March 10, 2025 • 40 mins
Megs delves into the concept of letting go, not just of physical items, but also tasks, expectations, and commitments that overwhelm our daily lives. She shares personal experiences and practical strategies for dealing with prioritization challenges, time blindness, and mental overload that are common for individuals with ADHD. Megs also introduces the idea of a potential organizing tour across the US as she plans to move from Colorado to Massachusetts. She highlights the importance of saying 'no' and reevaluating commitments to make room for decluttering and organizing. The episode wraps up by encouraging listeners to focus on the small steps that lead to achieving larger goals and provides insights for future advocacy in the ADHD community.
01:59 Prioritization and Time Blindness
07:27 The Analogy of Open Browser Tabs
10:13 Mental Overload and Decluttering
17:21 Practical Steps for Decluttering
17:53 The Garden Analogy
21:22 Evaluating Priorities and Saying No
33:54 Final Thoughts and Call to Action
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Yeti Stereo Microphone (00:00):
Welcome back to another episode of
(00:01):
organizing an ADHD brain.
I'm your host Megs.
And I am so happy to be talkingto you again about letting go.
I told you that this is a topicI could go on and on about.
In fact, I could relate it to somany of the things that we
handle on a regular basis, Notjust the letting go of our
stuff, but the letting go ofsome of the things that we have
(00:22):
to do and the things that wethink that we need to say yes to
and the shoulds and the shouldnots and the holy smokes, how
the heck do we manage a life inthis go go go world that we live
in?
I'm going to keep this trendgoing over the next couple of
months intertwined with someincredible interviews I have
coming up here as well.
Things like.
(00:43):
Digital organizers andnetworking queens and
photography organizers.
I've got so much goodinformation to drop for you.
The weather out in Colorado isgorgeous today.
My husband is outside chattingwith our neighbors And the kids
are enjoying just being outsideand playing together.
Before I jump in today, I didwant to drop that my husband and
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I are moving across the countrythis summer.
We're making a move fromColorado to Massachusetts.
And we have been playing aroundwith the idea of what if Meg's
did an organizing tour acrossthe United States So if that's
something that you would beinterested in, whether you're a
current client of mine, oryou're dying to have me come
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into your home and help youcreate systems that work for
you, shoot me a message at Meg'sat organizing and adhdbrain.
com.
Email me with, where you live,because we're going to be
driving from Colorado.
To Massachusetts, let me know ifthat's something that you're
interested in doing and we mightbe able to book a time to chat
and see if that's feasible.
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I'm just playing around with theidea, but I figured I'd put it
out there and start having someconversations if some of you are
truly interested in having mecome by.
Okay, so let's jump into thistopic today.
My goal truly is to help youthink about prioritization a
little bit better, because withA DHD priorities aren't
typically top of mind becauseeverything is a priority.
(02:10):
If I have something to do, thenI've gotta do everything.
Nothing gets prioritized to thefront of the line because
everything is important unlessthere's a deadline.
And even then we're gonna lookfor something else to do before
we finally complete the thingthat is facing us.
I also want to give you someperspectives on time blindness
and oftentimes what we do toourselves based on our time
blindness, which is actually apart of our executive function
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deficiency.
Super interesting.
So I'm going to get into that alittle bit and also just
understanding releasing theshould mentality because so many
of us are people pleasers.
And we've either been taught toact this way or we felt like it
was necessary for us to show upand do everything for everyone
else.
(02:55):
With that being the case, wefeel like we should be doing all
of these things.
I say this all the time, and I'mgoing to say it again probably
multiple times on this episode.
If everything is important, thennothing is important.
It took me so long to trulyunderstand what this concept
meant For me.
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But also, I have to repeat it tomyself now still, on a regular
basis, and create rules to helpme understand what I can truly
achieve in life.
So this has everything to dowith letting go because So
often, people come to me whenthey're talking to me about
coaching, or even in mycommunity, and they're like, I
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just don't know where to start.
And is this the right time tostart?
When do I start decluttering?
How do I figure out a way tomake this all work for me?
When at the same time, you'realso, and I'm going to speak to
the women out there, but I'msure so many of you men can
relate too, but you're managingfamilies and you're figuring out
what to cook every single weekfor dinner and you're figuring
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out how to keep up with somesort of cleaning schedule, but
then you also might work acorporate job.
But if you're not working acorporate job, or even if you
are, you're trying to figure outhow to stay active in your kid's
schools.
And maybe your kids areneurodivergent just like you.
So you're learning how to parentthem in a different way than
your parents did, because we'retrying to break generational
curses.
But at the same time, you'realso taking care of pets and
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there's gardening.
And then how many of you have atleast 25 hobbies that you are
trying to manage?
But with that, how many of youalso have just so many little
projects sitting around yourhouse waiting to get done?
Because You know, you could doit.
I often hear people with ADHDdescribed as a jack of all
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trades, master of none, or asone of my clients likes to say a
ham and egger.
it's a common new England termfor someone who's just happens
to be good at a lot of things.
what I've noticed is that peoplewith ADHD tend to get good at
things pretty quickly.
But then we get kind of bored ofit.
And then we move on to the nextthing that's new and exciting
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can fill our cup up with thatbeing the case.
It's so easy for us to adoptmore and more because we're
excited about doing all thesethings.
I got told in the corporateworld that I got too excited
about everything.
And because I got too excitedabout everything, I was putting
all of my eggs in so manydifferent baskets.
It was hard for me to manage myschedule and manage the things
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that were the most important tome, Now things always got done,
but I wanted so much more.
I wanted to work on developmentand I wanted to work on these
creative processes that helpedus do our job better and I
wanted to create different waysthat we could communicate
interdepartmentally to help uslearn how other departments work
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so that we could be moreefficient at our jobs.
But I decided that all of thatwas my job.
And it also was a very difficultbecause there were a lot of
people that were my peers thatdidn't want to do that much, and
I didn't understand it.
I was like, why don't you wantto do all of these things?
I now understand a little bitmore.
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So if you're listening to thisand you're at the point where
you're not ready to dropanything, that's totally okay.
I just simply want to give yousome perspective on where your
priorities might be with ADHD.
Because in order fordecluttering and organizing to
become a top priority for you,you can't say yes to everything,
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even if you're excited abouteverything.
And I'm not talking just withyour schedule, I'm talking with
the stuff that you have in yourhome.
If you keep everything and youwant to do everything, then it's
going to be so hard for you todo anything.
Cause there's so much! How doyou know when to start?
Not only in decluttering, thesilly mundane tasks that we
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don't necessarily want totackle, but the fun stuff! How
do you find your hobbies?
How do you even put it away ifthere's no spot for it?
There's so much that comes intoplay.
I want to get really visual withyou today, too.
having an analogy to attach thisto is so helpful.
I know that with my brain, I seethings very visually as I'm
talking to my clients or as, I'mseeing their home.
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I want to see pictures.
I want to see what you'reworking towards.
I not only want to hear youdescribe it to me, but I start
to create a picture of what thatlooks like in my brain, like
visually.
I see it.
It's very clear to me.
so think about it like this.
Your brain is like an internetbrowser with so many different
tabs open.
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I know you've heard this before,right?
okay, so I'm thinking about thisright now.
I'm Googling it.
I found the right topic for me.
This is what I need here.
But.
Oh, squirrel, let me open upanother browser because I'm
interested in this and I need tolog in here.
So I'm going to open up this andthen another browser gets open
because the first browser wasopen and there was just like a
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pop up thought, right?
So now we've got all of thesetabs open in our brain, but our
working memory is not great.
So as we're opening up new tabs,we're forgetting about all those
other tabs that are open.
They're still open.
They're hanging out there.
But they're not on the forefrontof our mind anymore, because we
don't have the capacity to keepeverything up there, mulling
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around all the darn time.
so as you're decluttering, youfind something that needs to be
sewed.
Oh, let me put this aside.
I'm going to sew that later.
And then you're like, I feellike I should keep this, because
what if I need it?
And so you put it aside.
You don't put it in a place thatyou can find it.
You just keep it, because whatif you need it one day?
You keep that aside too.
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And then you're like, Oh, thiscould really use some glue.
Let me put this to the side.
I'm going to glue that.
Oh, my daughter broke herbracelet.
