Inch by Inch

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Inchworm

Today I did something pretty cool. Twice.

I threw some stuff away.

I know. Ground breaking, right?

Come on. You’re an ADD Mom. It is kind of cool.

Here’s how it happened.

You know how you’re always told to take it a little bit at a time? Flylady says baby steps.

I always took that to mean that you can’t expect immediate results and that you should be patient.

I guess it does mean that in a way, but there’s another way to look at this.

Today I did my laundry and took it upstairs to put away. As I was opening drawers and getting hangers from the closet, I happened to notice a shirt that I haven’t worn in years.

In the past, I would have just ignored it or thought “Hmm.. I should do something about that.”

Today, I took it off the hanger and put it in a pile to throw away.

Yes, I have a pile in my bedroom floor for things to throw away. Not really a pile so much as a place where I make the pile. It gets picked up and thrown away whenever I go downstairs.

So anyway, after I did that, I spotted a couple of more shirts I could throw away.

None were nice enough to donate. One was a black polo with chlorine stains on it. I haven’t worn polo shirts in a long time and the last time we had a pool was over 6 years ago.

All of this took me 5 minutes or less.

Then I stopped and went back to putting my clothes away.

I didn’t turn this into a project. I didn’t let it take over my afternoon. I just weeded out a few things.

While I was making dinner I did the same thing with my utensil drawer. Again, less than 5 minutes and while I was cooking.

Did any of this make a drastic difference in the way my closets and drawers look?

No.

Can I tell I even did anything?

No.

But you know what?

If I keep doing it – and why not – it’s so easy – eventually I will begin to see a difference. And that’s another way to do it – inch by inch.

Lacy Estelle

Lacy Estelle

Lacy Estelle is the writer of Lacyestelle.com and the Podcast host for An ADD Woman.

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2 Responses

  1. I love this — it’s so easy to discount these kinds of things because they don’t seem like they’re making any difference (and so therefore I rarely do them). But it’s true, if I did them all the time, it WOULD make a difference. Thanks for the mental shift!!

    ~Angela~

  2. Thanks Angela. I just noticed this morning that my daughter’s high school graduation gown is still hanging in the closet. She’s 24. It took all of 2 seconds to pitch it. Why in the world did I keep it to begin with?