Positive Work Series: My Workspace
This officially kicks off a series I'm calling the "Positive Work Series" where I'm going to focus on how to stay positive as an employed worker. This can pertain to employees, employers, work at home or work outside the home workers, and even just stay at home moms (let's face it, you do work and it can get tedious). This series will be packed full of tips on how to both improve and maintain your positive attitude while trying to accomplish professional (or amateur) tasks.
We'll start with your working environment. When I'm at home, I spend a lot of time in my home office. This office used to be my art studio, but since I've gotten more into blogging and writing again, I'm back to using it as a office. Lately, I couldn't figure out why it was so hard to focus in here. But once I took a look around my space, I knew what the problem was. It doesn't take a genius to figure that out:
So, I took a couple of steps to make my office more suitable for the writing that I do in there. I invested in a filing cabinet which is something I've been needing for a long time. I filed all my paperwork away. Next, I sorted through my books. I took the ones I've already read and don't plan to read again anytime soon and moved them to a new location. I threw away two giant garbage bags worth of stuff that I no longer needed, had no idea why I had in the first place, or was just cluttering up my space. Finally, I organized the remaining parts of my office. My desk was de-cluttered, my book shelf rearranged and my paperwork filed away correctly. I can finally breathe in here again.
Here are the results:
If you are constantly stressed and frazzled when you are trying to work, your workspace may be the first place you need to work. I have three basic rules when it comes to my workspace(s) no matter where they are.
1. Everything has a place. When I'm done with something, I put it back. Pretty simple, right? But I'm naturally lazy, so this takes a lot of work on my part.
2. Keep things in site that make me smile. For me, that includes pictures of my family on my desk, fresh flowers every so often, and little trinkets that make me think of friends or happy times.
3. Straighten up at the end of the day. It's a little thing and yes, it ties into #1 on this list, but every day when you are done working, you should take 10 or 15 minutes and clean up your work area. That way, you are not greeted by clutter when you walk into your office, studio, or whatever workspace you have chosen.
Now there are other rules that I should follow but don't on a regular basis like not eatting at your desk or while you are working. These are natural breaks in your working day and you should separate the two. Not to mention it can get kind of gross. But, I'm not perfect. And tomorrow will be better than today so long as I keep trying.