Shelfify

Shelfify: to sort, rearrange and let go of physical and emotional clutter; to place such clutter in an actual or metaphysical shoe box

Years ago, my husband, John, was struggling with a major decision. His job was making him miserable and he was at his wit’s end. He was completely ready to quit. He knew something had to give.

But he was mid-way through an important project, and if he left at that moment, he’d be letting down a lot of people, including his whole team and everyone he worked with.

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I have a craft room where I draw and paint and sew and, in that room, I keep all the stuff I’ve collected over the years to help me pursue those projects. In the corner, there’s a stack of brightly-coloured shoeboxes I just know I’ll do something with. Someday.

But that day when John told me he was ready to quit, I pulled out a new shoe box and gave it to him. I suggested, “let’s put your decision about your job inside this box, and put it up on that shelf till the end of the month when your project’s due. If you wait until then, when you take it down and open it, your decision will be inside the box.”

And he agreed to do it. We put that box up on that shelf and he went back to work.

A week later, he called me one morning, so excited he was breathless. “You’ll never guess what happened!” He laughed a bit. “They’ve let me go! They let me go! I’m out of there! And you won’t believe the package their giving me!” John was ecstatic.

If he’d resigned the previous week, he’d have had no severance, no employment insurance, no pay. But the generous golden handshake they gave him to leave was going to more than tie him over until he could find somewhere else he’d rather be.

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Sometimes, you just have to give yourself permission to put a worry on the back burner. Shelf it. And while you’re at it, maybe it’s time to go through everything that’s been piling up on that shelf.

When I begin to feel overwhelmed with all the stuff piling up around me, I set out to do a small daily purge. And the purge might just be a straightening up, or a dusting. Sometimes completing a small task helps us feel like tackling the bigger ones might be more possible than we’ve been feeling.

It’s just taking baby steps, one shelf or drawer at a time.

So, instead of feeling overwhelmed by the colossal job of cleaning out the basement, the garage, or your closet, how about doing a shelf? Just one shelf. Or a drawer. Or one tote. Just do one for today. And if it goes relatively quickly and smoothly, you just might find yourself moving on to another one. One shelf at a time.

The same goes for decisions that seem impossible to make. Shelf it. If it’s looming but not one you need to make on the double, how about putting it in one of those boxes you’ve just pulled out? You can write it out if you like, you can write all the possibilities you see, all the choices you have, the upsides and downsides of each, and tuck the box away on a newly-less-cluttered shelf.

Tell yourself that when you pull that box down and open it next month, next week, or tomorrow, you’re going know what the answer is. And more likely than not, while the decision you’re worrying is not an easy one, when you do lift up the lid on that box, you will know what you’re going to do.

Without patience, you cannot understand the meaning of divine timing.

Years ago, my husband gave me a business-card sized deck of Angel Cards.

Pick a card, any card.

When faced with difficulty or stress, or a looming decision, or you just needed a little inspiration, randomly select a card. We used to pick a card whenever we were facing a complicated challenge. Often, the card we’d select said exactly what we needed to hear.

Just the right words to prompt us to move forward.

But one card in particular resonated with us again and again: “Without patience, you cannot understand the meaning of divine timing.” We actually keep it posted on our fridge.

Divine timing. The idea that things will happen at just the right time. If only we have the patience to trust that they will.

Certainly John’s decision to wait a little longer before quitting his job was the right one for him.

The right place at the right time

As the old adage goes, being at the right place at the right time. And sometimes, the right place for right now is being tucked away inside a shoebox until the right moment comes along.

Have you ever had an experience of Divine Timing?