Episode 132

If you are a parent, you definitely know what it feels like to be overwhelmed and disorganized. Every parent I think is constantly grasping for ways to control the chaos in their lives that these lovely little kids have brought into the family, right? Well, that's why we so are so excited about introducing you to Andy Hickman, who he is an expert when it comes to understanding what it means to

 

relate to the overwhelm in a different way. He's going to give you a mind blowing different perspective about how to see overwhelm and even what organization looks like. I know that's such a popular thing in our culture today of all these different self help books about how to be organized, but he's going to really frame it in a new way. And this new way is going to be so helpful for you to be able to help your kids with their overwhelm and with their lack of organization, right?

 

So take a moment today to listen to this conversation and you're gonna get these four great principles about how to be more organized, but also how to model and show your kids a different way to relate to the overwhelm that is in our society today because so many things are overwhelming us on a daily basis from our to-do lists to our activities to just, you know, current events, know, storms and natural disasters.

 

So look forward to you gleaning the wisdom that Andy is going to share with you. I would love you to take a moment before you dive into the interview to pause this recording, this podcast, to leave a review, to leave us a comment, tell us how this is helping you. We'd love your five star reviews. All those kind of help the podcast be seen by more and more people. And this podcast is growing every day because of you doing that. So if you haven't done already, please do it now and then enjoy the conversation we have with Andy Hicks.

 

Hello and welcome to the Art of Raising Humans. I'm Kyle. Hi, I'm Sara. And you know, Sara, something that we really like to do in our lives is be organized. Yes. Right? I think that's the goal of most parents is to have an organized home, is to have an organized life, right? As you can see by our bookshelf. Yeah, we try to even organize that, For those watching, we have an organized bookshelf. And just, man, we had a great conversation with Andy Hickman and we want to bring him in today. So hello, Andy.

 

It looks very organized.

 

You

 

Hey, Kyle, Sara, how you doing? Thanks for having me on the show.

 

Yeah, it's so good to have you on and something that we really thought would be helpful to our audience today is I want, just love your perspective on organization and chaos and overwhelm. think all these words are, man, if you're a parent listening to this, you are in the midst of chaos and overwhelm. And so I wanted you to meet Andy Hickman because Andy's got a really unique perspective on this topic. And it's not just like, how do we tidy up? How do we become a minimalist?

 

How do we do all these things, right? It's a little more in depth than that, although those are helpful. Yeah, this is another really helpful. And I think specifically with kids. I wanted Andy first. Who are you and why did you get passionate about this?

 

Okay, well I'm still trying to figure out the who am I piece. I think that that's a lifelong pursuit. How did I get into this piece? the short version is that so when I was 17, I went through a neurotic breakdown. so I was I didn't understand it was a gift at the time. But I look back, I receive it as a gift. Going through that.

 

You

 

Mmm.

 

gave me a very like an actual like first person in the thing, 3D sensible experience of what does it mean or what does it feel like to actually lose one's mind. And once you have that experience, you also know what the opposite is like a lot more. You can reverse engineer that to be like, okay, well, what created that factor or what factors created that experience? Are you guys Chesserton fans?

 

yeah, yeah, GK Chesterton. Yeah, I like his work.

 

Okay, like he's like my all time favorite writer ever. And he's got this wonderful description of insanity, which relates to organization and everything that we're talking about today. And also how I got into this. So he defines insanity as he says, most people think the insane person is the one who loses their ability to reason. And so you first hear that you're like, okay, yeah, that makes sense. Like,

 

someone's insane, they're like not being rational anymore. He proposes something very different, almost what feels like the opposite of that. He says the insane person is not the one who's lost their ability to reason. It's they've lost everything except their ability to reason. So the insane person is the hyper rational one, not the rational list one.

 

Mmm.

 

And so that very much was the kind of flavor for me. was my, I was going up and up and up more and more into my head and basically more and more disconnected from the rest of who I was. such that it just kind of whatever broke down. The interesting thing though, in Chesserton's description is that opens up the mind to like, okay, wait, if this is true, which I believe it is, it's actually not.

 

The good news is it's not possible to lose your mind, literally. But it is very possible to get lost in your mind.

 

Mm-hmm.

 

Yeah. Yeah.

 

And that's what causes the overwhelm. So going through that experience myself, I was like, OK, well, that was kind of crazy. But then later on, you have these quote unquote practical needs and raising a family and starting things up. And so at the time, I was looking for solutions to I was feeling very overwhelmed later in life. And I was looking for solutions of like, well, how do I

 

How do I eliminate that? How do I get organized? And so I would read all the business self-help books and there were elements in there that resonated, but then there were things, it always felt like an incomplete picture. Like, okay, well, if I implement this, this helps me control this one sliver of my life, but how do I actually scale it for the whole part of my life?

 

Yes, yeah, totally.

 

And so that brought me backwards to this experience I had and I could connect my own educational background and philosophy. I studied ancient and medieval philosophy with my own psychological experience to this like in my face practical need and going through that process resulted in us creating a behavioral framework for this. So it's distilling everything down to just four innate

 

natural abilities and ends up organization is really an internal thing rather than an external thing. And it's more about integrating the person rather than sharpening your thinking skills. So that's enough to spark some questions and paths.

 

Yes. Yeah.

 

Yeah. Well, no, I love that. And what it makes me think of is I know Sara and I both before we ever met each other and ever got married, we were, I would have considered both of us as organized people. We definitely liked have things clean and put away. I remember many times when I had roommates, they were very disorganized roommates and I sort of conflicts about, so when I married Sara, actually our lives seemed for the most part, pretty organized, you know, and, I,

 

Mm.