I'm going to put this backtogether.
I'm going to find a new stringso that I can help her wear it
and that way it won't breakanymore.
so on and so forth.
So these are all these likelittle to do tasks that you're
keeping up here.
And then you've got all of theseother different hobbies in this
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life that you're trying tomanage at the same time.
When you have too many tabs openon your browser, your browser
actually starts to work a lotslower.
it's slower in processing.
It starts to lag.
And sometimes it'll even crash.
And that's what leads us toburnout.
We're saying yes to all of thesethings because we genuinely want
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to do them, and honestly, wegenuinely know that we could be
good at so many of the thingsthat we're doing.
But we hold on to all of them,thinking that we can do all of
them, and when we don'taccomplish hardly any of them,
we beat ourselves up because wefelt like we should have done
everything.
And so instead of letting go andsaying, okay, what are the
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things that I really want to do,and what are the things that I
don't necessarily want to do asmuch, even though I still want
to do them?
We just think that we're awfulbecause we haven't been able to
accomplish everything.
Instead of exiting out of thebrowser and just deleting all
the tabs knowing that we'll beable to come back to it at any
time, we keep it open becausewe're nervous that we might lose
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those things.
We're so used to our brainforgetting things so much that
we try to keep all of thesethings around us to remind us of
the things that we genuinelywant to do.
This is mental overload.
No wonder we're so cluttered inour homes, because we can't
possibly prioritize this.
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The only time decluttering andorganizing truly becomes a
priority is when we realizesomeone's coming over and we
finally get our eyes on thisclutter as not just something we
can put off, but something weneed to take care of.
Otherwise, people are going tosee who we truly are.
But it's not that we're lazy.
It's not that, and yes, we maybe a little bit disorganized,
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but truthfully, This comes backto the way that we process
things neurologically.
But if clutter is never apriority, because you've got all
of these other things going on,then how do you make it a
priority?
How do you delete some of thetabs on your browser so that you
can truly start to effectivelywork in your life and be proud
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of the things that you're doing?
this year, as I'm building thisbusiness, and as I'm figuring
out what's next, I have so manyideas on what I want to do on a
regular basis.
And likely, you all have someincredible ideas for me too,
like why isn't Meg's doing this?
Why isn't Meg's doing this?
I ask myself the same questionsI'm telling you that because the
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ideas aren't lacking.
But I also know that when I'mtrying to get things done, I
want to do them really well.
And I'm not holding myself backfrom doing them, but I do want
to really hone in on the skillsthat I have right now and come
up with systems and ways toautomate these things so that as
I'm adding more to my plate, Iknow what to delegate and what
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to not.
I only know to do this becauseI've started to manifest and
figure out what did these bigpicture items look like?
What are the big things I needto do in order to get there?
And what are the tiny actions Ican take on a regular basis in
order to effectively hit theselarger goals?
I have practiced through projectmanagement in doing this.
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I also use a project managementsoftware for my business, but
also this is what I teach peopleto do when they're organizing.
What's the smallest thing youcould do to start making
progress toward that biggergoal?
Let me come back.
I'm circling back here because Iget lost on tangents and I want
to make sure that this is reallyclear today.
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I was talking earlier aboutpeople not knowing where to
start, or how do I even find thetime to declutter, I need to be
able to take off a week.
Okay, so many people tell methey need to just be able to
take off like the entire summerso that they can declutter and
organize their home.
Or, I need to take off a weekfrom work so that I can
declutter and organize my home.
As if it could happen in a week.
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What you will find as you'redecluttering and organizing your
home think about how long ittook to get that stuff into your
home.
Years, lots of years.
It could take a lot of time toget that stuff out of your home,
especially if you're puttingbarriers on it leaving.
when the clutter becomes so muchof an issue that you have no
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choice but to handle it, that iswhen you need to start to
prioritize it.
But what that also means is thatyou're going to be letting go of
some of the other things in yourlife so that you can live a life
with less.
You can do it and it starts bydoing one thing, and I have a
recommendation for you at theend of this podcast, just one
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thing, one thing that you canstart to do now to start to
understand how you're livingyour life and what you could let
go of to start to live your lifea little bit more effectively
and with a little bit more timeon your hands.
One of the reasons why wecontinuously say yes to things
is not only because we'reexcited about it, we want to be
involved in our kids schools, wewant to see more friends, we
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want to do another activity.
Sometimes we don't, but we sayyes to it in the moment, now we
feel obligated to do it.
But we genuinely want to dothese things, and because we're
time blind, and time blindness.
Is a difficulty managing andperceiving time.
So that's tied to executivefunctioning and The ability to
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plan and organize.
I watched a really cool video ontime blindness the other day.
And there's this adorablecouple, they're all over social
media, and they talk about timeblindness.
and they were describing 5minutes.
hey, we have 5 minutes before weleave the house.
And the husband asked the wifewho has ADHD, he does not.
And he said, how much could youdo in five minutes?
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And she's like, oh, quite a bit.
I could probably hop in theshower real quick, get dressed,
and, we can be on our way.
I'll fluff up my hair real quickand it'll be fine.
And then he's like, okay, whatif I told you that you had 300
seconds before you left thehouse?
And she's like, oh my gosh,that's no time at all.
I can't do anything in 300seconds.
so I've been using that in myown life to try to decide how
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much something is going to takeme.
I've tried using it with mygirls.
It's not as effective as it iswith me And I think that's
because i've had a little bitmore practice Perceiving time
even though it's still not aforte in my life.
I'm not curing adhd.
I'm just trying to understand itBut when I'm brushing my teeth
at night, I go, I'm like, okay,my whole bedtime routine is
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going to take less than 300seconds.
Can I do that?
Yes.
when I have to rinse out andrecycle the little cat tin from
feeding my cat, is that going totake less than 30 seconds?
Yes.
Can I do it?
Okay.
Even though I hate it, I don'twant to.
Those are the things I don'twant to do.
But because we're bad atperceiving time, it's so easy
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for us to say yes to all ofthese things because it doesn't
feel like it's much time at all.
But what's so interesting aboutthis is it's not only the time
on your calendar, oh, it'll takeme about an hour to do this.
You're still thinking about itin other parts of your world.
It'll come up because now it'sanother thing that you're
managing, another responsibilitythat you have.
oh my gosh, I genuinely want todo these things.
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I'm going to give you anotherexample.
In the beginning of the year, Idecided I wanted to be way more
present in my daughter, who'sfive, Cora.
I wanted to be more present inCora's classroom in the school.
And my husband and I wouldvolunteer for all of their class
parties, and that was reallyfun.
And then I was like, maybe Ishould be involved.
I should be helping to plan andprep the party.
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Maybe I could come up with allthese templates and these
different things that we coulddo to make it more efficient and
more organized.
And as I went through and didthis, I realized how much of the
mental capacity I was puttinginto this that I would just
wasn't going to be able tosustain.
So I did one party with a coupleof the other moms.
And the next time another partycame around, I held myself back
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and I said, Hey guys, I'm notgoing to volunteer for the
planning and the prep of thisparty, but I will still help out
as a classroom volunteer.
And so I'm starting to realizewhat I can and I cannot handle.
But sometimes it's taking actionand figuring that out as I go
along.
you're allowed to do that too,just because you don't know up
front, sometimes you need tomake mistakes or make, a
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perceived mistake to understandwhat's needed of you next.
You get to decide.
It's not up for me to decide,but it is up to you to figure
out what are the most importantthings that you do and what are
the things that you need tostart letting go so that you can
figure out how to create timefor decluttering and organizing
because it does take time.
And it doesn't have to take aton of time.
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It can be very small incrementalthings that you do each day that
can help make a huge differencein your life.
But like I said, we genuinelywant to say yes to these things.
Another beautiful.
piece of imagery for you isthink about your life as a
garden Think about the differentflowers that you've handpicked
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to put in that garden.
I love honeysuckles.
I think the honeysuckles that Iplant are So beautiful.
I love the way they climb.
I love the way they look whenthey're climbing up a wall and
they create almost this wall offlowers effect.
I think it's so cool.
I'm really into that.
I also have a peony bush that Iabsolutely love.
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It's so beautiful and it bloomsso big and bright.
I get so excited every time Isee the buds start to flourish.
