Like many others, I suffer a bit from anxiety, but it is mostly situational. Meeting new people, starting a new job, going to a new place, etc. Recently with the change in my employment status (as of tomorrow) it has brought a lot of uncertainty and anxiety. One coping method that I have found to work for me is to focus this nervous energy into something positive and rearrange something or organize something. For me, a sense of order goes a long way and makes me feel like I am just a little more in control of the situation, not to mention it helps alleviate some of the stress of something out of order. I find that when I have a messy desk, or clothes on the floor, or a messy inbox that it does nothing but add more stress to my current load. Sure all of these are trivial in the grand scheme of things, but when compounded with other situations, sometimes it is enough to really put you in a foul mood.
With that said, I am no clean/neat freak. My bed is never made, there is always at least one item of clothing on the floor and a stack of receipts on my desk. I do however tend to keep certain things in order all of the time and one of those items is my case of body jewelry. Some girls buy shoes or purses or regular jewelry, personally, I buy body jewelry. Aside from the 3 rings that I always wear, my body jewelry is really the only thing that I never take off (with the exception of places like work, etc. when needed) Previously working for a company that sold body jewelry has allowed me to amass quite the collection.
My collection consists of my jewelry divided by type in little jars that fit into a container meant for beads. I think I picked this up at Walmart or Michaels or something for a pretty low cost. This would also be a great idea for people who own a lot of rings and would like to keep them organized and visible. I find that this is the easiest way for me to have all of my jewelry in one place and see everything at a glance for those days where everything MUST match. Also not pictured that I keep with my collection are a pair of nitrile gloves that I use to loosen or tighten jewelry and a small bottle of tea tree oil used for cleaning.
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December NaBloPoMo Topic:
How hard do you think you work?
Early on in my working career, I established a personal goal to always put as much of myself into my work as I can. This sometimes can be a fault, due to the fact that I will agonize over something that is not worth it, solely because of the high standards I hold myself to. I also learned early on that you are at work to work, that’s why it’s called… WORK. Sure I will have a casual conversation with a coworker, or take a moment to look at a funny picture or video. I think all of these things are important and make more productive people, but you will never catch me with my stuff in my hands, jacket on, waiting for the time clock to tick over. When I was in HR this was one of my biggest pet peeves as the time clock was right in front of my desk. How does someone justify being paid for the 10 minutes they stand there waiting for the end of their shift? Of course you wouldn’t want to start a new project to turn around and call it quits for the day, but there is always something that can be done that can occupy the last few minutes of your time. The same could be said for the first 10 minutes of your day. If I want to make a cup of hot chocolate or a bowl of oatmeal, I will arrive early to do so.
Depending on my workload, I will usually go above and beyond when it comes to tasks, mostly to satisfy myself. Sure I could just write out that quick list that the boss wanted throw it on his desk, but if I know that I don’t have other urgent items needing my attention, nicely formatting the list in Word and taking that extra second to do usually goes a long way. For example, at my current job, I deal a lot with equipment lists for various locations. Sure it is easy enough to have one big list for each location and look through all of it when I need to find an answer for either a technician or client, but in my down time I have managed to break these lists out by building location (ie. Building A has 1,2,3, & 4, Building B has 5, 6, & 7, etc.) I like to think that by working a little harder right now, I am saving myself hard work later. Instead of searching through one giant list looking for an answer, I can now quickly find it. Work smarter. Not harder. Probably one of the best things I strive to do everyday.