 

Hmm. Mm-hmm.

 

felt a lot of peace about that. knew where things went. I knew how things were. But then we brought kids into the mix. And my gosh, it became exponentially more difficult to keep that control, you know, and and definitely began to feel overwhelmed as we had not only one but two, two little ones at the time who were both very little. And just by their nature of their development, we're very chaotic, because they were running around and making messes and doing all this stuff. And it was a real challenge.

 

with Sara and I having a lot of conversations, like how do we get back to getting control over this? Cause it looks like the house is messier than it ever was before. Our schedules are all over the place. You know, it just seemed like to me, there was this grasp was how do I get control of the external? How do I get control of that? Thinking that that then was going to bring peace. So I love your emphasis of really what I had to come to. It was really.

 

The thing that was chaotic was my internal. It was, felt out of control internally and I was trying to grasp the external to then get control. And sometimes that meant getting control of the kids and trying to make their behavior less chaotic or whatever it was. But I was trying to get the overwhelm away by gaining control of all the stuff outside.

 

Mm.

 

Mm-hmm.

 

So you said something before we hit record that I want to tie in here, which was you had this image of, because you guys were just coming back from a fun trip, and part of that was flying. And in the airplane, you could hear the safety talk like, if in case of a thing, oxygen mask comes down, put yours on first. And we can use that as an analogy in terms of.

 

Mm-hmm.

 

how to approach organization, right? So, because usually what happens is someone operates sufficiently in life, like no fire is coming up, so they're not really thinking about like, you know, what am I doing that's facilitating a sense of order? You only think of that when it's lost, right? So.

 

What tends to happen is you coast along, hit something. And then once you hit something, your...

 

the tendency is to react in a disintegrated way. So one common way that this shows up is you go, okay, I feel overwhelmed. I wanna get organized. I'm gonna go out there and I'm gonna get some kind of planner, okay? And I'm gonna take that planner and this planner is going to organize me. So.

 

That's like taking the oxygen mask and putting it on the other person first rather than putting it on yourself first, right? Because from the very beginning, the tone is set that the potential of organization is not seated inside me, it's seated outside in some kind of tool. And then what happens is you let that tool subtly

 

Yep.

 

govern and curate what kind of stuff you're organizing. And it's like you want to clean the bedroom up, but you're seeing, okay, what are the three things I'm grateful for? Okay, I think I can do that. And then you can fake that for so long and then you get frustrated, you throw the thing out. There's the whole, like you were saying, this is an internal thing, right?

 

Yes.

 

It is more true to say that this is an internal thing rather than an external thing, but it is most true to say that these two things are the same thing. That is, the internal is not able to be separated from the external and the external is not to be separated from the internal. Here's one very specific example of what I mean.

 

Mm.

 

Let's say we've got some sort of, we've got a lot of stuff in our head and it's taking a lot of space and we just want to have the breathing room. Well, part of what's going to facilitate the ability to get clear, to have a clear head is to realize that we are, we're not just a head, right? We're a full person. So when I'm trying to clarify my thinking,

 

I want to, in a way, cycle it in and out. I want to get my thinking out of my head. This can either be through speech or it can be through writing or it can be through a couple other mediums. And once it's out, it actually enables it to come back in in a clearer format. So,

 

This is one of the most fundamental things that I see from the very beginning. And if you can get this right, you save a bunch of unnecessary mistakes, which is accurately interpreting what you are experiencing when you first feel overwhelmed and are looking for those organizational systems. When you are overwhelmed, we've got two definitions of overwhelm, which

 

I encourage a listener to write down so that they stick. One definition of overwhelm that we use is it is the optional habit of ignoring clarity.

 

Overwhelm is the optional habit of ignoring clarity.

 

So one thing that that does is it shakes up. It helps us recognize that there's something that we're choosing and we can change if we don't want to have this experience. There's still this question of like, well, what does that change look like and how do we do it? Right. And so the second definition of oval realm is this.

 

Yes, exactly.

 

Overwhelm is not a sign that the answer is missing. It's a sign that you're missing the answer.

 

And this might sound a little bit like, did you guys remember the movie? Was it Mystery Men? Yeah, OK, so it might sound like we're going into that like camp with the goofy guys like you must not control your anger. Your anger will control you or something. But. Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. The thing is, I don't make the rules, it's just reality is paradoxical. So like if we want to.

 

yes, I do. With Ben Stiller? Yes. Yeah.

 

Yes.

 

always sounded like Yoda for a second.

 

If we want insight, it's going to come in a form like that, whether we like it or not. But really sit with this for a second. Overwhelm is not a sign that the answer is missing. So first, when someone feels overwhelmed, they're thinking, I've lost control. It's out of my hands, right? Something's wrong. Overwhelm is not a sign that the answer is

 

Yes, of course. Yep. Yep. Yep.

 

missing. It's a sign that you're missing the answer. So here's the flip which is what if overwhelm was just as friendly and helpful and positive as a sensation of hunger?

 

Mm. Yeah.

 

Right? Where it's like, when we feel the sensation of hunger, we're not like, crap, like my body's breaking down. It's more like, my body is functioning. It's letting me know that I could use a little bit more energy. we don't have these sensations. Every sensation we have, we have because there's something we can do about it. Right? Whereas it's not just some random thing from the outside. So the very

 

Yeah, yeah.

