Day Three: Order

Yesterday was the second day, in this month of discipline; I believe I remained temperate in my eating and drinking and also tried to integrate Franklin's 'silence' concept into my day. I believe I was successful in elevating the level of conversation, especially during a tennis match; we talked about business ideas and possible collaboration rather than trivial tennis facts or our favorite players. It is a challenge to keep up a high level of discourse and not fall into the casual routine of the standard superficial talks from which we learn nothing.

Today is the third day in the month of discipline, which brings us to the most challenging (for me, personally) concept from Ben Franklin's 13 areas of self-improvement: "ORDER. Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time." I am by nature a slob, but at the same time, I realize the value of order; I have never made order a proper priority although I know that it deserves to be one. Lack of order does hurt me: Sloppy experiments, forgotten obligations, and a growing to-do list resulting from putting off till tomorrow what might be done today, all are counter-productive and easily fixable.

So, today, I will clean my room, and make appointments for things I have put off. A quick stop at the public library netted a book entitled: 'The Complete Idiot's Guide to Organizing Your Life." Because I am but a novice when it comes to organization, I will rely on someone else's authority to bootstrap my learning.

One of the first interesting concepts in the book is that of 'unstuffing,' or simplifying by getting rid of unneeded, unused, or broken things. This appeals to me, because I would like to simplify my life, and reduce the amount of 'things' that I own; material things are nice, but they should not run or complicate my life. Hopefully I can put this into action, and perhaps more gems from this book will be detailed in later posts.

I realize that my problem when it comes to order, is that I frankly hate cleaning and organizing because I feel like it is wasted time and certainly not something that I am interested in. However, ultimately, it is productive use of time because in the long run it will lead to less wasted time on experiments, always having complete knowledge of my commitments, and a well-manicured to-do list. So, I must force myself into order until it is a habit, much like exercise, or reading.

The added benefit is that I will work-out my self-discipline muscle by forcing myself to be ordered (although I do not want to), which is the overarching purpose behind this month of discipline: Success follows from pursuing long-term goals at cost of short-term pleasure.