penguins_dont_fly is a Volunteer Community Mentor
It has been over a year since my Business partner and I went our separate ways.
With the split, I lost my dedicated 500 square foot space and have moved all operations into my home (which is not large at all).
My office space (pictures, research and listing) feels claustrophobic to me and I find myself not even wanting to go in there ... which results in me not listing anything or only listing one or two items before "escaping".
I have good inventory storage space and a good shipping workstation separate from the office, so I'm (mostly) OK there ... it's just the all-important "desk time" that's killing me.
I've been watching "Tidying Up with Marie Kondo" on Netflix (you should ... really ... she's wonderful).
Her basic principles work for the rest of my house and personal items ... but I can't seem to make them work in the office ... mostly because everything in there is necessary, even if it doesn't "spark joy". And at this point, it is the opposite of joy.
I need some ideas, gurus, videos ... something. Anybody got any?
@lacemaker3 wrote:Hi @penguins_dont_fly, I can understand what you're saying about this. I'm going to focus on the pictures of the office, because that's what you're asking for help with.
@penguins_dont_fly wrote:I'm on coffee #3 🙂
...
My "office" is also the spare room ... which is also the fishing tackle room ... it's terrible in there and it just keeps getting worse because I keep running from it 😞
The stuff on the floor and in the light box is the unlisted stuff that needs to get done ...
I think you have way too much going on in this space.
My first thought when I looked at the pictures was ... get rid of the fishing poles. They are just too much. They take up a great deal of visual space, and they aren't displayed attractively, which might help. You said it's the spare room too ... but I don't see a bed or anything for a guest room, so hopefully that isn't there too.
I think it would help to dedicate this room to a single purpose, for now at least, and move everything else out. You need this to be your working space, where you will spend more than half of your awake time. Also, it looks like there's too much "stuff" in the cubbies and on the shelves above the desk. Are those ribbons draped on the shelf? Can you store those in a drawer somewhere else? Too much visual confusion.
A lot of the stuff looks like papers, and you should minimize papers. Most of your records are better off stored digitally, with a backup on an external hard drive that you copy to at least once a week. Papers, bills, should be tossed once you're done with them. If you leave it for later, you'll waste too much time sorting and evaluating them later.
A good rule for paper work is, touch it once only. Open it, deal with it, then file it or toss it. Don't touch it again.
If YOU can't stand being in your office, then you need to change it so that YOU want to be in there, rather than something else.
(Addressing the highlighted stuff)
"Spare Room" = This room is the only other bedroom in the apartment. There is nowhere else to put out (very expensive) fishing equipment. We have 2 Bedrooms, one bathroom a living room, kitchen and laundry/mud room.
We don't have many overnight guests, we just don't have the room ... but we have a pull out couch for those that do stay a night or two.
The whole apartment is only about 600 square feet.
We have storage space outside of the apartment, which contains my inventory and extra packing materials.
@penguins_dont_fly wrote:
That corner is the closet, with sliding doors ... that is full of DH's "stuff", golf clubs, misc fishing tackle and boat stuff, extra ammunition (gun safe is in the bedroom) shooting targets, etc.
"Up" is already taken 🙂
The desk is a tall unit ... I probably should replace it, move it to the other side and then put shelves on that wall over the light box....switching my view 🙂
I share the desk with hubby ... our household gets run from there, too. Which makes it a bit more difficult ... but not impossible LOL
Motivation isn't my issue ... it's claustrophobic anxiety, compounded when I know I'm going to get anxious when going in there ... I just need to break the anxiety circle.
I would love to just rip everything out of there and start over ... I did that with our outdoor storage cubby this past weekend. Everything got listed as "free" on local sales sites. Anything leftover got put in the dumpster last night and picked up in the trash today. The bikes got sold last week (we never ride them).
I also set all of my local sales stuff to "free" and the last of that stuff went, too 🙂
I'm on a mission ... organization, a calm, inspiring household, or bust! My bedroom and kitchen are in the middle of being "Kon-Marie'd" (joy, trash or donate), but on a modified schedule ... I'm taking it a piece at a time LOL
This room just makes me insane ...
looking "up" 🙂
Oh my...my thoughts have changed. I think that you need a new space out of this one. Seems that what you have in this room is not yours for the most part. Do you have a small area in your living area that you can have a desk to work from?
@mcdougle4248 wrote:
@penguins_dont_fly wrote:
That corner is the closet, with sliding doors ... that is full of DH's "stuff", golf clubs, misc fishing tackle and boat stuff, extra ammunition (gun safe is in the bedroom) shooting targets, etc.
"Up" is already taken 🙂
The desk is a tall unit ... I probably should replace it, move it to the other side and then put shelves on that wall over the light box....switching my view 🙂
I share the desk with hubby ... our household gets run from there, too. Which makes it a bit more difficult ... but not impossible LOL
Motivation isn't my issue ... it's claustrophobic anxiety, compounded when I know I'm going to get anxious when going in there ... I just need to break the anxiety circle.
I would love to just rip everything out of there and start over ... I did that with our outdoor storage cubby this past weekend. Everything got listed as "free" on local sales sites. Anything leftover got put in the dumpster last night and picked up in the trash today. The bikes got sold last week (we never ride them).
I also set all of my local sales stuff to "free" and the last of that stuff went, too 🙂
I'm on a mission ... organization, a calm, inspiring household, or bust! My bedroom and kitchen are in the middle of being "Kon-Marie'd" (joy, trash or donate), but on a modified schedule ... I'm taking it a piece at a time LOL
This room just makes me insane ...