 

fact that one feels a room is evidence that there's something that they can do about it rather than not. And we can go into what that looks like when I put that's a good foundational piece.

 

You

 

Yeah, I love that because it's very empowering, right? Like if, like you said, with hunger, if I'm hungry, I feel empowered to go make myself some food. I'm not, it doesn't throw me into a state of, no, I'm helpless here. So I love that view of looking at overwhelms. It's just another message. It's another message communicating something to me. And I want to welcome that.

 

because it's not my enemy. It's not something I need to push away or run from or be worried, you know, even scared of. It's what is this message telling me? And now I can do something about it. So I love that framing of it because it just really switches your perspective of when that overwhelm is coming. A lot of times we just feel buried in it and completely helpless. And so I love that it gives me something to go, what is this saying to me? What can I do now?

 

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

 

Yes.

 

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

 

Mm-hmm.

 

Well, and the thing I like about that too, Andy, that jumping on what Sara said is a lot of parents struggle with how to help their kids when they're overwhelmed, you know, and that a lot of is that the kid, something happens at school or they don't make the team or they don't, and the kid is overwhelmed with all the pressures they're going through. And lots of times the parents, because they, they spend their life kind of like with their hand closed, resisting the overwhelm instead of just open-handedly accepting the overwhelm and going,

 

Correct. Correct.

 

Yes.

 

What is the overwhelm there to teach me about myself and about this moment? And so that's what I hope every parent listening understands. That's why we wanted to bring you on Andy is those kinds of insights are not only helpful for you, but then they're helpful to your kid. And if you can teach your kid at like five, six, seven, eight years old on how to approach overwhelm differently. my gosh, that's a gift for the rest of their life. As they're watching you approach it that way, as you're modeling that.

 

Hmm.

 

It's really beautiful.

 

Yes. Yes, totally. So there's part of what you're touching on right there is this, feels, you know, in the experience of time, like this little thin millimeter of a second, but between like when something happens and how I choose to respond, right? And in that little thin layer is an interpretation.

 

How am I interpreting that thing? What does it mean that I'm feeling this, right? And we'll plant the seed now and then we're gonna harvest it later when we get into defining these four behaviors of organization. We're working our way towards, okay, we're understanding what overwhelm is. The next kind of main question is like,

 

Yeah.

 

Okay, what's organization? And then we can go into these four behaviors of organization. But a little seed here is the, what you just presented is a great image, closed clenched hand verse open, and in, in a very real sense, soft hand. And most people think organization is this when organization is actually this. Right? So.

 

Yeah.

 

Yeah. 100%. Yeah.

 

There's a really great writer, last name is Sir Thiaj, it's a French name. He wrote this little red book called The Intellectual Life. was written in the 30s or 40s, 1930 or 40. But he says the passivity is the primary law of the mind.

 

passivity. So normally think like, okay, and we heard this word a couple times at the beginning. Someone feels overwhelmed, they just want to get things back in control. So there's a clenchiness and the problem is when we're in that clenchy kind of state, our field of vision in terms of what we consider as options, shrinks down.

 

Yep.

 

Yeah. Yeah.

 

we lose access to our creative faculties. And so we normally aren't able to see or hear, like Sara, you were saying, what is the overwhelm trying to communicate to me? I'm not gonna be able to hear it if I'm in a defensive stance, if my guard is up, right? I can hear it if my guard is down and I have an open stance. And I have...

 

Mm-hmm.

 

I have the confidence that I am fully capable of figuring this out. Otherwise, a part of me wouldn't be telling me about it.

 

Right? So yeah. So, yes, please.

 

Well, Andy, with that, what I want to add to that, that I love, is you've already used the word a few times about being reactive, which a lot of people are to situations. They just react. And I love how Dr. Dan Siegel talks about, let's get away from that. That's definitely, you don't want a parent being reactive to moments, these overwhelming moments. But then the next one was we could respond to the moment, which would be better than reacting.

 

Yeah, yeah.

 

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

 

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

 

but bringing it back, this is kind of where I came up with the open hand idea and then jumping on what you're saying. He would say the next step would be to no longer be reactive, no longer be responsive, but actually be receptive and just to receive the moment as it is. And so when you just receive the moment, then you can really more fully understand what the moment's trying to say to you. You know, and, what we found even on this vacation that we recently took, there was many moments of.

 

Hmm.

 

driving a lot and being overwhelmed and and many times where I unfortunately reacted or got upset and I could even feel myself go through those stages of going from Reactive to then being responsive where I'd kind of be more trying to be more thinking about it talking about it with the kids about what happened in that moment But then when I really moved into receptive, man, those were some deep conversations where everybody in the car was just receiving the experience of the other

 

Mm-hmm.

 

in the midst of the overwhelm. And it really brought us closer together as a family, like really moved us more towards intimacy, even though that moment wasn't what we wanted to happen, but we use that moment as a way to understand each other more deeply.

 

Yeah, sometimes we'll talk about

 

This is actually great. Let's use this as a natural transition into like, okay, what is organization? And this actually is a great bridge to the first behavior as well. we talk about what we call the 3D spectrum of activity, which is like, okay, there tends to be three different ways to act out of alignment.

 

Great.

 

Right. And then the way that we want is in the center of that. So one of the ways which you've been talking about is reactivity. Right. So we can be reactive. We can also be hyperactive. And then we also can be just in case anyone's hearing this or like, OK, this is starting to sound too, too soft and too like kumbayaish or something like you just have to open your hand. Right.

 

Yeah.

 

But the third way is inactivity.

