I'm messy and happy. My room is a mess. I'm happy. My desk is a mess. I'm happy. My thoughts are a mess. Let's not get it twisted. I didn't say I'm disorganized. I'm messy.
What's the distinction? Being disorganized implies I can't find something when I'm looking for it and things can lost easily. Being messy is simply portraying surface-level chaos. But it's a chaos that I understand.
Have you ever been told to clean your room by your parents? I walk into my room one day and looked around. Clothes (both clean and dirty), books, magazines, hangers, coins, music CDs are all over the floor. You can see carpet for about only 1/5 of the floor. I shrug my shoulders and don't see the big deal. I know exactly where to find my favorite sweater and the overdue library book I was looking for. I grab the sweater and book and go to the library to return the book. I come back home and enter my room again. My wonderful mom cleaned up my room. While I do appreciate the work she puts into keeping the house clean, now I can't find the new CD I just burned that was under the pair of jeans I had on the next to Money and Small Business magazines. My messy room is now clean, but I can't find anything. Isn't the purpose of cleaning to make it easier for me to find things?
I find myself putting off cleaning things that aren't essential for my day to day activities. My mom hates it. She always wants the kitchen sink empty with no dirty dishes. She wants every room clean and tidy. This has always presented a problem for us. We continue to get into arguments over cleaning. I don't see the point and she sees it as a necessity. I'm not saying I won't do the dishes. I'm just saying I don't want to do the dishes right NOW. The way I see it is, if there are dirty dishes, why do I have to clean them now when no one is going to use them at the moment? Why can't I clean them when I need them? Is there some harm in doing them later? Some may argue that doing them now allows you to not have to do them later. But from my perspective, that's terrible inefficient. I'm wasting time and energy doing something with no positive outcome. I'll clean the dishes now and they will just sit on the dish rack with no one to use them. Isn't cleaning the dishes when I need them and putting them to use right away so much better?
The same can be said about making your bed. Lots of kids are taught to make their bed in the morning when they wake up. Only to undo what they did when they go to sleep. It's like putting yourself in an endless cycle of futility.
I have this theory that the messier you are, the smarter you are. While I'm sure this is a ridiculous notion to some, please allow me to explain myself.
First off, it's difficult to define what a "smart" person is because there needs to be context around what a person is "smart" about. A whole other post would be required to even skim this surface. For argument's sake, I'll define being smart means to have periods of continuous train of deep thought. What I mean to say is that smart people are constantly thinking about something or other. They are easily preoccupied in thought and love new ideas. While the thoughts may be random, the person is thinking very hard or deep about it. This is the primary reason why smart people are messy. They are too busy with things that interest them to bother with trivial things like dirty dishes.
In addition if you put things into perspective, having a messy room or some dirty dishes and laundry has no impact on a person's accomplishments or quality of life. I rather attempt to create a new way to solve some problem and fail than condemn myself to keeping my room clean.
I think there's even a larger idea here. By cleaning and keeping things neat and tidy, the most you can only be is content with the status of your house. By investing your time in thought and your interests, you can be happy with yourself and your life.
I want to be happy, not content.