry | 17 Comments

DO IT TODAY

Back in March, I told you all about my fabulous friend-of-the-blog (and of the blogger — me!), Kara Cutruzzula in Paper Doll Interviews Motivational Wordsmith Kara Cutruzzula. Writer/editor/playwright/lyricist/librettist & all-around-cool-kitten Kara and I have been collaborating for years and sharing one another’s achievements, and today is a chance to share something fun we’ve created together.

If you didn’t get the chance to read that post back, I recommend you jump over to do that. (There are some cool comedic and musical interludes!) We covered Kara’s talents at writing dialogue, especially spitfire-fast banter for whip-smart female characters like those in The Gilmore Girls and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and her skills at writing musicals. That post dug deep into Kara’s background and the resources she creates, including her uplifting Brass Ring Daily newsletter, and her books:

Do It For Yourself: A Motivational Journal,

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Do It Today: An Encouragement Journal,

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and her forthcoming Do It Or Don’t: A Boundary-Creating Journal.

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In that prior blog post, I also told you that Kara and I had recorded an episode of her Do It Now podcast to air in the podcast’s second season — and that episode is out now!

Today with Julie Bestry: Letting Go of the Stress of Getting Things Done

And it’s not just out, but it’s hot! The episode premiered last Monday, while I was off celebrating a long Mother’s Day weekend with Paper Mommy. Meanwhile, Kara promoted our lively conversation in her Brass Ring Daily newsletter, and listeners really took to it. Kara even forwarded one fabulous email message she received:

“I just wanted to share that on average, I listen to zero podcast episodes a year (it’s not a format that works for my brain usually) — and I could have listened to another two hours of you two talking. I enjoyed that so much this morning. Thank you for making this and sharing it, and to Julie of course.  Inspiring as always, and so expansive. Wow. ❤️ thank you.” 

Given that Paper Doll readers know how extensively I like to cover a topic, and how delightful and wise Kara is, I’m pretty sure we could have spoken for another two hours — maybe even another two days!

Kara’s podcast usually involves interviews with people I’d consider a much bigger deal than I am — Broadway bigwigs (performers, producers, and stage managers), screenwriters, musicians, journalists, and others who do their work on a big stage (no pun intended). But what we all have in common is the need to get things done each day, and that’s exactly what Kara asks guests about as a jumping off point —  what we’re doing that day, and what goes into making sure we get it done.

I’d been fascinated by, and had taken gems away from, every episode of the podcast’s first season, and I was a little uncertain as to what new I could bring to the table. It’s not like I could break into song or share any behind-the-scene secrets from Hamilton or Six. (Oh, if only I could!) But it took all of two seconds for Kara to put me at ease, Oprah-style, and we were off and running. We covered a lot of ground, including:

Having so much fun talking to Kara and riffing on these kinds of topics *almost* makes me wish she and I had a regular podcast where got to talk all the time!

You can catch Kara’s and my conversation on the podcast episode page, or at pretty much anywhere you listen to podcasts, like Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Overcast, Pocket Casts, Amazon Music, Castro, Castbox, Podcast Addict, Player FM, and Deezer. (And no, I hadn’t heard of most of those services, either.) You can also subscribe to the podcast by RSS. 

WORLD ORGANIZING DAY

This past Saturday, May 20, 2023, was World Organizing Day. To quote from NAPO‘s web site: 

World Organizing Day is a global initiative founded by the International Federation of Professional Organizing Associations (IFPOA) to celebrate the work of organizing and productivity professionals.

This designated day aims to increase public awareness of the benefits of getting organized. It highlights the work of organizing and productivity professionals who enrich the personal and professional lives of their clients.

It also recognizes the accomplishments of individuals and organizations in their efforts to become more organized and productive. 

With regard to benefits, it’s obvious that being more organized allows us to save time and money, and to be more productive. When we have organized systems and skills to get (and stay) organized, we can more effectively and efficiently use our space and find what we need when we need it.

However, the psychological benefits of organizing are manifold, as well. When we declutter our living and working spaces, we also reduce the psychological friction that stands between us and getting things done. We reduce frustration and overwhelm, giving ourselves a sense of confidence about our abilities and our surroundings, and increase our sense of ease around having others in our environment with us.