I also laid some beautiful fullgreen ground cover in my garden
and I've got this really coolblack mulch that I filled it in
with so any of the color thatpops through will truly pop.
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But in order for me to make thisgarden work, I have to get out
there and work on it.
And so each and every day as I'mputting effort into each of
these flowers, and every yearwhen I'm coming back, they grow
bigger and brighter and morebeautiful.
But as gardens grow, so doweeds.
So do different things that Ididn't expect to show up.
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One time I was planting a lilacbush and as I was digging there
were these really disgusting,weird larva worm things that I
found in the dirt.
And my husband and I startedlooking it up and I thought that
we were going to have to fightthis disease that was happening
in our garden.
We were fine.
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But, we had to dispose of themand I learned a little bit more.
and part of it is because nowwe're taking care of a tree.
We've added that to therepertoire of our garden.
But weeds keep coming up andsometimes my dogs run through
the garden and now I have toclean that up.
think about your hobbies andyour passions as the flowers in
the garden, and then theunnecessary obligations and
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clutter are the weeds, but it'simportant that you identify what
are the flowers of your life andwhat are the weeds.
Now some weeds, like doing thedishes, are unable to be plucked
and thrown away forever.
Those are the things of our lifethat we must do unless you are
fortunate enough to be able tohire someone to clean your
dishes for you every singlenight.
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Think about this analogy as,What are the things that I truly
want to nourish?
Because those are the thingsthat are going to continue to
grow just like yourself.
Actually taking care of yourselfwhen you take care of yourself
on a regular basis, you're lesslikely to get burnt out.
And I'm not just talking aboutgoing to the spa for the day.
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I'm talking about, rememberingto take a deep breath and to be
grateful for what you have andto be able to.
Even do your skincare routine,anything, these small little
things add up to so much whenyou focus on that and you are
truly a flower in your life.
So something to start toexplore, even if you don't
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implement it right away, is howdo you weed out the unnecessary
stuff in your life that is notbringing you joy and not helping
you achieve so much of what youwant in life.
It's so important that we startto understand how we can say no
to the things that truly aren'tfilling us up on a regular
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basis.
It doesn't mean that you say noall of the time, but it's
learning how to start to say noin a way that could work for you
so that you can prioritize thethings that you truly want to
get done.
Think about yourself 10 yearsfrom now.
Do they have a decluttered home?
how's their face looked?
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are they consistent with theirskincare routine or are they
continuously coming back to it?
How about your garden?
What's it look like?
So as you're thinking about yourfuture and the different things
that you're trying to do andattain and achieve is
volunteering all the time goingto help you achieve those goals.
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One thing we had to do over thislast year was say no to so many
of the extracurricularactivities we have had our kids
involved in.
Previously, I may have talkedabout this before, but I'm going
to talk about it again.
part of it was for the budget.
It's just it gets more and moreexpensive to not only buy all
the gear that comes along withit, but then, of course, the
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lessons and then, making surethat we can fit that into our
time schedule and withneurodivergent children routines
that are different on a regularbasis can be very difficult to
adhere to.
And so over this last year, aswe have taken a step back on all
these extracurriculars, We havefilled up our life so much more
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in so many different ways.
It's been incredibly valuableNot only has it helped us
because we're putting that moneyinto a different bucket We're
also figuring out How to supportthem in the different things
that they want and desire to do.
We're spending more timetogether.
We've spent so much more timetogether, because we're not
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constantly rushing to do all ofthese things, which ultimately
burn you out.
and I'm not knocking you fordoing what you're doing.
Please continue.
If that is what brings you joy,incredible.
And I just want to normalizesaying, what if you took a year
off?
Is that still going to get youto where you're trying to be 10
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years from now, or where yourkids want to be 10 years from
now?
You get to evaluate that, andyou get to evaluate how that's
affecting your life right now.
Decluttering your physical spaceis going to work very similarly.
It's likely that you want all ofthe stuff that you have.
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Because you brought it into yourhome for a reason.
you want to be able to be goodat painting, but also have a box
of peacock feathers, just incase I'm winking to the person
who knows exactly who I'mtalking about in this case.
You want to be able to have acostume on hand, Or be the house
that has a toy for everyone toplay with.
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You want to have that perfectpiece of wood that's gonna fix
your project or finish yourproject and you don't have to go
to the store to get it.
You want to have every variationof a medium because what if one
day you get this incredibleinclination to do this?
You're not gonna throw awayanything that's broken because
you can fix it and let me justput it over here and I'll get to
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it.
I really like the way that thispiece of clothing fit me 10
years ago, so I'm going to keepit just in case my body ever
looks like that again.
if we continue to keep all ofthe things that we think we
should in our home andeverything is important, then
nothing is important.
The more clutter you have, themore priorities are taking up
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your brain space.
And the less that gets donebecause now everything that
you're looking at becomes adecision that needs to be made
and often one that's way toooverwhelming for you to even
begin to start.
That's okay.
It's okay to feel overwhelmedand it's okay to look at a pile
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of stuff or a doom pile, right?
Didn't organize, only movedpile.
So many of us have them.
It's okay to look at it and justbe like, Oh my God, I don't want
to begin to tackle that rightnow.
Too many decisions.
Yikes.
But if you wait until you havemore time in your schedule, if
you wait until you finally readall of the books, if you wait
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until you take a week off workand that's the time you're going
to do it, if you wait until thesummer when the kids are off
school, If you wait and you waitbefore too long, you're going to
realize that it's not going toget done, but it is okay to
start saying no to some of thethings that are not as important
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as decluttering.
so that you can make room for itin your life.
Not the stuff, but for lettinggo of the stuff.
Truthfully, we were never meantto be this busy.
We really weren't.
Our brains were never meant tokeep up with this much.
So my challenge for you thisweek, this is an extra thing for
you to do, I know, but bear withme, it's gonna help as well.
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I want you to find one notebookin your house, and do not go buy
another notebook, and if you dobecause you need that dopamine
hit, that's fine, but there'slikely a blank notebook sitting
somewhere in your house, andwe're gonna repurpose it.
I want you to go and find thatnotebook and it should be blank,
let's start from scratch or pullout the papers that are in there
and just get rid of them orrecycle and write on it, my to
(26:49):
do's or the things that arefloating around in my brain, the
things that you feel obligatedto say yes to, whatever it is.
And I want you for the next weekto start to write all of the
things down that come up.
if you are decluttering and aproject comes up, write it down.
If you are letting go ofsomething, you decide to keep it
just in case, write it down.
(27:11):
Okay?
I'm keeping this just in case,right?
Because now that's, it reallytruly is another to do on your
list.
Now you've kept it, Write downall of the things that are
floating around in your brain.
Did you say yes to a coffee datewith this person?
Put it down.
Are you planning to plan yourdaughter's eighth birthday and
go all out?
Write it down.
(27:31):
How much time is that going totake?
Are you moving across thecountry and now you're trying to
say goodbye to all of thefriends you've made over the
last 10 years of living inColorado?
Write that down.
Write down the people who youtruly want to see.
Am I giving this advice tomyself?
Maybe.
With that in mind, on the otherside of this piece of paper, I
(27:52):
want you to start writing downthe things that you truly love
to do.
Like gardening, or singing, orthings like that.
Now, something to support youthrough this project is go to my
website and download the freedopamine menu, because with
that, those different hobbiesthat you're writing down, those
are the things that you could doto help you with your focus and
motivation.
Because when you're doingsomething that truly brings you
(28:13):
joy, things that you could do in10, 15, 30 minutes.
those could help you get themotivation you need to do the
things that you don'tnecessarily want to do.
start a decluttering project for15 minutes or 30 minutes,
whatever makes sense for you.
I'm not telling you how to dothat right now.
So go back to one of my previousepisodes on how to get started
with decluttering and what thatlooks like and feels like.
(28:35):
But it is important for us tolet go of not only the stuff
that we have, but also theprojects and the things we need
to add to our to do list.
Because one thing isn't a bigdeal, and that's the only thing
technically you're saying yes toin the moment.
But that's because it's out ofsight, out of mind now.
But when you're saying, I'mgoing to do this later, 20, 30,
(28:57):
40 times, now your to do listhas gotten so much longer.