 

Yes,

 

Right? So we're saying all three of these are out of alignment and what we want is to simply act.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

 

Right? Not to react or hyper or inact, but act. So we're doing this because we want to be organized. Here's a great foundational piece in terms of what organization actually is. If you look at the word organize, take out the eyes at the end and you get the most accurate picture of what organization is. You get that word organ.

 

Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

 

Think of the organs in our body, okay? And etymologically, it's the coming from a Greek word, organon, which means tool for making or doing. Tool for making or doing. Organization.

 

Mm. Okay. Did not know that. That's good to know. I've got tools for making or doing in my body. That's fantastic.

 

Well, yeah, and organization is much more a has a much more practical and moving picture in the mind than we normally think of organization is, okay, we've now frozen everything, and we've got it in its one and only place. And now I'm organized. we often confuse tidiness with organization. Yep. Whereas

 

Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Completely.

 

It's most helpful to look out into nature and like, what does that look like? Because you can walk through a forest, we wouldn't think of it, we wouldn't use a word. But that's a perfect image of an organized system, right? And we feel that because it's very calming. We can go out there and we already feel regrounded and okay, cool. And yet you look.

 

you're going through a forest, there's a little bit of quote unquote messiness, right? There's some twigs falling down over there and right. So it's not, it's not about control. It's not about tidiness. It's about functionality and it's about flow. And once you have that image, it organization should feel a lot more open and fluid and loose.

 

Yes, chaos.

 

while still giving you the structure that you want. We typically talk about organization is in the middle. Usually people think either over here on one side of the extreme, they're looking for the formula or they identify as well. I'm the artistic messy. I don't actually like being organized. They're lying to themselves, but I understand why.

 

So they go over here into formlessness and we're saying, no, no, no, there's something in between called form where it's got some order and because not despite of that order, but because of it, it's able to be loose and functional and practical and moving. And that's what we're ultimately trying to create when we say we want to be organized.

 

huh.

 

Yeah, yeah.

 

Mm-hmm.

 

Yeah. Yes. So how does somebody do that? Because I think I think everybody, everybody resonates with that. I think that's so true. And I love you using nature as a picture that everybody can go like, yeah, no, it's organized. But it's not tidy. You know, I think we understand too. Yeah, so my shelf is more tidy. That's right. what I was thinking. Shelf behind it. Yeah, I was thinking of this time where you can feel in a family, maybe everything isn't put away just

 

Okay, yeah, yeah, sure, sure, sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's, mean, it.

 

But you can feel this flow of organization, even with as things are moving and cause as a family, it's very rare that the whole house is tidy. Right. But you can still in the midst of that have kind of a flow and you know, we can be in and out of that moment. But sometimes I, when you were talking about that, like, yeah, I recognize that when there is this flow and different than tidy and this organization.

 

Yes.

 

Yeah, it feels kind of like peace.

 

Well, so there's you also see in that word organization, you've got a really close distance between that and organism. And when we have that image of organism, we recognize there's different kinds of organisms. Right. And so then we have this opportunity to see organization looks different for different things or different people. Right. So there's a form for organization for a bookshelf.

 

Mmm.

 

and there's a form for organization for whatever, a six-year-old's bedroom, right? And these are different, but if we're locked into only one picture of what this is, we start to force things that don't actually fit. So I wouldn't say that that bookshelf is tidy. I would say that it's organized, right?

 

thank you. Okay. If you want to see it, go to YouTube and check out the video of this podcast.

 

But that's it fits the books. There's a stability to books, And there's a whatever, a certain vibe around books that's different. So how do you do that? But like we spend this time getting clear on this because I would argue most people don't resonate with that, what we just talked about.

 

Yeah.

 

They resonate with it, but they don't imagine it. It is more common for people to imagine organization as things are now under control. Trust me, you do not want to control your life. Things are now under control. Things are now tidy. Things are now static. Well, if that's the picture, then all the techniques you can throw out the door because they're aiming in the wrong direction, right?

 

Yeah.

 

Yes.

 

Yeah, yep.

 

So how do you do that? Now we understand what that refers to. How do we maintain the vibrancy and motion and functionality in whatever we're wanting to organize? And so what I do is I help people habituate behaviors that create this. So you can think of,

 

You know, like the simple machines, there's like the wedge and the screw and the wheel. And it's like, you know, we've, we distilled certain tools down to their like essence, and then we can replicate them and repurpose them in all these variety of ways. It's like, we're still using the screw. We're still using the wheel, right? We're still using the wedge and we can use it in all these different ways because we got it down to the essence.

 

So these four behaviors which we'll now go through, they're the essence, they're the distilled essence of organization. And again, they already exist in you. They will be evident and demonstrated in the quote unquote external world. They show up.

 

and produce things in systems, but they are ultimately your innate abilities, which is why the whole oxygen mask image is great because you're like, okay, wait, this is all first. How do I get reconnected here? Once I'm reconnected here, I will naturally know what to do. Okay, so what we're going to go now through is in one sense,

 

Yeah.

 

almost like putting into words what it's like to ride a bike. It's like once you're on it, you kind of already know how to do it. And yet there's something very helpful in being able to name things. Once you name something, you have something tangible to anchor your awareness to, and that allows you to practice it more often. So we talked about

 

this 3D spectrum of activity, and we're trying to aim for living a life in which we act rather than react or hyperact or be inactive. This is what the first behavior touches on. There are four behaviors in a very real way. There's not a first, second, third, fourth. It's much more a circle rather than like a linear assembly line.