In honor of World Organizing Day, the Institute of Challenging Disorganization (ICD) is making four 90-minute sessions from their 2021 virtual conference available for free to professional organizers as well as to members of the public. Start by watching this video:

Next, go to the ICD website page for World Organizing Day. If you’re already a subscriber or otherwise have an account, you can just log in and go straight there; otherwise, you can quickly create an account.

Then you’ll be taken to the Request for Access to World Organizing Day online form. Once you fill in a few details, you’ll immediately be sent an email granting you access to watch any or all of the four available courses in the World Organizing Day 2023 Package, covering a wide variety of issues related to chronic and challenging disorganization:

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  • A Fabulous Way to Build Resilience to Mitigate the Impact of Compassion Fatigue, taught by Barbara Rubel MA, BCETS, DAAETS, author of a variety of books on loss, grief,  bereavement, and renewal.
  • Neuroarchitecture Contributions To Challenge Disorganization, taught by Andréa de Paiva, MA, professor, founder of NeuroAU, and an architect seeking to bridge research, education and design.
  • Turning Pain into Purpose: My OCD Journey, taught by Ethan S. Smith

Please note that while all four sessions are free of charge, they are only available through June 3, 2023.

OLD HOME WEEK & PRODUCTIVITY PEEPS

Meanwhile, as my colleagues across the planet were celebrating World Organizing Day, I went on a little road trip and got to enjoy camaraderie and talk about productivity with two people whose names might be familiar to Paper Doll readers.

Each March for the past several years, I’ve participated in the Task Management and Time Blocking Summit run by Francis Wade. As I’ve mentioned, not only do I know Francis from the productivity community, but we actually lived in the same dorm, the International Living Center, at Cornell University!

Although we’ve popped up on the same podcasts, webinars, and virtual meet-ups, Francis and I hadn’t seen each other in person in about 37 years! A few months ago, I found out Francis was flying in from Jamaica to Atlanta to present at an International Association for Strategy Professionals (IASP), and would be taking a quick jaunt to Alabama to see family and meet up with our fellow productivity colleague (and my fellow Evernote Certified Expert), Dr. Frank Buck. We knew we’d have to find a way to meet up!

You readers know Frank from when he interviewed me for his own podcast. And all three of us have crossed paths in a variety podcasts and summits recapped in Paper Doll posts, including those mentioned above and Paper Doll Picks: Organizing and Productivity Podcasts.

I wonder if anyone frets over (I mean, “embraces the challenges of”) logistical concerns more than organizing and productivity people. Over several weeks, we squared away the details of triangulating the travel details of our little circle. (See what I did here?) Francis was arriving from Jamaica and driving west to an outer suburb of Birmingham, Alabama to spend the weekend with family before heading back to Atlanta for his conference. 

(Ignore the total time and mileage; I couldn’t figure out how to make Google show two separate routes simultaneously, so it added two routes together.)

Added to the complications of planning were my continuing reliance on COVID precautions (not dining indoors) and the fact that I don’t eat meat, but Frank took on the role of cruise director with aplomb and dove into research mode!

Once we knew Francis had arrived safely, I’d be driving southwest from Chattanooga, and Frank would drive a far shorter (but not insignificant) route westward. Through the magic of Google, we identified the unfortunately-named but absolutely delightful community of Trussville, Alabama for our meet-up. There were a few kerfuffles due to weather and communication (take note: always agree on which method of communication — email or texting or whatever — before arranging any muti-location adventure), but we still managed to arrive at our destination within moments of one another.

For anyone ever hoping to meet up with friends in the general vicinity of central Alabama (and I’m not sure how many of Paper Doll readers might find that likely), and not having a reason or inclination to go all the way to Birmingham, I can’t recommend Trussville more highly. This walkable community, filled with restaurants, shops, and a central “entertainment district“ with a communal dining pavilion, outdoor theater, and hanging-out lawn was perfect for getting together for a late lunch/early dinner.

Interrupted only a few times by bursts of rain that moved along in minutes, Francis, Frank, and I enjoyed an afternoon and evening of hearty discussion of productivity methods, Evernote, Artificial Intelligence, video editing, our respective families’ genealogical histories, the current politics of education in America, international perspectives on long-term strategic planning (as a nod to Francis’ conference topic), and the meaning of an all-gender bathroom pictogram (which apparently is not a common sight in Jamaica — we assured Francis that it’s just like any one-person bathroom available to all, like in one’s home or on an airplane, ).

