How do you best store digital things part 2

Yesterday, I wrote about how to best store your digital documents. You can find that here. Today, the focus is going to be on pictures. Gone are the days of gigantic photo albums, waiting to get your film developed, and waiting to see how many of your pictures turned out. Now, pictures are on demand, and you can edit and perfect them as you see fit.

So, in this on-demand world, what do you do with all of those pictures? They take up plenty of space on your phone or tablet, so where to put them? I’d suggest either saving them on a portable hard drive, your computer, or in the cloud. My wife and I have a 1 Terrabyte portable hard drive that we store our pictures on. The great part of it is that you can share it between devices. Saving it to your computer is another easy way, just plug your device into the computer and save. For many, though, saving to the Cloud is the easiest. If you’re an Apple user, you can save to ICloud. You can also use Dropbox, Google Photos, Amazon Photos and others. All of these are helpful tools, the only drawback is the limitations on space before you have to purchase more space.

The same principle applies for pictures as it does documents. You don’t want them just haphazardly thrown in one big lumped file. The organization can happen as you see fit. You can break it down by year, by subject, by month, however you want. And as with the documents, it’s a lot of work upfront, but once you get your storage organized as you want it, it’s very easy to keep up with. Also, once you’ve saved your pictures from your device, delete them if you don’t want them on your device. That frees up more space. This is a process I’ll be starting very soon, but I’ll be doing it while watching football, so I’ll be multitasking!

But what about those old not digital pictures? How do you store them? You can continue to store them as you have in the past, or you can digitize them. Either you can scan them in a flatbed scanner (or if you’ve got a printer/scanner combo) or you can use your phone. I’ve found a great app called Scannable, which connects to your Evernote account (and if you’re not using Evernote....well, that’s another blog post) and you can save to it. Also, the app Tiny Scanner works just as well.

Finally, if you want to share photos, you can get a digital picture frame and upload your pictures to that. Many of them connect via wi-fi, so that’s an easy way to share pictures with those around you. Another way that my wife has found, which is super easy and inexpensive is www.chatbooks.com. For $10 you can have your pictures automatically uploaded from social media, your devices, wherever. She’s made a bunch of them for our girls and summer adventures.

I highly encourage you to consider digitizing your photos. They are great snapshots and memories of your life. As I have seen in the area around me over the past year with Hurricane Harvey, water comes and destroys, no matter how valuable your things are or what your income status is. If you have solely physical photos, they may be gone forever. But if you have digital copies, you’ll be able to see those pictures and remember.

Check out the Uncluttered course as it will help you if you’re stuck in your journey of minimalism, or if you’re wanting to dive in.

Also, join The Minimalist Musician group on Facebook

How do you best store digital things part 1

The next 3 posts will be dealing with storing digital things. While digital things take up less space than physical things, they still take up space and do need decluttering from time to time. I’ll be breaking them down into 3 areas, pictures, videos/music and today’s post, documents.

Storing things digitally is a wonderful advance. It gives us access, space to store things that would take up so much physical space. But it can create clutter and hassles if you’re not always on top of it and keeping things organized.

So today, we’re dealing with documents. PDFs, Word documents and things like that can take up a lot of space and can create lots of clutter. Think of your hard drive or storage device as a filing cabinet. The device holds things, but inside the device are individual folders that hold individual files, or ideas. So, how to store all of them? How best do you organize and operate in that organization? Is it by year? By type of document? By idea? However you best think and organize, set it up that way.

Some things have a certain “shelf life” or usefulness. If your ou meant has outlived its usefulness to you, delete it. Or if you know you’ll need access to it down the road, consider moving it to another file or another storage device so that you can access it later.

For me, I work best by ideas. For my job, I direct different musical groups. So my files are organized by group, then in each folder is a sub folder. I’m in the process of updating them and organizing them more, and what I’ll end up with is it broken down by year. Now, if your brain doesn’t work that way, then don’t do it that way. Figure out what works best for you and how you best process things and then go from there.