 

For presentation sake, you need to start somewhere. So let's start with a common problem, which will then contextualize what the answer is, and the answer will be the name of the behavior. So a common problem is choosing or deciding feeling very hard. Most people either are making rash choices or they're over analyzing and they're frozen in their decisions.

 

What we want is we want to be able to choose throughout the day we're making all these micro decisions. We want to be able to make those choices in a manner that feels natural. One that has, you could think of it as they're effective choices. They don't need to be perfect. And they didn't cost a ton energy-wise to make. They just kind of like roll off the tongue, but we're not winging it, right?

 

Yeah.

 

So what this, we call this moving. This is behavior number one, moving. And the simplest definition of it, and then we'll break out that definition, is moving is choosing naturally. Choosing naturally, okay? So there is a couple questions for this. And again, I encourage the reader or the listener

 

Let yourself also see this stuff, not just by looking at the YouTube video, but actually bringing it into the your actual physical space by writing it. And then you can see what we're talking about moving. Okay. Moving is choosing naturally. Well, what are we choosing and how do we choose naturally? Okay. when it comes down to it, you really only have three choices at any given moment.

 

at any point in your life. And that is tremendously relieving to know because it gives you a framework, a mental framework that helps simplify what feels like an infinite number of decisions. Here are your three options at any given moment. They're all three different kinds of work. You can choose to do planned work.

 

I'll come back through these and kind of define them, just the two are planned work, planning work, or unplanned work.

 

Okay.

 

Everything ultimately boils down to that. Planned work is like what most people think of. go to their to-do list and they are checking things off that they've already written down. Now we'll get to why your to-do list isn't much fun for you in a second. It's more related to another behavior, but let's assume you've got a nice clear list. That's planned work. Planning work is taking a something

 

Yeah.

 

Yeah.

 

undefined and bringing it to some sort of definite state. So it's, okay, you have, we want to go on this week vacation, this family vacation. Well, it's figuring out where do we want to go? Where are we going to stay? What does it look like? That's all planning. Unplanned is all the stuff of life that is unnatural to try to fit into a to-do list. It's the kid throwing up at three in the morning or the diaper that

 

Yeah.

 

needs to change or whatever. The camera doesn't work when you're supposed to do the thing. That's all unplanned work. Any questions on that so far? Is this making sense? OK. OK, cool, sweet. So how do we know which one of these to do at any given moment? First of all, helpful reframe is there's not a hierarchy here. Again, we're trying to.

 

Yes, in there.

 

Yes,

 

No, I've got it. No, yeah, makes sense. Yeah, breaks it down simple.

 

a little bit. There's like the Wild West cowboy who is like already against organization because they think it's control. And then there's like the type A controller who like is the organizational groupie. And we're trying to like pull them both towards the center. how do we know which sorry. Yeah. So there's no hierarchy here. We're not saying planned work is the pinnacle of

 

Yes, yes.

 

living an intentional life and to the extent you do unplanned work, you're procrastinating or getting distracted, they all have a place. You want to harmonize three things to know which one of these to choose at any given time. Those three things are your reason, your intuition, and your lists. Your reason is a slower, more methodical, strategic,

 

mode of thinking. Your intuition is that quick gut, know, non-explicit but very clear way of knowing. And then your lists are any kind of thing you've externalized. So we're including your calendar under that heading of lists. We're including the sticky notes on your desk, the things in your Apple notes, whatever. All of those are forms of lists. And when you know how to

 

Yes.

 

let all three of those talk with each other, then you naturally know which one of these types of work to do at any given moment. Most people, however, are atrophied in one of those three things, and they're hyper-extended in another. So they might be a super intuitive person, like that's their default way of thinking, but they don't really have any lists, or if they write them, they always forget to come back to them and check in on them.

 

Yeah.

 

Yes, yeah, we know those people.

 

Yeah, okay. And you might be addicted to your lists and have a very atrophied intuition. so choosing becomes this very laborious thing because you're not letting all three of these things speak with each other. Does this make sense so far?

 

Yeah, does. Yeah, yeah, totally.

 

Okay, cool. So this is what we call moving. It'll gain color and definition as we go through these other behaviors. So we start there because that's what we ultimately want to get to. Like all the other things we're going to talk about or for the purpose of, well, I want to live my life. I want to be able to move through the day and feel exactly.

 

Yeah, take action. Yeah, be pro. Yeah, be moved. not be stuck and paralyzed by the overwhelm. Yeah.

 

Mm Yeah, yeah, exactly. And we don't want to create some kind of system that is going to be so complicated. It's like becomes a full time job. Right. Like if the system starts to get in the way of the day to day, then we've got a misalignment. So that's why we start with moving as like whatever the world this thing is going to be. It's got to have some fluidity to it. OK, so what gets put on these lists?

 

Yes.

 

How do we know what things we want to plan? This is the behavior of noting. So this is behavior number two. Behavior one was moving, behavior two is noting. And this is when things get fun. So noting is recognizing and collecting. That's the shortest way we can put it into words. It's recognizing and collecting.

 

Another way you can think about it is noting. This is gonna sound like I'm making a mistake in my speech. I'm not. Noting is noting and noting. It is noticing something and it's taking note of that thing that you notice. So Sara, you use the word recognize.

 

Hey, you messed up how you said that.

 

Yes. Yes.

 

And this is one of my all time favorite words forever because there's so much in that word that we miss. When I work with somebody, usually I'm working with a group of people and one of the first things we do is we let the stuff out of the head. And so I go, OK, take a piece of paper and just don't try to figure this stuff out. Just let this stuff out. What's taking a lot of space up in the head?