At Pinchgut Pies, the fellas partook of a specialty “Gaitor Bait” pizza with alligator sausage, while I ordered a pesto-and-fresh-mozzarella pie; later, after hearty discussion of all of the above topics, plus early 20th-century treatments of polio and our experiences of 9/11 (Frank was a school principle; I was working in television), we sampled the wares of Cookie Dough Magic, which sells both ice cream and edible cookie dough.

After three years of COVID and not traveling to any professional gatherings in person, it was a delight to gather outside and talk to colleagues/friends (about productivity as well as personal topics), and getting to finally meet Frank in person, and seeing Francis for the first time in 37 years, seemed like something worth sharing with all of you readers.

Being organized and productive is wonderful, but we must remember that we do it in service of a greater good, to have the opportunity to accomplish not only our labors, but achieve our joys.

As Memorial Day weekend approaches and we head into a (hopefully) more sociable summer, may you be organized and productive, but I hope you also get to enjoy good company, good food, and good times.

Posted in ADHD, Productivity, Professional Organizing, Task Management, Time Management | 17 Comments »

Paper Doll Suggests What to Watch to Get More Organized and Productive

Posted on: May 8th, 2023 by Julie Bestry | 8 Comments

You may have heard that for the first time in 15 years, the Writers Guild of America has gone on strike. What they’re asking for is reasonable, especially in light of all that’s changed in the television industry (including streaming services). Meanwhile, you may find yourself with a shortage of your favorite shows to watch.

You’ve got lots of options to fill your time. You could read a book (or several), in which case, you might seek guidance from 12 Ways to Organize Your Life to Read More — Part 1 (When, Where, What, With Whom) and 12 Ways to Organize Your Life to Read More — Part 2 (Reading Lists, Challenges & Ice Cream Samples) Or you could get out in the sunshine or hang out with friends.

But what can you do if you really like to sit in a comfy chair and watch things on a glossy screen? Well, if you’ve already exhausted every English-language comedy and drama on Amazon Prime, Apple TV, Netflix, Hulu, Paramount+, Disney+, and YaddaYadda+, you could try watching one of the many Korean-language dramas on Netflix. (I recommend Extraordinary Attorney Woo — it’s charming and delightful.)

Or you could try something completely different. Today’s post offers up a mix of webinars and actual TV programming designed to help you live a better, more productive, more organized life. 

DAILY DOSE MINI CHALLENGES

Could you use a little support in reaching your goals? My cool friend Georgia Homsany runs Daily Dose, a wellness company celebrating its 3-year anniversary! How do you celebrate three years of supporting people’s health and wellness needs through corporate and individual endeavors? With three really cool weeks of 5-day mini-challenges! And I get to be part of one of them!

  • 5-Day Positivity Challenge (May 8-12) — Learn how to conquer stress and negativity with simple reminders and healthy habits to transform your mindset. (It starts today!)
  • How to Overcome Perfectionism (May 15-19) — Learn how recognize the signs of perfectionist tendencies, understand the negative effects of it, and gain skills to minimize the idea of perfection in your workplace and personal life.
  • Declutter Your Space and Schedule (May 22-26) — Receive actionable advice to help you get motivated, make progress, and gain control over the life and work clutter that weighs you down. From chaotic mornings to cluttered desks and screens to procrastination and wonky schedules, I’ll be telling you how to make it all better.

Yup, that last one is my mini-challenge. And you KNOW how much I pack into whatever I deliver. 

For each mini-challenge, you get:

  • Video content delivered daily over the course of five days. Videos are designed to be short and to the point so you can learn and get on with your day to incorporate the advice.
  • Email and/or text reminder notifications — and you get to set your reminder preference!
  • An interactive platform to ask questions and chat with other participants.

Plus, there’s a BONUS: Each participant will also be entered in a raffle to win one of three wellness prizes! (One (1) winner per challenge.)

The cost is $25 per challenge, or $65 for all three! (And remember, the first challenge starts today, Monday, May 8th!) So go ahead and register before it falls to the bottom of your to-do list!

5-Day Positivity Challenge!

How to Overcome Perfectionism

Declutter Your Space and Schedule 

If you have questions or want to sign register for all three, email Daily Dose with “5 Day Mini Courses” in the subject line. And say hi from me!