It will be a bit of work upfront to get things organized, but once you get organized, if you keep on top of it, you’ll find your life less stressed and you won’t be having to spend time looking for things.

A minimalist office

What does a minimalist office look like? The easy answer is, whatever you want it to look like. The harder part is what practical form does it take on?

A desk, right? Sure. Does it have to be big or small? Well, if you have a big desk, but not much use for a big desk, then that won’t work. And the other way around, too. It has to be functional for your needs.

What about storage? Books? If you have books, you need a place to store them, right? Shelves work. Shelving units or shelves mounted on the walls.

Ultimately, I could walk through everything in an office, but really, you have to determine what you need and what priority that has in your life. Will you need a pen to write with? Probably so. But do you really need 50 pens? You can probably get rid of a few of those, right?

Minimalism doesn’t mean spartan and bare. Unless you want it to. As I look at minimalism, it’s about practicality, function and purpose. Start with what the purpose of your office is, then the purpose of the stuff in your office will follow suit. Don’t just ask the question once. Come back to it again and again. Your purposes may change, and then your needs will change with the purpose!

Uncluttered

Are you struggling as to what the first step is take in Minimalism? Or do you feel like you got rid of a bunch of stuff and you’re struggling where to go? May I suggest Uncluttered.

Uncluttered is a 12 week online course led by Joshua Becker, a minimalist whose voice has resonated with me, as well as many others.

What do you get out of the course?
Videos with step-by-step instructions
Interviews with thought leaders in productivity and minimalism
Live webinars tackling specific tough-clutter topics 
Live Q&As for members to ask questions
Weekly challenges
And accountability and encouragement from a super-engaged community.

One of the best parts I think about this course is that you get LIFETIME membership! That means that if you get to a “stuck point”, you can come back and review the material covered. 

The course is offered 3 times a year and registration starts today and goes through September 2nd. The cost for the course is $89. Check it out and sign up here!

Collecting

One of the things that I’ve noticed about myself, and people in general is that we like to collect things. Back when I was younger, I collected baseball, basketball and football cards. That was my focus and passion, second only to music. Once I was in college, I was faced with a dilemma. Do I lug my expansive collection of cards with me or do I get rid of them? They weren’t valuable because they were of the 80’s and 90’s, when cards were overproduced, so I just got rid of them. I haven’t thought much about collecting cards since then.

My girls love Barbies, as many girls do. My youngest daughter’s room has all of the Barbie paraphernalia in it. The dream house, the cars, and a whole ton of Barbies. Many of these things were given to them by a family in our church whose daughter didn’t want her collection anymore. And my girls play with the Barbies quite regularly.....but there’s so much of it!

I could keep going with more examples from my life, but as you’re reading this, you can probably think of many more yourself. We collect things. And when we find something we like, people feel compelled to give us things that help us with that collecting. Now, inherently, there’s nothing wrong with that, until your shelves, your rooms, your house is filled with your collection. And you’re facing the “now what” with all of it. You’re overwhelmed, And you don’t control the stuff, the stuff controls you.

While the optimal first encouragement I’d give in regard to collecting is don’t do it, I have 3 encouragements in helping to deal with your collecting:

1) Find a manageable number. When one new thing comes one, it has to replace another item in your collection. I collected nutcrackers. I’d only put them out at Christmas. I kept a few out regularly. So I decided that 28 nutcrackers were not worth storing, so I kept the 8 I really liked, and got rid of the rest. If I get a new one, it replaces one in my collection.

2) Keep asking yourself why. Ask why you collect these things. Do they bring you joy? Cheer you up? Awesome. Do they serve a purpose? Because if you don’t keep asking why, you may end up with the dinner plates of the world collection and not really have them serve a purpose or have a place to store them!

3) Don’t be afraid to say no. As a musician, much of my music has been handed down or picked up through giveaways. And I’m thankful for that because I’ve found some great music. I’ve also found some awful music, music I’ll never use and music that’s falling apart. Why should I keep it? So, I’ve become more discerning. I’ve learned to look and if there’s music I know I can’t use, I’m not just going to take it and hold on to it to take up space.....I’m not taking it in the first place. No is a hard word to say, but it’s so necessary and beneficial!