 

What's going on? What would you like some clarity on? Okay. So they do that and they've got things like whatever mother-in-law and a rental and kids school and blah, blah, blah, blah. Okay. Then I asked them, do you recognize these things? And they go, yeah. do I recognize them? 100 % like.

 

I can't stop thinking about them all the time. They keep me up at night and blah, blah, blah. And they go, okay, well, this is great. Here are real definitions of the word recognize that are very relevant to us. So one of the definitions of recognition is to acknowledge as one's own. To acknowledge as one's own. So we could describe a neglect.

 

A neglectful father as one who doesn't recognize his children.

 

Mm, yeah, yeah.

 

Okay, so to acknowledge as one's own, here's another definition to express obligation, thanks or gratitude. So did we recognize the effort that our friend made in organizing our birthday party? Okay.

 

Yeah, yeah. Or even I would say, did we recognize the hug my kid gave me this morning? Right? I that's the big one. think lots of times we don't even, we just do it. It gets done. Thank you. Go get your breakfast. You know? And instead of like, did I take a moment to recognize what that meant? You know, that hug that they just gave me.

 

Yep. Yep.

 

Yes, yeah, exactly. Okay, so here's another one. It's to acknowledge as a person entitled to speak at a particular time. So think of being in like a court and Judge Judy recognizes the defending plaintiff or something. I don't really know the language stuff, but. it's to, yeah, yeah. To acknowledge as a person entitled to speak at a particular time.

 

Another definition of recognized, to detect with the senses. I recognize someone coming up over the hill. There's some kind of shadowy figure, right? And then lastly, is a very, very old definition, 15th century, but it's to resume the possession of land. So here's the consideration. Thinking about something over and over and over again is not recognizing it.

 

Yeah.

 

Hmm.

 

that's thinking about it, okay? Unless you are acknowledging that sensation of overwhelm as your own sensation rather than some interruption or annoyance coming from the outside, as long as you are not expressing gratitude towards it, acknowledging it as…

 

Mmm, yeah, yeah.

 

that which is entitled to speak, it's got something to say, it's communicating something important. As long as you are not interacting with it in some sensorial manner, you're just spinning it in the head rather than writing it down.

 

You are both not recognizing it and you also will never be able to resume possession of the land of your own mind because you're not recognizing. You're thinking about the thing, which is very different.

 

Yeah.

 

This is all that first part of noting. Okay, so, cause most people jump right over that and they go, yeah, to writing stuff down. That's what we're talking about here. No, we are, but often one of the biggest things that's making organization harder than it has to be for you is lack of awareness in terms of what you actually wanna write down.

 

Of course. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

 

Yeah. Yeah, that's the word. When you said noting, think Sara and I were both thinking of raising one's awareness to be able to kind of slow down the moment to really note what is around you, what is happening, what's occurring inside of you, what's all that stuff.

 

Yes. And so this is what bridges the gap between overthinking stuff and making sense of it. So Aristotle talks about knowledge and he talks about it in the book Metaphysics and he says all men desire to know. And then you're like, okay, how's he going to, what's his reason for saying that or what's his evidence? The evidence that he presents is

 

We know this, we know that all men desire to know because of the delight they take in their senses, which to the modern mind is like, what does that have to do? We're talking about the invisible ghostly process that just happens here, right? Well, the ancients understood and also the medievals understood that thinking is not a mental activity. It's an act of the whole person that begins with the physical senses.

 

Yeah.

 

Yeah

 

So if we want to start to fully hear or listen to use Sara's language, what our own signal of overwhelm is trying to communicate to us, want to involve, we want to listen with all of us rather than just part of us. want to give the child a hug and really be there and not have one part of us thinking about the thing over there while we're giving the child a hug, right?

 

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And every parent listening knows that like, and when we've purposely tried to notice that and feel that and like, you know, just even this morning, my youngest came and laid down on the couch with me for a minute and just trying to like, breathe in her essence, you know, who she is, like the fact that I'm not going to get many more years of these type of moments and just trying to soak that in. I mean, that really, to me, helps with the overwhelm of the day, you know, because in this moment,

 

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

 

Mm-hmm.

 

I don't feel overwhelmed. I feel completely delighted.

 

So let's say you've got someone who's like, okay, they're opening up their awareness, they're being more receptive, and then they're trusting the process, like, okay, well, I'm not gonna quite shorten, I know what to do with this, but I'm gonna write this stuff down. First of all, they've already done great, because most people think that they need to figure the thing out before they let it out. You wanna let the thing out so you can figure it out.

 

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you can see it so you can actually look at it. Yeah, yeah.

 

Yeah, exactly. So let's say we've gone that far. so you've got someone who's got a bunch of, cause the listener might be like, trust me, dude, I've tried that. And then my desk becomes a big pile of sticky notes. And then I'm doomed. Right? I mean, have you guys ever felt that before where it's like, there's, you've got the noting part down. Yeah.

 

It's right. Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

 

yeah. Totally. Yeah, I have a lot of lists and that can be my tendencies where it's like, okay, I just got to get this out there and I'll make a list and then I have another list and then I have to compile my list and it's just, it's just a mess.

 

Good. So this is exactly what the third behavior is designed to help with. The third behavior is called clarifying. clarifying, can distill it down to a very short set of words, which is clarifying is defining, then deciding. defining and then deciding. So most

 

Okay. Yeah.