HOW TO FIX MEETINGS

Graham Allcott of Think Productive is the author of How to be a Productivity Ninja: Worry Less, Achieve More and Love What You Do, which has a prominent place on my bookshelf.

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He’s also written How to be a Study Ninja: Study Smarter. Focus Better. Achieve More (for students), Work Fuel: The Productivity Ninja Guide to Nutrition, and more.

Graham and Hayley Watts, his writing partner on their book, How to Fix Meetings: Meet Less, Focus on Outcomes and Get Stuff Done, are offering a free Zoom-based webinar this week, on Tuesday, May 9, 2023. (Note that Graham and Hayley are in the UK, and the start time listed is 2 p.m. GMT, which is 9 a.m. Eastern Time, so please synchronize your watches accordingly.)

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If you struggle with attending (or scheduling) meetings that should have been emails, if you have no planned itinerary for meetings, if your meetings tend to go on forever, and especially if your meetings don’t seem to ever achieve anything, this should be a good webinar to help you find your way forward. In Graham’s own words,

“Our approach to meetings in the book is much like Think Productive’s entire approach to productivity: it’s all about making space for what matters. That means eliminating so many of the unnecessary and unproductive meetings we have, but then in that space that we’ve created, we are able to focus in on the meetings that make a difference. The ones where collaboration and consensus generate the magic and momentum.”

They practice what they preach, so the webinar is only 45 minutes…and unlike broadcast TV, there are no commercials!

If you like what you see, you might want to sign up for their other upcoming free webinars (Human, Not Superhero on May 17, 2023, and Getting Comfortable with Mistakes and Imperfection on June 7, 2023), as well as their YouTube channel and paid public workshops.

Not only is the material great for building productivity, but everything is delivered in posh UK accents!

THE GENTLE ART OF SWEDISH DEATH CLEANING

Over the years, I’ve read a lot of books about organizing and decluttering, and am often conflicted. If you read my post, The Truth About Celebrity Organizers, Magic Wands, and the Reality of Professional Organizing, you know how I feel about celebrity organizers (and non-professionals) offering up advice that’s one-size-fits-all and doesn’t take into account individual’s personal situations, mental health, family and work obligations, home sizes, and comfort levels. In short, such an approach does not please me!

But that doesn’t mean I eschew all books on the topic, either by celebrities or non-professionals. Five years ago, I read The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning: How to Free Yourself and Your Family from a Lifetime of Clutter with curiosity but few expectations.

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The author, Margareta Magnusson, wasn’t a professional organizer; she hadn’t even been previously published. Was this going to be another “hygge” kind of movement where everyone and his brother would take a cultural phenomenon and profit off of it? Was “death cleaning” even actually a thing in Sweden? And would the advice be any good?  

First, I got a little taste of Magnusson’s style by watching this interview clip.

Eventually, I sprinted through the book. Here’s an excerpt from the Goodreads review I wrote at the time:

“Gentle” in this book’s title is the key to guiding your expectations. If you’re looking for a detailed how-to book on decluttering, this is not your resource. It’s something else, and as a professional organizer, I’m inclined to say it’s something better. Swedish artist Margareta Magnusson, self-reportedly somewhere between eighty and one hundred years old, is experienced at döstädning, translated as “death cleaning,” but meaning the essential downsizing one should do in one’s 60s, 70s, and beyond so that one’s children and friends are not left with the sad labor of separating the wheat from the chaff and risking missing gems among the clutter.

Magnusson is like a worldly but sweet elderly aunt, writing lightly amusing, firm-but-gentle, philosophical guidance for her friends and age cohorts. If you’re in your 40s or younger, you may roll your eyes at this book, thinking, “Oh, I know that!” but as a professional, I can tell you that the difference between knowing you should dramatically reduce your clutter (or not acquire it in the first place) and doing it represent a chasm as vast as the ocean that separates us from Sweden. […]

Some of Magnusson’s tips are about dealing with what you keep, rather than about letting go of items. My favorite, and one that I think we all need to hear every so often, came after her story of boating with friends and the constant loss of the boat keys, and how a small hook for the key inside the cabin door might have improved upon the crankiness of the participants. She said, simply, “Sometimes, the smallest changes can have amazing effects. If you find yourself repeatedly having the same problem, fix it! Obvious.” Perhaps, but do you always follow that obvious advice?