Oh my...my thoughts have changed. I think that you need a new space out of this one. Seems that what you have in this room is not yours for the most part. Do you have a small area in your living area that you can have a desk to work from?
Ok, whew. Looking up, I would want to get out of there too. I get it, your husband loves his fishing poles. Without another room to put those in, how can you lighten the room so that it is a little more feminine for you, to diminish the effect of those poles? You need to claim part of that room as your own. Also, is the light that yellow in there, or is that just the pictures? How about white light in there? LED's Christmas lights hanging from those fishing poles! Cheap economical bright white light.
@luckythewinner wrote:
@penguins_dont_fly wrote:
@luckythewinner wrote:
@penguins_dont_fly wrote:I find myself not even wanting to go in there
{snip}
only listing one or two items before "escaping"
{snip}
it's just the all-important "desk time" that's killing me.
You title says you need "organization ideas", but everything in your post about screams that the real issue is motivation. It sounds a little like a carpenter blaming his tools ...
No. Not at all.
I go in there everyday and I try to list ... And then get feeling claustrophobic 😞
When I have elbow room, I get things done ... When I don't, I get anxious and edgy and don't function very well.
I don't shop in Wal-Mart at Christmas or big sales times. I have abandoned carts in the aisle. I don't do large concerts or other places where people are just too close.
You said in your initial post that everything in your "office space" was "necessary".
I guess I assumed you meant that everything in there was necessary to your eBay business, but now that I can see the pictures that is clearly not the case.
Here's an isea - if you are incapable of working at your desk, then don't work at your desk.
You appear to have a laptop. Your light box appears to be mobile. Your unlisted inventory is on the floor, so it must be mobile.
Go do your "desk time" somewhere where you don't feel claustrophobic.
Lucky, I appreciate it … but that's just not possible.
There is NO OTHER place to work in my 600 square foot apartment. I do not have a dining table (we have a High-top Bistro Table in the kitchen). I have no "extra" space in any other room.
I must make this space work … somehow.
@muttlymob wrote:I was going to jokingly suggest Bonfires! Lots of Bonfires!
But from an earlier post it looks like you have taken care of a lot of the unnecessary stuff in a rational manner already.
I don't mind a sporting motif, but ALL those fishing poles would feel like jail cell bars to me. That's a lot. of rods. If there is any way, any how, any at all, see if there is anywhere else to put them. Especially those on the ceiling.
I have no practical suggestions, just moral support. I also live in a small apartment and deal with the clutter - it's been too long since my last "bonfire".
I should explain a bit further.
Hubby and I were both over 40 and life long "bachelor/bacherlorette" before we got married 8 years ago.
I moved into "his" space LOL - I am the invader here 🙂
I have managed to carve myself out some personal space in this man's world that I share … and everything that I moved out of other rooms has ended up in here .. this was "his" space.
That worked well for a long time … and he has been a very good sport about being "marginalized" in his own home 🙂
When my business partner and I started this little business, we had a whole empty 500 square foot space to work out of which was "my" space (mostly .. she hardly spent any time there). When the partnership ended, so did access to that space. I could have kept it, but it was just not economically feasible.
I can't ask him to give up the last of his space completely …. but I am slowly bring him around to maybe, just maybe, letting go of some of his "man" stuff, maybe, at some point … "yes, honey" 🙂
@penguins_dont_fly wrote:
That corner is the closet, with sliding doors ... that is full of DH's "stuff", golf clubs, misc fishing tackle and boat stuff, extra ammunition (gun safe is in the bedroom) shooting targets, etc.
"Up" is already taken 🙂
...
I share the desk with hubby ... our household gets run from there, too. Which makes it a bit more difficult ... but not impossible LOL
Motivation isn't my issue ... it's claustrophobic anxiety, compounded when I know I'm going to get anxious when going in there ... I just need to break the anxiety circle.
...
This room just makes me insane ...
Oh wow, that room is a cage, with bars on the walls and on the ceiling. No wonder you're having difficulty.
Hubby has to let you out of the cage. Your "DH" shouldn't expect you to work in a cage.
You guys may need to set some priorities for your very limited space. Which is more important? Your business, or storage for hobby equipment that is rarely used or needed?
I can't imagine that anyone needs to have that many fishing poles. He should pick a dozen of the best ones*, and display them on the wall in the living room. They are important to him, so they would be better wall art than anything else you could hang on the walls in there. The rest of them should go to storage, or better yet, sell them. It will only get harder to get the value from them, the longer he keeps them.
[* - normally, I would have said 3 or 4 of the best ones, but he obviously has such a humongous collection that paring it down that far would be too large a task.]
Or ...
Get your desk and the things you need to work with out of the cage. Move them into the living room, maybe? If your hubby works outside the home, then he won't be there in the living room during the day when you are trying to work on your selling business.
Or maybe, you can move the gun cabinet into the man cave, and move your desk into the bedroom where the gun cabinet was.
@mcdougle4248 wrote:Could you do a murphy bed set up in your bedroom? There are quite a few options that include desks.
The bedroom is a 12 x 11 box. With a Queen Bed and one long dresser (his). We share the 3 sliding-door closet and I have a night table (no room on other side of the bed). There is a 2 foot space to walk around the bed, except the narrower space in the corner where the gun safe is (which is bolted to the concrete floor)
(not going to show you a picture, it's a mess right now LOL)
I know these pics are dark … sorry, but you can get an Idea of the (non) space that I am dealing with.
Living Room
Kitchen (laundry/mud/shipping room beyond)
