5 Joyful January Learnings!

It is time for Rapid Fire Learning!

If you are new to Joyful Jubilant Learning, this is our monthly drill for all lifelong learners in the community: We post this shout-out asking about the first 5 learnings that come to mind for you, stream-of-consciousness, quick as you can list them --- What have you learned in January?

We do this every month on day 6 before month-end.  All of our JJL contributing authors take turn hosting our shout-out (see all past RFL (Rapid Fire Learning) posts here), and I'm up, so here's my review of the month's contributions to our theme of "Packing Your Bags for 2008" and my own 5 things I've learned with 5 days left!

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One thing for sure I've learned is that my co-contributors here are an amazing talented group of people!  The theme for the month was "Packing our Bags for 2008."   

Who knew there were so many creative and delightful ways to interpret that theme! I didn't have a chance to add to that theme because this is one of the busiest months of the year for professional organizers, but I was greatly inspired by the contributions of everyone here.  Here are some of the highlights:

• Rosa Say is "losing it in 2008" and taught us about  ma'alahi (just one Hawaiian word for a bunch of English ones.)  She's also packing up some great ideas to make waiting productive".
  
• Phil Gerbyshak is "packing in" his addiction to information and self-development (but thankfully he's not going to do that till AFTER he reads my new book  Neat & Simple Guide to Organizing Your Office)
  
• Steve Sherlock is packing his bags with cans.  No...that's not a typo!  Check out his 2008 challenge!
  
• Terry Starbucker packed his bags virtually for a move to a new "virtual" home.  Congratulations and thanks for sharing what you learned doing that!
  
• Karen Wallace is packing a smile and a clever little Black Velvet Purse!
  
  

  And now here are 5 things I've been learning a lot about this month....

1. Book self-publishing
   Since I finished my Neat & Simple Guide to Organizing Your Office  I learned how to get an ISBN number, sell digital books on-line with e-junkie, use on-demand print publishers:  lulu , booksurge, and instantpublisher Thanks to our very own Phil Gerbyshak for recommending these, and also vervante, recommended by Suzanne McLoone.  Now I just need time to layout a version of the book so that it will print right...and soon, you'll be able to order your own copy to pack in your bags for 2008! 
   
2. I learned how to set up Google Groups!
   I'm working on a Google Support Group for people who like me are interested in my number 4 learning: eating healthier. But I found out people can only join my group if they have a Google email address.  UGH.  I have a gmail address, but during my test of the group, nearly everyone I invited to join me in the group got hung up and did not want to get a google email just to join it.  So, back to the drawing board for me.  On to learning more about Yahoo groups maybe.
   (p.s. here's the link to the Neat & Simple Healthy Eating Group. http://groups.google.com/group/neat-and-simple-healthy-eating) 
   
3. Chronic Disorganization
   I've been doing a lot of learning over the last year and particularly this month about how to best help people who are chronically organized.  Here is an article I wrote this month that distills much of what I've learned about chronic disorganization.
   
4. How to organize to eat healthy even if you have ADD
   How can you eat well, if you are a creative person, or have ADD, and often forget to eat during the day like me? What about if you eat junk food a lot just because it's handy and you don't have to think? Well, if you don't organize to eat healthy and have a super easy system for having a variety of healthy fast foods on hand, I'm afraid you will continue to make the junk food marketers rich at the expense of your own health. This is something I've been working on for the last couple years and this month it came to the forefront for me when I started reading the book:  Pieces of a Puzzle:  The link between ADD & Eating Disorders. So I've been learning so much and am currently gathering my thoughts and ideas on this topic.
   
   Oddly enough, I got a call from SELF magazine last week to be interviewed on the subject of organizing for healthy eating!  I guess that's the laws of attraction at work!  I'm so excited about pulling together my ideas for the simplest, easiest ways to eat healthy and lose weight with NO calorie counting, NO structured meal planning, NO Food diaries, etc.  I even finally pulled together an A-Store devoted to 7 core books on healthy eating and nutrition. After reading these books, you won't ever look at food the same way again. How is all this related to organizing?  Because if you aren't getting the proper nutrition, or if you are eating foods that cause "brain fog" I guarantee you are also having difficulties organizing.  And if you don't organize to make it happen, you won't be eating healthy either. 
   
5. The Benefits of a Raw Food, Vegetarian Diet
   The more I learn about the philosophy behind Raw Food diets, the more I'm leaning toward it as a way of life. I am currently experimenting with eating only raw food during the day and I can honestly say it's improved the consistency of my energy levels, moods, focus, productivity and more. I've really started to notice that where I used to get "brain fog" rather often - it's very much correlated with eating cooked food.  The less I eat of cooked food, the more I notice it's negative effect on me.  I'm also noticing that eating cooked foods leads to far more overeating.  Especially at night.  I've always had issues with night eating and using food to help me sleep.  Far fewer problems with night eating when I eat raw all day, which I'm doing 90% of the time. 
   