Magnusson seems uncertain about my own profession, noting that she thinks it’s important, when death cleaning, to seek out advice on things like the best charities to which to donate certain items, how to deal with beautiful items with no monetary value, and the wisdom/safety of gifting or donating potentially dangerous items. Elsewhere, she expresses the notion that she sees the value in professional organizers but worries about the cost (of many hours of help) if one is reluctant to actually let go of things. I can’t disagree with her. This is why she slyly uses her book to (again) gently encourage people to work toward understanding the wisdom of really looking at their possessions and considering what they really need and want as they age.

Again, her philosophy rather than her step-by-step advice is the value of the book. In one section, Magnusson offers some conversation starters for younger adults to help their elderly parents and grandparents (or those approaching their dotage) consider the very issues that she raises in the book. In another, she lays out how possessions can yield strong memories, but that one shouldn’t be sad if one’s children don’t want/need the unusable possessions just to remain attached to the memories.

At no time is Magnusson harsh; she’s wistful.[…] She says, “You can always hope and wait for someone to want something in your home, but you cannot wait forever, and sometimes you must just give cherished things away with the wish that they end up with someone who will create new memories of their own.” Lovely, and true, and yet so hard for so many people to accept.

There were two small areas of the book I particularly liked. First, Magnusson very briefly speaks of how death cleaning has traditionally been a woman’s job — women have historically been the caregivers, they live longer, they want to avoid causing trouble for the kids, etc. But although she is a woman of advanced years, she doesn’t give in. She notes that women of her generation were brought up not to be in the way, and to fear being a nuisance, and then notes, “Men don’t think like I do, but they should. They, too, can be in the way.” Death cleaning must be an equal-opportunity endeavor.

The other parts of the book I especially liked involved her focus on “private” and “personal” things. I won’t spoil the paragraph on “private” things except to say that what caused a few reviewers to call Magnusson “dirty” for one small paragraph in an entire book causes me to declare her refreshing. (I laughed out loud, joyfully.) This is not a prim old biddy, but a woman who has lived, and who understands that leaving behind one’s truly “private” items is not quite fair to those you predecease. The “personal” section that I enjoyed was the notion, towards the end of one’s time on the planet, of having a small box, about the size of a shoebox, for things that are yours alone. Think: love letters or a small whatnot that gives you pleasure but that will mean nothing to anyone after you’re gone, and which you can easily advise others to toss if you so choose.

As no translator is listed, I believe that Magnusson, herself, wrote the English version of this book. (Perhaps it was written for an English-speaking audience and Swedes have no need for what may seem like common sense to them?) This gave the text a warm, quaint feeling, as Magnusson’s English is excellent, but perhaps a tad formal. Yet she is not old-fashioned, nor are her ideas, and her recognition of the importance of technology will set at ease the minds of potential readers who might feel this book is too behind the times for them.

[…]If you are overwhelmed by clutter, certainly you can read this book, but don’t expect a primer on decluttering and creating new systems. (Better yet, call a professional organizer!) But do read this book to immerse yourself in the mindset that Magnusson puts forth, and you will likely find yourself more at ease with the notion of letting go of excess as you go through life.

I even liked the book enough to read her follow-up, mostly a memoir of her fascinating life, The Swedish Art of Aging Exuberantly: Life Wisdom from Someone Who Will (Probably) Die Before You.

So, I was surprised and delighted when my colleague Hazel Thornton told me that there was going to be a TV show based on the book, and then let me know it was launching before I’d even seen the trailer (below). 

I’m generally dubious about reality shows, especially organizing-related reality shows. They can be exploitive or silly, reductionist or melodramatic. I haven’t made my way through all of the episodes yet, but many of my colleagues have praised the sense of hope the show puts forth, both for the individuals portrayed on the show and for the useful new lives of the possessions that have been “death cleaned” out of their homes.

A note about the tone of the show. While Magnusson’s writing is, indeed, gentle, the show is produced and narrated by comedic actress Amy Poehler, who has been known to be on the sarcastic side, and the show has some instances of adult language (including the words George Carlin once noted could not be said on television), so if you are sensitive or uncomfortable with such, or tend to watch programming around impressionable children or adults who are uncomfortable with such language, please proceed cautiously. 

The team is made up of Ella, a professional organizer, Kat, a psychologist, and Johan, a designer, and the show is thematically similar to Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, produced by the same company. Some of my colleagues have called attention to the fact that the team’s practitioners are Swedish, so some sensibilities are quite different from our attitudes and practices in North America. 