And that's not even counting allof the things that you've said
yes to adding to your schedulewhile also taking care of kids
while also trying to figure outhow to be the best version of
yourself.
Not only.
As you, but as a mom, but assomeone who works in the
corporate world, wherever youare showing up, there's so much
(29:19):
that's now being added to yourplate.
It's like you're filling up thisbackpack and you're like, Oh,
I'm a mom, I'm a wife, I'm a,I'm an entrepreneur.
And then everything else thatyou say yes to is now getting
put in that backpack and there'sno more room for it.
You have no idea where to findanything in this backpack
because it's so chock full.
It's so heavy on your back, butyou feel like you can't take
(29:40):
anything out because it allfeels so important.
When everything is important,nothing is important.
We got to take some stuff out ofthe backpack and in order to
take some of the stuff out ofthe backpack, we've got to say
no to some things.
But in order for you to startsaying no, you've got to
understand what you'reprioritizing.
And part of that just comes frombrain dumping it all out.
(30:03):
And I'm not saying make a to dolist for the day.
I'm talking like, Over the nextweek, what are the things that
are pulling you from doing allthe things that you truly want?
Okay, so that is what I want youto take away from this.
Start to write down What are thethings that you are genuinely
doing on a regular basis thatare taking so much of your
(30:24):
mental energy?
And can you truly let somethinggo so that you can make
decluttering and organizingSomething that is a regular
occurrence in your life becausethat's what makes all the
difference is knowing that okayI'm making another step in the
direction of getting moreorganized and Decluttering my
home so that I can live a morepeaceful life today, and this is
(30:47):
what I'm doing about it.
I can't remember if I said thisearlier, so I'm gonna say it
now.
When I have a bunch of tabs openon my browser, Instead of
leaving them there and savingthem for later, I just exit out.
At this point, I have gottenconfident enough and I trust
myself to know That if I closeit out, I will be okay.
And I will always be able toreopen a browser, and most
(31:08):
things are saved nowadays.
Anyways, if there's somethingthat is truly that important,
you'll be able to get it again.
You are allowed to make changes.
You don't have to live witheverything that you're living
with right now.
We've trained ourselves to, toknow that we could get anything
off of Amazon.
We've trained ourselves to knowthat we could go to our
subscription base and we couldput any of those channels on
(31:31):
because we're probablysubscribed to all of them.
Over the last couple months, myhusband and I cancelled Amazon.
We've been without it for twomonths now, and we've been fine.
I tried doing it last year, andit was more difficult last year,
but I can't put a finger on why.
I think it was because we hadsubscriptions connected, and
then I didn't, I wasn't ready tosay goodbye to them.
(31:53):
I didn't have a lot of the toolsthat I have now to be able to
say, I don't need those anymore.
Or this decision isn't forever.
It's not permanent.
Just because I'm saying no to itnow doesn't mean I can't get it
in the future.
It just means I don't have itright now, which means I'm
thinking a little bit morepurposefully about the different
decisions on the things that I'mpurchasing in my life.
(32:16):
we deleted Disney plus for alittle bit too.
and Cora, again, my five yearold was like, I don't
understand.
We don't have Bluey.
Why don't we have Bluey, right?
We love a little Bluey in ourhousehold if you've never
watched it, even as an adult.
There's some beautiful messagingin there.
But, we just talked about it'snot a forever thing.
We're just choosing to spend ourmoney in different places right
(32:36):
now.
And there's nothing wrong withthat.
Just because you don't haveeverything doesn't mean that
you're not fully equipped tohandle life.
we just as a society have beentrained to have everything.
It's so easy to go and buy thesethings that we need so that we
can have it.
I've figured out where I want tospend my money so that I don't
feel obligated to spend my moneyin so many other places.
(32:59):
I'm so much more purposefulabout what I buy because I also
know what I have.
It's very easy for me to seeclearly what's available and
what's not.
So that way when I am making apurchasing decision, it is more
about like, well, I don't havethis.
Do I really need it?
I also recently deletedFacebook.
I realized that it was taking upa lot of my time.
(33:20):
And that comes back to our timeblindness.
We can oftentimes get sodistracted by our phones.
That we forget that real lifeeven exists because it's so easy
to escape on our phones.
I can say that I, I'm such aculprit of being on my phone too
much and not truly doing thework that I want to be doing.
(33:43):
So I, I challenged you all abouttwo weeks ago to use the
dopamine menu to start to dothings that fill up your cup
that aren't your phone.
So I'm going to encourage you todo that again.
So here are some ways that youcan continue to stay in touch
with me.
Go to my website,organizinganadhdbrain.
com.
(34:03):
There's a banner that says, getyour free download.
It'll take you to the dopaminemenu, tell you all the cool
things it does.
You not only get the dopaminemenu, but also a video of me
walking you through how to usethat.
Put it on your fridge.
When you sign up, you'll get myemails on a weekly basis.
I'm always keeping you up todate with what's going on in the
organizing and ADHD braincommunity.
(34:24):
And that's another way to workwith me is go to.
OrganizinganADHDbrain dot com,forward slash community.
And there you can sign up forthe Organizing an ADHD Brain
community.
We meet monthly, not only doingbody doubling sessions,
decluttering sessions, but alsogroup coaching to support
ourselves through gettingdecluttered and more organized.
(34:47):
We're always talking about somereally amazing stuff.
Sometimes we're super deep,sometimes we're more surface
level.
But it's always a really goodtime and everything's recorded
so you can keep coming back formore.
That's 27 a month.
It's super affordable if youneed a little bit more
accountability.
And then if you're stuck, ifyou're listening to the podcast,
If you've literally tried somany decluttering and organizing
(35:11):
stuff, and it's just notworking, and you feel like you
need more guided support, book acall with me.
You can go to my website,organizingandadhdbrain.
com, and there's, A bookingbutton right on the front page
or go to the show notes belowand you can get on my calendar
that way as well.
Right now I only have one spotleft in the month of March.
(35:32):
So if you're ready to getstarted for the month of April,
be sure to book a call soonerrather than later because I will
start to fill up a wait list.
My goal is to only be workingwith eight people at the most at
any given time because Idedicate so much time and energy
to my clients.
So that's really important tome.
Regardless, join the community.
(35:52):
I'd love to see you there.
Oh, and don't forget, I askedyou at the beginning.
If you want me to stop by on myway from Colorado to
Massachusetts to help youdeclutter and organize your
home, I'd be so happy to have aconversation with you.
All you need to do is email meat megs at
organizinganadhdbrain.
com, and I'd be so happy to chatwith you more to see if this is
(36:13):
something that's feasible andsomething that I do.
I just need to be havingconversations with people to
discover what are some of thoseThings that you would expect to
get done as I'm driving acrossthe country, and some of the
things that would need a littlebit more time, right?
I have some really cool ideasand I'm excited to see If it's
feasible, if it's realistic ornot.
So it's out there in theuniverse and let's see what
(36:37):
y'all think about it.
I've held myself back fromgetting political on this
podcast and this podcast willremain about organizing an ADHD.
what's also important toremember is that This world is
political.
Everything that we do, we eat,sleep, drink, with the homes
that we buy.
ADHD specifically has becomemore and more politicized as we
(37:00):
move into the year 2025.
And so if there are ways to getinvolved, especially when it
comes to ADHD, and ways toadvocate for our community, I
will be mentioning it in thepodcast because it feels like
we're drinking through a firehose sometimes when it comes to
All the information that notonly we get through social
(37:21):
media, but also through all thedifferent media platforms that
are feeding us the news.
and so many of the people I havebeen speaking to, not only my
clients, but also my neighborsand, people I meet on the
street, they don't know where tostart as far as advocating for
themselves and advocating fortheir communities and their kids
and their families and what ittruly looks like to be an
(37:44):
American nowadays.
with an ADHD brain, you'redifferent.
And because you're different,you're cool.
Being different is incredible.
Whether you are black, white,Mexican, I don't care.
Your differences should becelebrated because they help us
grow and learn new things thathelp us be better humans in this
(38:05):
world.
I'm so excited to continue tocome to you with more about
letting go and understanding howyou can have more in this world
by having less.
Truly, there's so much more tolive for than the stuff that we
buy, and the stuff that we have,or the to do lists that are
continuously getting longer andlonger.