 

things that come up, if we recognize them and then write them down, they aren't arriving pre-assembled. They're half ideas or they're the beginnings of a thought. If we immediately go into putting them onto the planner or putting them onto Wednesday or whatever, we are going to have the demoralizing experience of

 

Well, we're going to get to that day. We're going to be like, OK, I'm going to look at my list for for today of here are the things I'm going to do. We're going to get uppercut in the face with our own half formed writing and be like, Dan, like this isn't even clear. I don't know what this is. And then then comes the numbing sensation. Then comes the OK, well, I'll just do tomorrow. I'll punt it down the field. Right. And then we repeat the

 

Yes.

 

Yes. Yes.

 

Yeah.

 

the terrible ritual for the rest of our life, unless we understand how to get out of this. yeah, the first, the thing that's happening there is we're trying to do something that we haven't defined yet. We haven't actually made clear. And very handy, there's a little bit more to this, but you can get by with a lot with just these two tools in terms of how do you define something.

 

Yes. Yeah.

 

this is what we call like the ones and zeros of defining something. You want to come up and out and you want to go down and in. And you do that by two different questions. So one question and you'll be inclined listener. One of these will sound more familiar. The other one is the one you always forget to ask. Okay. And it'll be different for different people. So one question is what's the, what would be the next physical action?

 

if I were to do this. That's moving you down and in. It's taking the big thing and making it bite sized. Okay. The other question is if I did that, would I be done?

 

Okay.

 

Hmm.

 

this is moving you back and up. So often a problem we see is like, okay, either the thing's unclear that they wrote down on their to-do list or they only wrote down the next thing and they haven't really provided any structure for the mind of like, well, where am I actually trying to go with this? What am I ultimately trying to do? And so they remain in a reactive stance because

 

Yeah, yeah.

 

Yeah.

 

Mentally, they haven't clarified what's the bigger picture that this thing is connected to.

 

Yeah. Yeah. So now what we've got is movement is one, right? Noting is two and then clarifying is three, right?

 

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, clarifying is three. It's defining, which we just talked about, and then deciding. We won't go into all the details of deciding. But what I can say for the sake of time and for optimism is there's only eight decisions there. So it all changes once you understand that the process for clarifying is a fixed and standard process. You don't have to start with a blank

 

Yeah.

 

canvas every time you come to a new situation in order to clarify it. Use the same fixed set of questions and they'll always bring the thing to a state of clarity. yeah. Then lastly is, please.

 

Yeah.

 

It's almost like what I heard you saying before you get to that fourth one. It's like you're bringing it into focus You know, it's like with those questions whatever the decision is It's like I feel like it's blurry and then it's coming into focus. and that's the thing I'm gonna do next. That's the thing. I'm gonna take the action on. Okay Yeah

 

And that focus, the coming into focus only happens if we are first opening the hand rather than clenching it. And that's the same way of saying, this happens if this happens. That is, if I am interacting with the thing with integrity, as in I'm

 

Yeah.

 

listening to my physical sensations, I'm listening to my emotions, I'm listening to my thoughts, and I'm synthesizing those together rather than pulling them apart and only listening to one, then the thing comes into focus. Yes.

 

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Great. Great. Thank you. Yeah. So the fourth step was the fourth one.

 

Yeah, so everything gathers dust. You can have that experience where it's like you've got lists, but then they keep growing and you've got two reactions typically at that point. Either you take all the lists and you burn them and then you swear that being organizing is not for you. Yeah, it's not for me. Or you add

 

you

 

Yes, that's not for me. Yes.

 

complexity to the problem. And you go, okay, well, I've got all these lists, I better come up with some kind of color coding system or some kind of labeling system. Or what this sounds familiar, it seems like for you, Kyle, yes? Yeah, okay.

 

Yeah.

 

Yes, it does. Yes. Yeah, there's a numbering system. There's a highlighting system. Yeah, I'll tell you.

 

Yeah, exactly. So there's a principle that we call the law of familiarity, which there's an inverse relationship between familiarity and need for structure. So the more familiar you are with something, the less structure you need.

 

okay. Yeah.

 

Here's the inverse, which is more the one that you feel, Kyle, the less familiar you are with something, the more structure you crave or need, right? So you come in and you try to compensate for that by adding more complexity. So the thing is the last behavior is that which enables us to keep our system simple and sustainable. So it's the behavior of reviewing.

 

Yep.

 

Reviewing is realigning rhythmically. As per usual, there's a little breakdown for each of these words, realigning and rhythmically. So realigning is helping us understand what are we trying to do when we go back and we look through our lists again. And that's what we mean by review. We don't just mean like look backwards. We mean to view again, look at the stuff again. What are we trying to do? We're trying to

 

bring back into concert our reason, our intuition and our lists. Okay. And we're trying to do that. So then once the, you know, starting line gun fires again and the week is off, we're again able to move through it and make choices in a very natural way. So that's what we're trying to do when we review. One of the biggest and simplest things you can introduce

 

And the rest is important, but not essential to get started is bring rhythm to this process. So most people only review stuff when they feel out of control or when a big project's looming over their shoulder. Whereas if you, know, most people hit this when they're about to leave for vacation, like Christmas is coming. That's when they sit down and like, okay, well, what's essential? What's not?

 

Yep.

 

What can I leave until I get back? So we joke and we say, pretend like you're going on vacation every weekend. And that's gonna help you maintain a baseline of familiarity because there's a regularity to it. One of the things that will drive your mind crazy is if you don't let it know when it has a chance to come back and look at this stuff again.

 

Yeah.