Happy collecting!

Digital versus Physical

One of the things I have too much of is books, CDs, DVDs and printed music. They take up so much space in my house! Last night, we went over to a friend’s house, and he asked before we went over if we had bought or rented the movie Black Panther that we watched the night before. We bought it. Digitally. And it got me thinking when the last time I bought a physical movie was. I can’t remember. Between streaming on Netflix and Amazon Prime, and purchasing movies digitally on Amazon Prime, We don’t buy physical movies anymore.

The same thing goes for music. I can’t remember the last time I bought a physical CD. I stream all of my music through Amazon Prime. I’ve uploaded most of what I had already purchased to their site as well, so that I have access all in one place. I’ve been moving that way more with books, as well as sheet music.

Yes, moving from physical to digital can be scary. And can be a lot of work. But to me, it’s worth it, because I have many stacks of books now accessible on my Ipad. It’s far more practical. I can plug my phone in when I’m in my car and play whatever music I’m in the mood for. I don’t have to mess with CDs or where to store them when I’m not using them or whatever the case is.

Yes, it is nice to have the physical things, because you can mark them up, if they’re books. I do still have some CDs, and the reason is because they’re autographed. But, you can make notes with the Amazon Kindle app, if you choose to go that route. Is it exactly the same? No, but it works just as well. And you can digitally check out books from your local library and access them via your device.

To me, the pros far outweigh the cons to go digital. My hope is that by the end of summer, I’ll have everything completely digital, and will have much more space in my house! It is definitely something for you to consider as you continue to go through and sort through all of those physical things and wonder if having all of it is worth it!

Ikea

Yes, I’m writing a blog post about Ikea. Why? Well, we went as a family last Saturday and it was quite fun. Yes, we bought stuff. I know that violates the “rules” some may have of minimalism, but see my last post about the “rules”. Here’s the deal. After exploring the possibility of purchasing our own house (we rent), enough doors were closed where it looks like making another year in our rental house will work. But, we have to be better organized and make the space work. So that’s our summer project.

A big part of that summer project is getting rid of stuff. There’s just too much that we have and do not need. But for my youngest daughter, her room was a disaster. Primarily because we had a dresser that was far too big and not enough efficient storage space. So, that was our primary purchases at Ikea. A new dresser, a bookshelf and a storage unit.

But one of the things that amazed me in looking at Ikea was the creative uses of space. Sure, you could spend a ton of money there and get stuff and not really be better off for it. And really, it doesn’t matter what store you go to, that would be the case. Ikea’s design, though, is definitely to make efficient uses of space.

Will we purchase more stuff at Ikea? Probably. Depending on how our purge and organization process goes. We have a few things that would better benefit us when it comes to organization, whether that is something to put on the wall to keep us better organized when it comes to paper, or storage for things, or whatever the case is. As we go through the process, we’ll figure out. We’re starting with the girls’ bedrooms, then moving out from there.  It’s a process that will be a lot of work, but is necessary and will be beneficial for us in the long run.

Rules of minimalism

Yesterday I wrote a post titled “How many shoes do you need?” I shared it on Facebook and got a few interesting responses. Most of them were actual responses about actual shoes. While I’m glad people have reasons for specific shoes, that wasn’t quite my point. The shoes are a means to an end. You can insert anything for shoes and still have a question that only you can answer.

There has been a big push toward minimalism. But the interesting part of it is that there isn’t any specific “rules” that you must follow. If you want to have 20 shirts, you can. If you want to have 5 shirts, you can too. Really, the biggest rule is how you justify what you have and why you have it. And whether you consider yourself a minimalist or not, Justifying what you have and why you have it is practical and benefiical.

Whether it’s shoes and you having your reasons for 10 pairs of shoes, or CDs and your reasons for having 125 of them, or anything else you come up with, asking yourself the questions, “Why do I have this?”, as well as “Do I need this?” and “What purpose does this serve” will definitely help you to sort out the things that need to stay and the things that need to go.