(38:27):
I hope you're having anincredible week, and I will see
you next week.
Welcome back to another episode of
(00:01):
organizing an ADHD brain.
I'm your host Megs.
And I am so happy to be talkingto you again about letting go.
I told you that this is a topicI could go on and on about.
In fact, I could relate it to somany of the things that we
handle on a regular basis, Notjust the letting go of our
stuff, but the letting go ofsome of the things that we have
(00:22):
to do and the things that wethink that we need to say yes to
and the shoulds and the shouldnots and the holy smokes, how
the heck do we manage a life inthis go go go world that we live
in?
I'm going to keep this trendgoing over the next couple of
months intertwined with someincredible interviews I have
coming up here as well.
Things like.
(00:43):
Digital organizers andnetworking queens and
photography organizers.
I've got so much goodinformation to drop for you.
The weather out in Colorado isgorgeous today.
My husband is outside chattingwith our neighbors And the kids
are enjoying just being outsideand playing together.
Before I jump in today, I didwant to drop that my husband and
(01:06):
I are moving across the countrythis summer.
We're making a move fromColorado to Massachusetts.
And we have been playing aroundwith the idea of what if Meg's
did an organizing tour acrossthe United States So if that's
something that you would beinterested in, whether you're a
current client of mine, oryou're dying to have me come
(01:28):
into your home and help youcreate systems that work for
you, shoot me a message at Meg'sat organizing and adhdbrain.
com.
Email me with, where you live,because we're going to be
driving from Colorado.
To Massachusetts, let me know ifthat's something that you're
interested in doing and we mightbe able to book a time to chat
and see if that's feasible.
(01:49):
I'm just playing around with theidea, but I figured I'd put it
out there and start having someconversations if some of you are
truly interested in having mecome by.
Okay, so let's jump into thistopic today.
My goal truly is to help youthink about prioritization a
little bit better, because withA DHD priorities aren't
typically top of mind becauseeverything is a priority.
(02:10):
If I have something to do, thenI've gotta do everything.
Nothing gets prioritized to thefront of the line because
everything is important unlessthere's a deadline.
And even then we're gonna lookfor something else to do before
we finally complete the thingthat is facing us.
I also want to give you someperspectives on time blindness
and oftentimes what we do toourselves based on our time
blindness, which is actually apart of our executive function
(02:34):
deficiency.
Super interesting.
So I'm going to get into that alittle bit and also just
understanding releasing theshould mentality because so many
of us are people pleasers.
And we've either been taught toact this way or we felt like it
was necessary for us to show upand do everything for everyone
else.
(02:55):
With that being the case, wefeel like we should be doing all
of these things.
I say this all the time, and I'mgoing to say it again probably
multiple times on this episode.
If everything is important, thennothing is important.
It took me so long to trulyunderstand what this concept
meant For me.
(03:15):
But also, I have to repeat it tomyself now still, on a regular
basis, and create rules to helpme understand what I can truly
achieve in life.
So this has everything to dowith letting go because So
often, people come to me whenthey're talking to me about
coaching, or even in mycommunity, and they're like, I
(03:36):
just don't know where to start.
And is this the right time tostart?
When do I start decluttering?
How do I figure out a way tomake this all work for me?
When at the same time, you'realso, and I'm going to speak to
the women out there, but I'msure so many of you men can
relate too, but you're managingfamilies and you're figuring out
what to cook every single weekfor dinner and you're figuring
(03:58):
out how to keep up with somesort of cleaning schedule, but
then you also might work acorporate job.
But if you're not working acorporate job, or even if you
are, you're trying to figure outhow to stay active in your kid's
schools.
And maybe your kids areneurodivergent just like you.
So you're learning how to parentthem in a different way than
your parents did, because we'retrying to break generational
curses.
But at the same time, you'realso taking care of pets and
(04:20):
there's gardening.
And then how many of you have atleast 25 hobbies that you are
trying to manage?
But with that, how many of youalso have just so many little
projects sitting around yourhouse waiting to get done?
Because You know, you could doit.
I often hear people with ADHDdescribed as a jack of all
(04:41):
trades, master of none, or asone of my clients likes to say a
ham and egger.
it's a common new England termfor someone who's just happens
to be good at a lot of things.
what I've noticed is that peoplewith ADHD tend to get good at
things pretty quickly.
But then we get kind of bored ofit.
And then we move on to the nextthing that's new and exciting
(05:04):
can fill our cup up with thatbeing the case.
It's so easy for us to adoptmore and more because we're
excited about doing all thesethings.
I got told in the corporateworld that I got too excited
about everything.
And because I got too excitedabout everything, I was putting
all of my eggs in so manydifferent baskets.
It was hard for me to manage myschedule and manage the things
(05:26):
that were the most important tome, Now things always got done,
but I wanted so much more.
I wanted to work on developmentand I wanted to work on these
creative processes that helpedus do our job better and I
wanted to create different waysthat we could communicate
interdepartmentally to help uslearn how other departments work
(05:46):
so that we could be moreefficient at our jobs.
But I decided that all of thatwas my job.
And it also was a very difficultbecause there were a lot of
people that were my peers thatdidn't want to do that much, and
I didn't understand it.
I was like, why don't you wantto do all of these things?
I now understand a little bitmore.
(06:06):
So if you're listening to thisand you're at the point where
you're not ready to dropanything, that's totally okay.
I just simply want to give yousome perspective on where your
priorities might be with ADHD.
Because in order fordecluttering and organizing to
become a top priority for you,you can't say yes to everything,
(06:29):
even if you're excited abouteverything.
And I'm not talking just withyour schedule, I'm talking with
the stuff that you have in yourhome.
If you keep everything and youwant to do everything, then it's
going to be so hard for you todo anything.
Cause there's so much! How doyou know when to start?
Not only in decluttering, thesilly mundane tasks that we
(06:50):
don't necessarily want totackle, but the fun stuff! How
do you find your hobbies?
How do you even put it away ifthere's no spot for it?
There's so much that comes intoplay.
I want to get really visual withyou today, too.
having an analogy to attach thisto is so helpful.
I know that with my brain, I seethings very visually as I'm
talking to my clients or as, I'mseeing their home.
(07:12):
I want to see pictures.
I want to see what you'reworking towards.
I not only want to hear youdescribe it to me, but I start
to create a picture of what thatlooks like in my brain, like
visually.
I see it.
It's very clear to me.
so think about it like this.
Your brain is like an internetbrowser with so many different
tabs open.
(07:32):
I know you've heard this before,right?
okay, so I'm thinking about thisright now.
I'm Googling it.
I found the right topic for me.
This is what I need here.
But.
Oh, squirrel, let me open upanother browser because I'm
interested in this and I need tolog in here.
So I'm going to open up this andthen another browser gets open
because the first browser wasopen and there was just like a
(07:52):
pop up thought, right?
So now we've got all of thesetabs open in our brain, but our
working memory is not great.
So as we're opening up new tabs,we're forgetting about all those
other tabs that are open.
They're still open.
They're hanging out there.
But they're not on the forefrontof our mind anymore, because we
don't have the capacity to keepeverything up there, mulling
(08:15):
around all the darn time.
so as you're decluttering, youfind something that needs to be
sewed.
Oh, let me put this aside.
I'm going to sew that later.
And then you're like, I feellike I should keep this, because
what if I need it?
And so you put it aside.
You don't put it in a place thatyou can find it.
You just keep it, because whatif you need it one day?
You keep that aside too.
(08:35):
And then you're like, Oh, thiscould really use some glue.
Let me put this to the side.
I'm going to glue that.
Oh, my daughter broke herbracelet.
I'm going to put this backtogether.
I'm going to find a new stringso that I can help her wear it
and that way it won't breakanymore.
so on and so forth.
So these are all these likelittle to do tasks that you're
keeping up here.
And then you've got all of theseother different hobbies in this
(08:56):
life that you're trying tomanage at the same time.
When you have too many tabs openon your browser, your browser
actually starts to work a lotslower.
it's slower in processing.
It starts to lag.
And sometimes it'll even crash.
And that's what leads us toburnout.
We're saying yes to all of thesethings because we genuinely want
(09:17):
to do them, and honestly, wegenuinely know that we could be
good at so many of the thingsthat we're doing.