As I haven’t had the opportunity to finish the entire series, I’m still formulating my thoughts, but I think only good things can come of looking at our time left and making the best use of it by not letting possessions weigh us (and those who live on after us) down.

The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning is streaming on Peacock; there are eight episodes in the first season, each ranging from 46 to 56 minutes in length. If you have cable, you can likely watch it for free (with commercials); if you do not have cable, you can subscribe to the Premium version for $4.99/month or Premium Plus for $9.99/month, and access it directly on a variety of devices and through services you already have. 

HOW TO GET RICH

Of my many complaints over the years about how organizing and productivity concerns are portrayed on television, the one that bothers me most has less to do with attitudes, performances, and advice, and more to do with what gets completely ignored.

Almost every organizing show I’ve ever seen has focused on decluttering residential spaces! 

It’s not that this isn’t important; it’s just that it’s not the only important thing. I’ve yet to see a television program designed for mass viewership that covers procrastination, productivity, organizing one’s tasks and time, or anything that goes into organizing non-residential, non-storage space. Even office organizing gets ignored. (One minor except: Tabatha’s Salon Makeover included small segments of workspace organizing in a hair salons.)

I’ve also noticed that there have been very few shows for a mainstream audience on organizing personal finances, an important sub-speciality for NAPO financial organizers and daily money managers in the American Association of Daily Money Managers. Financial organizing — everything from budgeting to investment planning to decluttering bad financial habits — is definitely important for leading a healthy, productive life.

And yet, how many reality or educational shows have you seen about personal finance? Suze Orman used to have a weekly call-in advice show on CNBC, the reruns of which you can see on Amazon Prime using Freevee, but that was more like watching a radio show and you only got narrow slices of people’s lives.

I preferred Til Debt Do Us Part, a Canadian show with Gail Vaz-Oxlade, where she visited the homes of a few different individuals and families each episode and doled out applicable financial advice. 

How to Get Rich, led by Ramit Sethi, author of I Will Teach You To Be Rich, reminds me of a louder, glitzier version of Vaz-Oxlade’s show.

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Over the course of eight episodes in this first season, Sethi meets with couples and individuals and offers financial (and seemingly life-coaching) advice to help them reach their goals. Sethi has degrees from Stanford University: a BA in Information & Society (in Science, Technology & Society) with a minor in Psychology and an MA in sociology (Social Psychology and Interpersonal Processes, and he’s a writer and entrepreneur. As far as I can tell, though, he’s not an accountant or Certified Financial Planner; he’s a self-labeled financial expert, so before you implement his financial advice, speak to a licensed expert in your state or jurisdiction. 

That said, the advice he provides to the guests on the show are generally common-sense on researchable topics. He comes out in favor of renting rather than buying when the cost of buying is excessive, and against multi-level marketing (MLM) in such a way that really makes clear how, mathematically, expectations of success are similar to middle school athletes expecting to be NBA All-Stars.

Like the majority of organizing shows, there’s not a lot of opportunity to provide in-depth financial organizing solutions or guidance. It’s TV, and TV is designed to entertain first and foremost, to keep hitting the dopamine centers in the brain in order to encourage viewers to keep watching.

That said, shows like How To Get Rich (and The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning, all those other organizing shows) do one great thing. They call attention to the fact that pain points can be soothed, that bad habits can be reversed, and that there is hope if you are willing to seek guidance and make behavioral changes.

The first season of How to Get Rich is on Netflix.

I’m not just a fan of good narrative television; my first career was as a television program director and I served on my network’s Program Advisory Council, giving network executives feedback on programming and scheduling. You can take the girl out of TV, but you can’t take TV out of the girl.  As such, I hope the deep-pocket corporations come to the negotiating table with the WGA and work out a deal that is fair to the hardworking professional writers who create the comedies and dramas, the TV shows and movies, that entertain and enliven us.

Until then, whether it’s an educational webinar or a edutainment reality show, I encourage you to mix some organizing and productivity into your viewing habits. And please feel free to share in the comments any recent shows, webinars, or other programming that slakes your thirst for guidance toward living your best possible life. 

Posted in Office, Paper Organizing, Productivity, Professional Organizing, Task Management, Time Management | 8 Comments »

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