So it’s not completely about shoes. It’s not about rules. It’s about your individual reasons for why you have what you have. I would guess that many of us, myself included, have plenty of things in our houses that we don’t have very strong reasons for why we have.

How many shoes do you need?

This topic was something my wife and I go back and forth on from time to time. Recently, I brought the topic up and she told me. Black shoes, brown shoes, casual shoes, heels, flats...and she kept going and after that my head started spinning.

When it comes to things, this question of how many do you need is an interesting one. And I’ve gone through this in my life. How many CDs do I need? How many shirts do I need? How many.....you name it.

With minimalism, there aren’t really any specific rules. That’s part of the beauty of it. You’re in charge. For me, the question of shoes is simple. Black and brown dress shoes, running shoes, old running shoes to wear for mowing, causal shoes, and a pair of boots. I’ve got a couple of pair of flip flops, but I rarely wear them. Simple, right? And even that might be excessive to some. But that’s what I’ve chosen as my amount of shoes.

I’m not dogging my wife for her amount of shoes. She does have a lot of them, and over the years we’ve been married, she does do a good job of going through them from time to time to cull them. But whether it is shoes, clothes or anything else, it can be quite easy to justify and explain why we need to have so many of some item. And if we’re honestly asking ourselves the question of if it is needed or what number is needed, we may realize that we don’t need as much as we thought we did.

So...how many shoes do you need?

Simple

In response to my post yesterday "Discipline and focus", I received a comment. It said "Wow, you mean the secret to getting things done is just doing them? And the cure for a lack of discipline is sticking to your calendar? Why didn't I think of that!" 

If eating healthy were so simple, why is the diet and exercise industry so large?

If keeping a neat and tidy home were so simple, why are there so many resources out there to help you, or how many people pay someone else to clean their homes?

If staying disciplined were so simple, why are there so many books about how to be more disciplined?

I don't ask these questions to argue, rather, to make the point that these things aren't as simple as they seem to be. While we may have the best of intentions to do things, there are other things that get in the way. Or, as was my point in writing the post yesterday, we lose focus. As I said, I'm awesome at being focused for short periods of time....and then I fall off. And I'm sure I'm not alone in that.

While I may have the best of intentions for my calendar, being a church music minister, things come up. Like funeral. The last 2 weeks, I've had 2 funerals to prepare for and play for. That takes priority over other things when it comes to practicing. 

When you work, when you have children, or even if you don't, maintaining focus and discipline is not the simplest thing in the world. If the secret to get things done is just doing them, then we'd have no problems. We'd be the most productive people on the planet. The productivity section in your local bookstore would cease to exist. If the cure for a lack of discipline is sticking to your calendar, then calendar sales would be off the charts! But neither of these are the case. Why? Because it's not that simple.

Life is a series of choices. Sometimes we choose well. Sometimes we choose poorly. I've made my share of good choices. I've made my share of poor choices. As I've grown older, I've learned that I don't have all of the answers, and I try to look to and lean on others for help. Because it's not that simple. 

So is that it? Just throw your hands up and say, "well, it's not that simple, so I'm sunk"? Not at all. My point in writing the post yesterday and this one is to share that while it isn't simple, you keep trying. While I did awesome in January at eating healthy and exercising, and staying focused, I didn't in February, March and so far in April. Does that mean that I'm sunk for the year? Of course not! It's only April! There's 7 and a half months to learn from those mistakes, make better choices and make progress. I haven't managed my time as well as I should have. Same point applies. And the same thing goes for you. It's not simple. But it's doable. And it's necessary. So I pray that you are able to find those things that bring you focus and discipline, as I pray that I am too. 

Are you a superhero?

In talking about expectations of self, as I did in yesterday’s post, one of the things we struggle with is that we expect far too much of ourselves and when it doesn’t go perfectly or as flawlessly as we think it should, we quit. I think it’s a superhero complex. We feel we can do everything, fix everything and everyone and still have time to make dinner. News flash: it isn’t going to happen.

