View north from Millers Flat Bridge, Central Otago

It already feels like the new year has started as I sit in my office and clear out the detritus of 2008 and make lists for 2009.

I get easily distracted as I ponder whether I need to keep a piece of paper or whether it should be binned or shredded or if a particular snippet of information is safely enough buried in my cerebral hard drive to be recalled if needed.

I form piles and then prune the piles, carefully saving the paper that is only used on one side for future scribblings. I don’t scribble enough to use it all <note to self> scribble more in 2009 to utilise the box of scrap paper hiding behind my desk </note to self>.

Of less damage to the environment is the digital pruning. Documents that have been superceded or updated or are just plain obsolete are deleted. Next on the list – email! I’m a filer and archiver rather than a deleter and am way up there with my digital footprint on the company mail server. Maybe I have too much ruth (isn’t that the opposite of ruthless?) and should shed some of it in 2009.

And then there’s that book in my book shelf “Getting a grip on Time – Productivity and life balance made easy” by Robyn Pearce. I must read that. However it shares shelf space with another (much larger) book “A Perfect Mess: The Hidden Benefits of Disorder” by Eric Abrahamson and David H Freedman.

I like this para from the book

“As both John Steinbeck and the University of Texas researchers pointed out, our personalities tend to be more clearly expressed in our disorder than in our neatness. When we are being ruthless about ridding ourselves of what naturally accumulates around us and about meticulously straightening out what remains, we are in a sense tidying our identities. The truth is, we are all at least a bit of a mess – and all the more interesting for it.” p. 145

And what about resolutions for 2009? I’m still thinking about it but I figure that it may be best to make ones that can be fulfilled in the first week or the new year rather than broken in that week. Then you have the rest of the year to feel virtuous!