 

So if you don't have an understanding of when you get to return, then your mind is gonna do one of two things. Either it's gonna be like, well, screw this, I can't hold this forever. Or it's gonna be like, I'm never coming back to this, I better have it all in front of me right now. So when that happens, you really don't want everything on your to-do list. But if you don't have any trust that you're gonna come back to this other stuff, then you feel like,

 

Yeah.

 

Everything has to be on to-do list, otherwise you're going to forget it. And reviewing helps resolve that problem.

 

Yes. Yep.

 

Yeah, no, I love it. So the four I'm hearing you say is movement, then there's noting, then there's clarifying, and then reviewing. And you know, as you were talking, Andy, I'm thinking to some extent, this is part of the process that we do in parenting, almost on a nightly basis in regards to the choices that we're making when it comes to how we're raising our kids, that almost on a nightly basis, we're having these conversations.

 

Yep. Yep. Mm-hmm.

 

Like you're saying, all four of these work together. They're not separate steps necessarily, right? How they're all working together of like, how is Abby processing this or working through that or how is Brennan handling this situation? we're noting these things. We're trying to raise our own awareness of ourselves, our interactions with them. And we really believe those conversations are what continue to help us grow to become the parents we wanna be. And that's what I was saying on our vacation.

 

Yes, correct, correct.

 

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

 

how there was so many opportunities where we had these talks almost without giving words to what you just said, with the kids about just like looking back on what just happened in that moment, how we all reacted to it, how we wish we would have instead responded or received it, right? And like those moments, like there was actually, cause we had an Airbnb so far away from Yosemite, it ended up being like a two and a half hour drive to and from Yosemite every time. And it was like,

 

Yes.

 

Yep. Yep.

 

At first I was kind of beating myself up because I thought I didn't know it was going to be that far because I didn't know how long it took to get into Yosemite. But it ended up being a gift because we actually were like, man, we had these amazing conversations with the kids about these different positive or negative events that happened. And we almost really broke them down, just like you said. And it really, I think, became just so delightful to have these conversations.

 

Yes.

 

Yeah.

 

Mm-hmm.

 

So I hope every parent wrote those four steps down that you were talking about and just really like what you gave them was kind of a steak. I hope they take a little time to take a knife and like cut it up and eat it. Just enjoy each of the ideas and let them ruminate because these are things your kids need. Like if you could help your kids do these activities from a young age,

 

Yes, yeah, yeah. Right.

 

Yes.

 

it is going to benefit them so much as adults. so, so first doing it for yourself and then handing off these steps to the kids, you know? And so, so I wanted to give you an opportunity, Andy, if they want to know how to find out more about the work you're doing, about how to learn more about what you're teaching, how could they find you and learn more about

 

Mm.

 

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

 

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

 

Cool, yeah, thank you. So what we're talking about today is part of a more cohesive whole. we're talking about organization. What was outside the scope of our conversation today is what is appropriate to organize? Most people think organization applies to their time and to-dos and their physical space, essentially.

 

The consideration for the listener is what if organization was also perfectly appropriate to apply to your emotions and also to apply to your intellectual interests or to your life of study. So if you'd like to learn more about like how like more of these details about those four behaviors, but also how they get connected into being able to organize your head, your hands and your heart.

 

Mmm.

 

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

 

Yeah.

 

and in one simple way. Come to our website heal.co that is H E L dot C O. It's the only place we hang out we are not hanging out in the social media world. And we don't miss it. And what you'll see there is a big purple button that says heal your creativity. If you click that

 

I've written a series of letters. There's 13 letters in which I give more of the background. Where did this stuff come from? More of my own personal story. You'll also hear real clips of actual people going through this process of applying these behaviors either to a time or project or to an emotion. And you get a full kind of sensorial experience of what this is all like. So

 

If you'd like to learn more, that's the best way to do it is to read those letters.

 

Great. And we will include that website too, in the show notes and have some more information there. So as a listener, if you're saying, man, I really do feel overwhelmed. I need help with this organ, which I know is pretty much us and everybody listening, definitely go out and check out those show notes to dive even deeper into these practical steps about how this can change your life. And I want to emphasize even more about how in this chaotic world,

 

where so many things are overwhelming on a daily basis with the constant news cycle and all the craziness. I would say this is so important for your kids to learn from you because the kids that I am seeing on a daily basis, they are overwhelmed and they feel like they have no idea how to handle it. And so knowing that these simple steps are there to teach them and to give them, I just think is one of the greatest gifts you can give your kid because then when they go into this overwhelming world,

 

They're able to face it with courage. They're able to face it with confidence that they know it's not about resisting the overwhelm, but just receiving it and listening to it and growing from it. Okay. So I want to thank you again, Andy. Do you have something to add?

 

Mm-hmm.

 

Mm-hmm.

 

Yeah, well, it's just carrying, picking back that one thing is, is we're talking about these behaviors or we're talking about these tools and a very encouraging thought, is also true is you listener are the tools like you, the behaviors are not something out there for you to chase down. It's more to slow down so that you can be who you are, which is a person who already knows how to do this. We're just naming things.

 

Yeah. Yeah.

 

that are natural and innate in you.

 

Yeah, I love that. think that's a very important point. Yes. So I want to thank you again, Andy. Thank you for coming and joining us.

 

Cool. Awesome. Thanks guys. I super appreciate it.

 

You're welcome. And so if anyone wants to find more info, definitely go visit the websites and learn more and definitely gain the wisdom that Andy has to offer you. So I want to thank you for listening today and hope you have a wonderful day.