I’m a church musician. One of the things that I’ve found in comparing my two very busy seasons of Advent/Christmas and Lent/Easter is that Advent/Christmas is neatly wrapped up in a 4 week period, with two really big, busy days of Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. For Lent/Easter, it’s a 6 week period with a really big, busy week of Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter. Sure, December for everyone else is busy, and that compounds the hectic nature of the season. But I’ve regularly found that by the time Easter Sunday afternoon rolls around, I’m exhausted. It’s a good exhausted, but I’m worn out. And so today is the recovery. Sure, I could dive back in to the organizing and cleaning that I’ve wanted to do and needed to do. I could check things off my list. But today, my goal is to find the kitchen table, do dishes and laundry, find the kitchen counter and do yard work. That’s a good amount to do, but my girls are off of school today, so I wouldn’t be able to be a whirling dervish of work anyway.

So, to the question I posed in the title of this post. Are you a superhero? If you answered “I’m Batman”, nicely done. None of us are. So why do we expect ourselves to be? Give yourself a bit (or a bunch) of grace. Keep plugging away, little by little. Set your goals and your plans for the day to be achievable, but give yourself a reward. Maybe it’s watching an episode or 2 (not 20) of your favorite show. Maybe it’s going for a walk. Whatever it is, give yourself that reward for knocking out things on your to-do list. And keep plugging away. While you’re not a superhero, you’re still very capable of plenty of amazing and awesome things.

Expectations

I took a break from Facebook starting on February 14th. I didn’t miss it. That was intentional. Also on February 14th, I started an unintentional break from walking and from writing blog posts. In this time period of the last 6 weeks, I’ve had an opportunity to think about that word expectation for a while.

There’s really 2 expectations. The expectations you place on yourself and the expectations others place on you. I want to unpack that aspect of personal expectations for a bit. In his book “Finish”, my friend Jon Acuff writes about how we make goals for ourselves, the goals may be a bit unrealistic, or something comes up to change that status, and we end up quitting. He talks about it in a lot more detail, but that’s a lot of what happened to me. I quit. I’ll admit that. My excuses were noble. And somewhat legitimate. I got sick for 2 weeks in that time period and still had to keep going with work and life. But what about those other days? Why didn’t I make healthy choices or walk or better manage my time? The honest answer, as I’ve been processing through it is.....I just didn’t want to. But today is a new month. A new start. So what makes today different than any other day? Well, it’s Easter. That means that my 6 week period of Lenten busyness is over. So what? That will be replaced by end of school busyness was a parent, preparing my musical groups for a concert in May, working with my team to plan summer camp in July and many, many more things to do. On top of that, God willing, we’ll be finding a house to purchase, so we’ll have to pack up, move and get settled in the midst of all of that. I’m guessing that while you may not be in the specific boat that I’m in, your schedule is busy, too. So how do you balance and manage those expectations and that schedule?

I come back to one word again and again. Organization. If you’re on top of things and deal with them immediately, you will be less overwhelmed. Again, that’s something I haven’t done well, not just over the past 6 weeks, but for years. I know I’m capable of it, but it’s a matter of doing it. Organization is simple things like dealing with mail immediately, cleaning your kitchen counters before you go to bed, doing dishes and putting them away, doing laundry and putting it away immediately. Those things may seem simple, but after a long day, you may not have the “want to” to do it. You’ve got to do it. Of course, there’s the bigger things like going through your clothes, books, digital files, etc. and while that takes more time, it is most definitely helpful and worth it.

One of the things I did on Friday at my desk before I left was to make sure that the top of it was picked up and organized. That way, after my hibernation tomorrow, I can dive into things on Tuesday and not have to be stressed about starting with my desk.

Over the next couple of weeks I’ll be dealing with this topic of organization and what it looks like and some simple and easy things to do. I hope you’ll keep checking back and also commenting with your ideas and tips for what works for you!