But we hold on to all of them,thinking that we can do all of
them, and when we don'taccomplish hardly any of them,
we beat ourselves up because wefelt like we should have done
everything.
And so instead of letting go andsaying, okay, what are the
(09:37):
things that I really want to do,and what are the things that I
don't necessarily want to do asmuch, even though I still want
to do them?
We just think that we're awfulbecause we haven't been able to
accomplish everything.
Instead of exiting out of thebrowser and just deleting all
the tabs knowing that we'll beable to come back to it at any
time, we keep it open becausewe're nervous that we might lose
(10:00):
those things.
We're so used to our brainforgetting things so much that
we try to keep all of thesethings around us to remind us of
the things that we genuinelywant to do.
This is mental overload.
No wonder we're so cluttered inour homes, because we can't
possibly prioritize this.
(10:21):
The only time decluttering andorganizing truly becomes a
priority is when we realizesomeone's coming over and we
finally get our eyes on thisclutter as not just something we
can put off, but something weneed to take care of.
Otherwise, people are going tosee who we truly are.
But it's not that we're lazy.
It's not that, and yes, we maybe a little bit disorganized,
(10:45):
but truthfully, This comes backto the way that we process
things neurologically.
But if clutter is never apriority, because you've got all
of these other things going on,then how do you make it a
priority?
How do you delete some of thetabs on your browser so that you
can truly start to effectivelywork in your life and be proud
(11:08):
of the things that you're doing?
this year, as I'm building thisbusiness, and as I'm figuring
out what's next, I have so manyideas on what I want to do on a
regular basis.
And likely, you all have someincredible ideas for me too,
like why isn't Meg's doing this?
Why isn't Meg's doing this?
I ask myself the same questionsI'm telling you that because the
(11:29):
ideas aren't lacking.
But I also know that when I'mtrying to get things done, I
want to do them really well.
And I'm not holding myself backfrom doing them, but I do want
to really hone in on the skillsthat I have right now and come
up with systems and ways toautomate these things so that as
I'm adding more to my plate, Iknow what to delegate and what
(11:50):
to not.
I only know to do this becauseI've started to manifest and
figure out what did these bigpicture items look like?
What are the big things I needto do in order to get there?
And what are the tiny actions Ican take on a regular basis in
order to effectively hit theselarger goals?
I have practiced through projectmanagement in doing this.
(12:11):
I also use a project managementsoftware for my business, but
also this is what I teach peopleto do when they're organizing.
What's the smallest thing youcould do to start making
progress toward that biggergoal?
Let me come back.
I'm circling back here because Iget lost on tangents and I want
to make sure that this is reallyclear today.
(12:31):
I was talking earlier aboutpeople not knowing where to
start, or how do I even find thetime to declutter, I need to be
able to take off a week.
Okay, so many people tell methey need to just be able to
take off like the entire summerso that they can declutter and
organize their home.
Or, I need to take off a weekfrom work so that I can
declutter and organize my home.
As if it could happen in a week.
(12:54):
What you will find as you'redecluttering and organizing your
home think about how long ittook to get that stuff into your
home.
Years, lots of years.
It could take a lot of time toget that stuff out of your home,
especially if you're puttingbarriers on it leaving.
when the clutter becomes so muchof an issue that you have no
(13:16):
choice but to handle it, that iswhen you need to start to
prioritize it.
But what that also means is thatyou're going to be letting go of
some of the other things in yourlife so that you can live a life
with less.
You can do it and it starts bydoing one thing, and I have a
recommendation for you at theend of this podcast, just one
(13:37):
thing, one thing that you canstart to do now to start to
understand how you're livingyour life and what you could let
go of to start to live your lifea little bit more effectively
and with a little bit more timeon your hands.
One of the reasons why wecontinuously say yes to things
is not only because we'reexcited about it, we want to be
involved in our kids schools, wewant to see more friends, we
(14:01):
want to do another activity.
Sometimes we don't, but we sayyes to it in the moment, now we
feel obligated to do it.
But we genuinely want to dothese things, and because we're
time blind, and time blindness.
Is a difficulty managing andperceiving time.
So that's tied to executivefunctioning and The ability to
(14:24):
plan and organize.
I watched a really cool video ontime blindness the other day.
And there's this adorablecouple, they're all over social
media, and they talk about timeblindness.
and they were describing 5minutes.
hey, we have 5 minutes before weleave the house.
And the husband asked the wifewho has ADHD, he does not.
And he said, how much could youdo in five minutes?
(14:44):
And she's like, oh, quite a bit.
I could probably hop in theshower real quick, get dressed,
and, we can be on our way.
I'll fluff up my hair real quickand it'll be fine.
And then he's like, okay, whatif I told you that you had 300
seconds before you left thehouse?
And she's like, oh my gosh,that's no time at all.
I can't do anything in 300seconds.
so I've been using that in myown life to try to decide how
(15:07):
much something is going to takeme.
I've tried using it with mygirls.
It's not as effective as it iswith me And I think that's
because i've had a little bitmore practice Perceiving time
even though it's still not aforte in my life.
I'm not curing adhd.
I'm just trying to understand itBut when I'm brushing my teeth
at night, I go, I'm like, okay,my whole bedtime routine is
(15:30):
going to take less than 300seconds.
Can I do that?
Yes.
when I have to rinse out andrecycle the little cat tin from
feeding my cat, is that going totake less than 30 seconds?
Yes.
Can I do it?
Okay.
Even though I hate it, I don'twant to.
Those are the things I don'twant to do.
But because we're bad atperceiving time, it's so easy
(15:50):
for us to say yes to all ofthese things because it doesn't
feel like it's much time at all.
But what's so interesting aboutthis is it's not only the time
on your calendar, oh, it'll takeme about an hour to do this.
You're still thinking about itin other parts of your world.
It'll come up because now it'sanother thing that you're
managing, another responsibilitythat you have.
oh my gosh, I genuinely want todo these things.
(16:12):
I'm going to give you anotherexample.
In the beginning of the year, Idecided I wanted to be way more
present in my daughter, who'sfive, Cora.
I wanted to be more present inCora's classroom in the school.
And my husband and I wouldvolunteer for all of their class
parties, and that was reallyfun.
And then I was like, maybe Ishould be involved.
I should be helping to plan andprep the party.
(16:33):
Maybe I could come up with allthese templates and these
different things that we coulddo to make it more efficient and
more organized.
And as I went through and didthis, I realized how much of the
mental capacity I was puttinginto this that I would just
wasn't going to be able tosustain.
So I did one party with a coupleof the other moms.
And the next time another partycame around, I held myself back
(16:56):
and I said, Hey guys, I'm notgoing to volunteer for the
planning and the prep of thisparty, but I will still help out
as a classroom volunteer.
And so I'm starting to realizewhat I can and I cannot handle.
But sometimes it's taking actionand figuring that out as I go
along.
you're allowed to do that too,just because you don't know up
front, sometimes you need tomake mistakes or make, a
(17:16):
perceived mistake to understandwhat's needed of you next.
You get to decide.
It's not up for me to decide,but it is up to you to figure
out what are the most importantthings that you do and what are
the things that you need tostart letting go so that you can
figure out how to create timefor decluttering and organizing
because it does take time.
And it doesn't have to take aton of time.
(17:39):
It can be very small incrementalthings that you do each day that
can help make a huge differencein your life.
But like I said, we genuinelywant to say yes to these things.
Another beautiful.
piece of imagery for you isthink about your life as a
garden Think about the differentflowers that you've handpicked
(18:01):
to put in that garden.
I love honeysuckles.
I think the honeysuckles that Iplant are So beautiful.
I love the way they climb.
I love the way they look whenthey're climbing up a wall and
they create almost this wall offlowers effect.
I think it's so cool.
I'm really into that.
I also have a peony bush that Iabsolutely love.
(18:21):
It's so beautiful and it bloomsso big and bright.
I get so excited every time Isee the buds start to flourish.
I also laid some beautiful fullgreen ground cover in my garden
and I've got this really coolblack mulch that I filled it in
with so any of the color thatpops through will truly pop.
(18:43):
But in order for me to make thisgarden work, I have to get out
there and work on it.
And so each and every day as I'mputting effort into each of
these flowers, and every yearwhen I'm coming back, they grow
bigger and brighter and morebeautiful.
