Where I’m Coming From

Greetings! I am a productivity and organization systems addict enthusiast. Not because I am naturally organized: quite the opposite. I am artificially organized. 

My natural tendency when it comes to objects, things… let's say, something like vintage glass doorknobs… is to save everything, forever, just in case. For example, there is always some cool craft project you can do with old glass doorknobs. (I have not yet gotten around to creating anything with my old glass doorknobs.)¹

It was not better with planning and time management. When it comes to planning and time management, my natural tendency is to let stuff happen (which I used to call "going with the flow") and ride the adrenaline surge before deadlines.

But some years ago, when my life outpaced my adrenaline, I realized that I had to do something unnatural for me: get organized. 

I started by literally getting my house in order. I learned how to set up workflows to handle the perpetual stream of dishes and laundry and meals and admin and recycling and stuff (SOOOO much stuff) that comes with family life: spouse, children… guinea pigs… cats… caring for an older relative... being business owners… yeah, all that.

Then I got more interested in productivity systems: time and information management. I used to work as a researcher, so I already knew ways to organize information. As I learned more about time management and workflows, I started a business as a professional organizer, working with clients to set up their productivity systems. 

Later I took a change of direction and became a pastor. Then I learned about another system for getting things in order, on a different level from the kind of organization and productivity practices I was used to.

This system, called a "rule of life" (or simply, a "rule") emerged in the third century C.E, with Christian monastic communities in Egypt, and it is still used in monastic and other intentional communities today.

For me, keeping a rule of life — what I call a personal framework — was the missing piece, which organizes my organizing. My framework is my meta-system for getting everything else in order and for living with intention.

A rule of life contains elements that we commonly see in organizing spaces and things (e.g., kitchens, utensils) and in managing time (e.g., task lists, calendars). However, what makes it a rule of life is that you organize your things and your time based on your values. The values come first, and the rest flows from that. In other words, you decide what is most important to you, what matters most in your life, and you go from there. (There is a little more to it, which I’ll be exploring in this blog, but that’s the foundation.)

These values can be religious or secular. In college, I lived in a women's housing co-op. It operated under what I would consider a non-religious rule of life: based on the value that young women can learn a great deal by living in an independent community. (And I definitely learned some great things from that experience!)

The practice of keeping a rule of life is similar to the practices of meditation and yoga. These practices all originated in religious traditions but have been adapted for people outside of those traditions.

You do not have to be a Hindu to practice yoga.

You do not have to be a Buddhist to practice meditation.

And you do not have to be a Christian to practice a rule of life. In my writing, I separate the specifically religious elements of a rule of life, from the organizing principles it makes use of.

My hope is to help you live according to what matters most to you, whatever your guiding philosophy is. I am calling this system a “personal framework” to distinguish it from the communal religious practice. My hope is that at the end of your life, you look back with gratitude on a well-lived life. This framework will help you get there.

Like yoga and meditation, a rule of life - a personal framework - can be practiced with a community or done as a personal discipline.

 I'll be writing here about how you can do this as an individual. 

I'm starting this blog because I love thinking about getting things in order and thinking about what helps people live well. I've done workshops to help others create a personal framework, and as I learn more, I continue to adapt my own.

Right now, this blog is about my project to live by my own framework, and think about what it means to create such a framework in general, apart from a specific religious tradition.

This ancient system is helpful for anyone wanting to integrate their lives with the values they hold dear. My hope is to share this system — and other wisdom practices I have learned from my tradition — in such a way that whatever your belief or non-belief, you can make use of these time-tested organizational systems and principles.

¹ Best sign I ever saw at a crafts fair booth: "Yes, you could make these yourself. But will you?"