   What started me down the raw food path?  Well, after 35 years of yo-yo dieting, I vowed never to diet again.  Never again to state losing weight as a goal.  (Even though I would be beyond thrilled to shed 50 -75 pounds.)  I vowed that every goal I set would be a positive lifestyle change - not a quick fix diet.  So my goal is to achieve optimum health via optimal nutrition - one habit and one belief at a time. It started with only drinking water about 10 years ago - no soda or juice.  Then no gluten (I listed what I would eat instead.) After a year of that I was strong enough to tackle sugar 2 yrs ago.  When I quit sugar, I didn't have that as my stated goal.  My goal was to eat mostly unprocessed, nutritious whole foods.  Guess what?  none of them have sugar and few have gluten!  : )  So it is with raw food...I'm not quitting anything, just choosing to eat raw, unprocessed, whole food - most of the time.
   
   I truly believe than when I've figured out how to eat healthy  and I've made it super easy to do - my weight will naturally become what it should be, and my ADD will naturally be easier to manage too.
   
   Here's the site by Angela Stokes that got me started thinking and learning about the raw food movement.

So what have you learned this month?

p.s. If you've read this far, you deserve a gift!  Please accept my free gift to you!
"100 Surefire Ways to Organize Your Busy Life!" plus two bonuses!

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Ariane Benefit, M.S.Ed, Organizing Coach, specializes in helping people conquer clutter, simplify their lives, and create the homes & offices of their dreams! Ariane is the author of the "The Neat & Simple Guide to Organizing Your Office" the popular organizing blog, Neat & Simple Living.

Comments

[Joanna Young]

Hi Ariane, I'm sure your learning around healthy eating and ADD will be of huge benefit not just to you but to many, because, knowing you, I'm sure you'll find a way to pass it on :-)

On the google groups thing, it's easy to set up a google e-mail address. I have one that I don't use for e-mail, just to access things that are google dependent like the groups. Hope that helps.

I'm going to reply properly in a post on my learnings - trying a new experiment, if I can make it work!

Joanna

[Ariane Benefit]

Thanks Joanna! You are so right. It's very easy, but your comment made me realize I did not write that clearly, so I've rewritten it. I did set up the Google group...but the people I invited didn't join because they did not want to set up a gmail account! I'm always surprised at how resistant some people are to things like that. But I have to live with it, so I want to find a group format that is not as restrictive in who can join. Hugz!

[Phil Gerbyshak]

Holy cow Ariane! You had QUITE a month full of learning. Thanks for sharing all of them.

My biggest learning? Letting go of the junk. Packing my bags and then throwing stuff away! Still MUCH more to do, but as they say...knowing is half the battle!

[Benjamin Bach]

Hey Ariane, thanks for sharing what you've been learning!

Have you been following StevePavlina.com on his raw food trial this month ? If not, you'll definately want to click over and see what Steve is up to.

Keep Learning,

BenjaminBach.com

[Rosa Say]

Ariane, I am reading A Perfect Mess, and the author mentions that January is the busiest month for professional organizers - why is that? Is it connected to the New Year's resolutions folks make, and just wanting to start with a clean slate?

I'm a big Google apps convert - and a huge reason is that going web-based for so many apps has helped me de-clutter in a strangely intangible, nonmaterial way... kind of hard to describe it, but even though they occupy the same digital server space somewhere (e.g. hard drive with Outlook versus web-based with GMail), I feel much more liberated and baggage-free. Admittedly it can be an instance where my perception is my reality, but I'm loving it. --- just joined your Google Group!

Ariane I also applaud your health commitments to a lifestyle change: Well done.

[Ariane Benefit]

@ Phil, My life is always about learning...it's so much a part of every day for me, that it's actually hard to narrow down 5 things to talk about! LOL Someday, I would really like to know what it's like to get bored.

@ Benjamin, Thanks for the tip! I'll check out Steve's Site! And Thanks for all your great book reviews!

@ Rosa, Would love to hear your review of A perfect Mess. Yeah...People in January are recovering from the holiday clutter and here in NJ it's cold and not much else to do - it's a perfect time to work on clearing out clutter so you can enjoy being in your home more. I'm actually booked solid till April. I only have coaching by phone appts. available now.
Thanks for joing my google Group!! Feel free to add anything you want to the discussions and pages : )

[Phil Gerbyshak]

Ariane - I am totally with you. Bored I am NOT, that's for sure :)