But as gardens grow, so doweeds.
So do different things that Ididn't expect to show up.
(19:04):
One time I was planting a lilacbush and as I was digging there
were these really disgusting,weird larva worm things that I
found in the dirt.
And my husband and I startedlooking it up and I thought that
we were going to have to fightthis disease that was happening
in our garden.
We were fine.
(19:25):
But, we had to dispose of themand I learned a little bit more.
and part of it is because nowwe're taking care of a tree.
We've added that to therepertoire of our garden.
But weeds keep coming up andsometimes my dogs run through
the garden and now I have toclean that up.
think about your hobbies andyour passions as the flowers in
the garden, and then theunnecessary obligations and
(19:51):
clutter are the weeds, but it'simportant that you identify what
are the flowers of your life andwhat are the weeds.
Now some weeds, like doing thedishes, are unable to be plucked
and thrown away forever.
Those are the things of our lifethat we must do unless you are
fortunate enough to be able tohire someone to clean your
dishes for you every singlenight.
(20:13):
Think about this analogy as,What are the things that I truly
want to nourish?
Because those are the thingsthat are going to continue to
grow just like yourself.
Actually taking care of yourselfwhen you take care of yourself
on a regular basis, you're lesslikely to get burnt out.
And I'm not just talking aboutgoing to the spa for the day.
(20:36):
I'm talking about, rememberingto take a deep breath and to be
grateful for what you have andto be able to.
Even do your skincare routine,anything, these small little
things add up to so much whenyou focus on that and you are
truly a flower in your life.
So something to start toexplore, even if you don't
(20:57):
implement it right away, is howdo you weed out the unnecessary
stuff in your life that is notbringing you joy and not helping
you achieve so much of what youwant in life.
It's so important that we startto understand how we can say no
to the things that truly aren'tfilling us up on a regular
(21:20):
basis.
It doesn't mean that you say noall of the time, but it's
learning how to start to say noin a way that could work for you
so that you can prioritize thethings that you truly want to
get done.
Think about yourself 10 yearsfrom now.
Do they have a decluttered home?
how's their face looked?
(21:41):
are they consistent with theirskincare routine or are they
continuously coming back to it?
How about your garden?
What's it look like?
So as you're thinking about yourfuture and the different things
that you're trying to do andattain and achieve is
volunteering all the time goingto help you achieve those goals.
(22:04):
One thing we had to do over thislast year was say no to so many
of the extracurricularactivities we have had our kids
involved in.
Previously, I may have talkedabout this before, but I'm going
to talk about it again.
part of it was for the budget.
It's just it gets more and moreexpensive to not only buy all
the gear that comes along withit, but then, of course, the
(22:26):
lessons and then, making surethat we can fit that into our
time schedule and withneurodivergent children routines
that are different on a regularbasis can be very difficult to
adhere to.
And so over this last year, aswe have taken a step back on all
these extracurriculars, We havefilled up our life so much more
(22:48):
in so many different ways.
It's been incredibly valuableNot only has it helped us
because we're putting that moneyinto a different bucket We're
also figuring out How to supportthem in the different things
that they want and desire to do.
We're spending more timetogether.
We've spent so much more timetogether, because we're not
(23:10):
constantly rushing to do all ofthese things, which ultimately
burn you out.
and I'm not knocking you fordoing what you're doing.
Please continue.
If that is what brings you joy,incredible.
And I just want to normalizesaying, what if you took a year
off?
Is that still going to get youto where you're trying to be 10
(23:32):
years from now, or where yourkids want to be 10 years from
now?
You get to evaluate that, andyou get to evaluate how that's
affecting your life right now.
Decluttering your physical spaceis going to work very similarly.
It's likely that you want all ofthe stuff that you have.
(23:53):
Because you brought it into yourhome for a reason.
you want to be able to be goodat painting, but also have a box
of peacock feathers, just incase I'm winking to the person
who knows exactly who I'mtalking about in this case.
You want to be able to have acostume on hand, Or be the house
that has a toy for everyone toplay with.
(24:14):
You want to have that perfectpiece of wood that's gonna fix
your project or finish yourproject and you don't have to go
to the store to get it.
You want to have every variationof a medium because what if one
day you get this incredibleinclination to do this?
You're not gonna throw awayanything that's broken because
you can fix it and let me justput it over here and I'll get to
(24:36):
it.
I really like the way that thispiece of clothing fit me 10
years ago, so I'm going to keepit just in case my body ever
looks like that again.
if we continue to keep all ofthe things that we think we
should in our home andeverything is important, then
nothing is important.
The more clutter you have, themore priorities are taking up
(24:59):
your brain space.
And the less that gets donebecause now everything that
you're looking at becomes adecision that needs to be made
and often one that's way toooverwhelming for you to even
begin to start.
That's okay.
It's okay to feel overwhelmedand it's okay to look at a pile
(25:20):
of stuff or a doom pile, right?
Didn't organize, only movedpile.
So many of us have them.
It's okay to look at it and justbe like, Oh my God, I don't want
to begin to tackle that rightnow.
Too many decisions.
Yikes.
But if you wait until you havemore time in your schedule, if
you wait until you finally readall of the books, if you wait
(25:43):
until you take a week off workand that's the time you're going
to do it, if you wait until thesummer when the kids are off
school, If you wait and you waitbefore too long, you're going to
realize that it's not going toget done, but it is okay to
start saying no to some of thethings that are not as important
(26:03):
as decluttering.
so that you can make room for itin your life.
Not the stuff, but for lettinggo of the stuff.
Truthfully, we were never meantto be this busy.
We really weren't.
Our brains were never meant tokeep up with this much.
So my challenge for you thisweek, this is an extra thing for
you to do, I know, but bear withme, it's gonna help as well.
(26:25):
I want you to find one notebookin your house, and do not go buy
another notebook, and if you dobecause you need that dopamine
hit, that's fine, but there'slikely a blank notebook sitting
somewhere in your house, andwe're gonna repurpose it.
I want you to go and find thatnotebook and it should be blank,
let's start from scratch or pullout the papers that are in there
and just get rid of them orrecycle and write on it, my to
(26:49):
do's or the things that arefloating around in my brain, the
things that you feel obligatedto say yes to, whatever it is.
And I want you for the next weekto start to write all of the
things down that come up.
if you are decluttering and aproject comes up, write it down.
If you are letting go ofsomething, you decide to keep it
just in case, write it down.
(27:11):
Okay?
I'm keeping this just in case,right?
Because now that's, it reallytruly is another to do on your
list.
Now you've kept it, Write downall of the things that are
floating around in your brain.
Did you say yes to a coffee datewith this person?
Put it down.
Are you planning to plan yourdaughter's eighth birthday and
go all out?
Write it down.
(27:31):
How much time is that going totake?
Are you moving across thecountry and now you're trying to
say goodbye to all of thefriends you've made over the
last 10 years of living inColorado?
Write that down.
Write down the people who youtruly want to see.
Am I giving this advice tomyself?
Maybe.
With that in mind, on the otherside of this piece of paper, I
(27:52):
want you to start writing downthe things that you truly love
to do.
Like gardening, or singing, orthings like that.
Now, something to support youthrough this project is go to my
website and download the freedopamine menu, because with
that, those different hobbiesthat you're writing down, those
are the things that you could doto help you with your focus and
motivation.
Because when you're doingsomething that truly brings you
(28:13):
joy, things that you could do in10, 15, 30 minutes.
those could help you get themotivation you need to do the
things that you don'tnecessarily want to do.
start a decluttering project for15 minutes or 30 minutes,
whatever makes sense for you.
I'm not telling you how to dothat right now.
So go back to one of my previousepisodes on how to get started
with decluttering and what thatlooks like and feels like.
(28:35):
But it is important for us tolet go of not only the stuff
that we have, but also theprojects and the things we need
to add to our to do list.
Because one thing isn't a bigdeal, and that's the only thing
technically you're saying yes toin the moment.
But that's because it's out ofsight, out of mind now.
But when you're saying, I'mgoing to do this later, 20, 30,
(28:57):
40 times, now your to do listhas gotten so much longer.
And that's not even counting allof the things that you've said
yes to adding to your schedulewhile also taking care of kids
while also trying to figure outhow to be the best version of
yourself.
