Flat Surface Challenge

Before I get to the insidious piles of random paper I took from off, under, and near the desk in my office, I felt I needed to continue making my writing area functional again by dealing with the two bookcases in the room.

As I am on the path to becoming a minimalist I know I will eventually have to attack my book addiction, but for now I want to just stop the madness of making every flat surface a repository for whatever I am tired of carrying around. One of the minimalist ideas I like is "A place for everything... everything in its place." Yes, an old adage, but true nonetheless.

There are no set rules in minimalism, but a good guideline when it comes to books is that if your bookcase holds thirty books, when you bring in book number thirty-one, then it is time to pass along a book to someone else. Simple, right? One in one out. I can do that. But the bigger problem for me is just laying "stuff" down wherever I find a flat surface. Thus, I want to end that practice today.

Here are the before pics of the two bookcases in my office.


The big stack of paper buried under the label maker is my novel that I have not been editing because I HATE working in the office. Now that my desk is clean, I feel more at peace and creative in the office, and am in fact typing this while sitting at my minimalist desk. Yes, it remains uncluttered as seen in the previous entry and I plan to keep it that way.

This is the other bookcase in the office. I also note that the little flip-calendar was last updated on 6 July, 2011. Again, probably the last time I felt at ease in the office.

Later today I will do the reveal on these two bookcases.