Not only.
As you, but as a mom, but assomeone who works in the
corporate world, wherever youare showing up, there's so much
(29:19):
that's now being added to yourplate.
It's like you're filling up thisbackpack and you're like, Oh,
I'm a mom, I'm a wife, I'm a,I'm an entrepreneur.
And then everything else thatyou say yes to is now getting
put in that backpack and there'sno more room for it.
You have no idea where to findanything in this backpack
because it's so chock full.
It's so heavy on your back, butyou feel like you can't take
(29:40):
anything out because it allfeels so important.
When everything is important,nothing is important.
We got to take some stuff out ofthe backpack and in order to
take some of the stuff out ofthe backpack, we've got to say
no to some things.
But in order for you to startsaying no, you've got to
understand what you'reprioritizing.
And part of that just comes frombrain dumping it all out.
(30:03):
And I'm not saying make a to dolist for the day.
I'm talking like, Over the nextweek, what are the things that
are pulling you from doing allthe things that you truly want?
Okay, so that is what I want youto take away from this.
Start to write down What are thethings that you are genuinely
doing on a regular basis thatare taking so much of your
(30:24):
mental energy?
And can you truly let somethinggo so that you can make
decluttering and organizingSomething that is a regular
occurrence in your life becausethat's what makes all the
difference is knowing that okayI'm making another step in the
direction of getting moreorganized and Decluttering my
home so that I can live a morepeaceful life today, and this is
(30:47):
what I'm doing about it.
I can't remember if I said thisearlier, so I'm gonna say it
now.
When I have a bunch of tabs openon my browser, Instead of
leaving them there and savingthem for later, I just exit out.
At this point, I have gottenconfident enough and I trust
myself to know That if I closeit out, I will be okay.
And I will always be able toreopen a browser, and most
(31:08):
things are saved nowadays.
Anyways, if there's somethingthat is truly that important,
you'll be able to get it again.
You are allowed to make changes.
You don't have to live witheverything that you're living
with right now.
We've trained ourselves to, toknow that we could get anything
off of Amazon.
We've trained ourselves to knowthat we could go to our
subscription base and we couldput any of those channels on
(31:31):
because we're probablysubscribed to all of them.
Over the last couple months, myhusband and I cancelled Amazon.
We've been without it for twomonths now, and we've been fine.
I tried doing it last year, andit was more difficult last year,
but I can't put a finger on why.
I think it was because we hadsubscriptions connected, and
then I didn't, I wasn't ready tosay goodbye to them.
(31:53):
I didn't have a lot of the toolsthat I have now to be able to
say, I don't need those anymore.
Or this decision isn't forever.
It's not permanent.
Just because I'm saying no to itnow doesn't mean I can't get it
in the future.
It just means I don't have itright now, which means I'm
thinking a little bit morepurposefully about the different
decisions on the things that I'mpurchasing in my life.
(32:16):
we deleted Disney plus for alittle bit too.
and Cora, again, my five yearold was like, I don't
understand.
We don't have Bluey.
Why don't we have Bluey, right?
We love a little Bluey in ourhousehold if you've never
watched it, even as an adult.
There's some beautiful messagingin there.
But, we just talked about it'snot a forever thing.
We're just choosing to spend ourmoney in different places right
(32:36):
now.
And there's nothing wrong withthat.
Just because you don't haveeverything doesn't mean that
you're not fully equipped tohandle life.
we just as a society have beentrained to have everything.
It's so easy to go and buy thesethings that we need so that we
can have it.
I've figured out where I want tospend my money so that I don't
feel obligated to spend my moneyin so many other places.
(32:59):
I'm so much more purposefulabout what I buy because I also
know what I have.
It's very easy for me to seeclearly what's available and
what's not.
So that way when I am making apurchasing decision, it is more
about like, well, I don't havethis.
Do I really need it?
I also recently deletedFacebook.
I realized that it was taking upa lot of my time.
(33:20):
And that comes back to our timeblindness.
We can oftentimes get sodistracted by our phones.
That we forget that real lifeeven exists because it's so easy
to escape on our phones.
I can say that I, I'm such aculprit of being on my phone too
much and not truly doing thework that I want to be doing.
(33:43):
So I, I challenged you all abouttwo weeks ago to use the
dopamine menu to start to dothings that fill up your cup
that aren't your phone.
So I'm going to encourage you todo that again.
So here are some ways that youcan continue to stay in touch
with me.
Go to my website,organizinganadhdbrain.
com.
(34:03):
There's a banner that says, getyour free download.
It'll take you to the dopaminemenu, tell you all the cool
things it does.
You not only get the dopaminemenu, but also a video of me
walking you through how to usethat.
Put it on your fridge.
When you sign up, you'll get myemails on a weekly basis.
I'm always keeping you up todate with what's going on in the
organizing and ADHD braincommunity.
(34:24):
And that's another way to workwith me is go to.
OrganizinganADHDbrain dot com,forward slash community.
And there you can sign up forthe Organizing an ADHD Brain
community.
We meet monthly, not only doingbody doubling sessions,
decluttering sessions, but alsogroup coaching to support
ourselves through gettingdecluttered and more organized.
(34:47):
We're always talking about somereally amazing stuff.
Sometimes we're super deep,sometimes we're more surface
level.
But it's always a really goodtime and everything's recorded
so you can keep coming back formore.
That's 27 a month.
It's super affordable if youneed a little bit more
accountability.
And then if you're stuck, ifyou're listening to the podcast,
If you've literally tried somany decluttering and organizing
(35:11):
stuff, and it's just notworking, and you feel like you
need more guided support, book acall with me.
You can go to my website,organizingandadhdbrain.
com, and there's, A bookingbutton right on the front page
or go to the show notes belowand you can get on my calendar
that way as well.
Right now I only have one spotleft in the month of March.
(35:32):
So if you're ready to getstarted for the month of April,
be sure to book a call soonerrather than later because I will
start to fill up a wait list.
My goal is to only be workingwith eight people at the most at
any given time because Idedicate so much time and energy
to my clients.
So that's really important tome.
Regardless, join the community.
(35:52):
I'd love to see you there.
Oh, and don't forget, I askedyou at the beginning.
If you want me to stop by on myway from Colorado to
Massachusetts to help youdeclutter and organize your
home, I'd be so happy to have aconversation with you.
All you need to do is email meat megs at
organizinganadhdbrain.
com, and I'd be so happy to chatwith you more to see if this is
(36:13):
something that's feasible andsomething that I do.
I just need to be havingconversations with people to
discover what are some of thoseThings that you would expect to
get done as I'm driving acrossthe country, and some of the
things that would need a littlebit more time, right?
I have some really cool ideasand I'm excited to see If it's
feasible, if it's realistic ornot.
So it's out there in theuniverse and let's see what
(36:37):
y'all think about it.
I've held myself back fromgetting political on this
podcast and this podcast willremain about organizing an ADHD.
what's also important toremember is that This world is
political.
Everything that we do, we eat,sleep, drink, with the homes
that we buy.
ADHD specifically has becomemore and more politicized as we
(37:00):
move into the year 2025.
And so if there are ways to getinvolved, especially when it
comes to ADHD, and ways toadvocate for our community, I
will be mentioning it in thepodcast because it feels like
we're drinking through a firehose sometimes when it comes to
All the information that notonly we get through social
(37:21):
media, but also through all thedifferent media platforms that
are feeding us the news.
and so many of the people I havebeen speaking to, not only my
clients, but also my neighborsand, people I meet on the
street, they don't know where tostart as far as advocating for
themselves and advocating fortheir communities and their kids
and their families and what ittruly looks like to be an
(37:44):
American nowadays.
with an ADHD brain, you'redifferent.
And because you're different,you're cool.
Being different is incredible.
Whether you are black, white,Mexican, I don't care.
Your differences should becelebrated because they help us
grow and learn new things thathelp us be better humans in this
(38:05):
world.
I'm so excited to continue tocome to you with more about
letting go and understanding howyou can have more in this world
by having less.
Truly, there's so much more tolive for than the stuff that we
buy, and the stuff that we have,or the to do lists that are
continuously getting longer andlonger.
(38:27):
I hope you're having anincredible week, and I will see
you next week.
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