First off, I apologize in advance, this post is a little all over the place, but I have a lot to say today! 🙂
If you are anything like me, February can be a mentally trying month. The days are short, the sun comes and goes quickly, and my energy to get out an seize the day wanes quickly. However, I have found that in the depth of these winter months, it creates an opportunity to pause and explore deeper meaning to life’s daily pleasures.
I was listening to a great podcast the other day and they mentioned the topic of “your room”. The idea is that each one of us has a room, and you only have so much space in your room – and you only have to let in certain people or certain things. “Your room” can also be considered the space between your temples and simultaneously, it can also mean your physical space and those things that you let into your life.
Taking this metaphor into account, I couldn’t help but think about the people who I let in close to me, and also about the “things” that I wanted to be surrounded and influenced by. If we have limited breathe, limited space, and limited time, how can we get the most out of these spaces? What should be in the bulk of these spaces? I know that I don’t want to waste any of these precious moments or spaces that I have been given. For me, that’s what February and the dead of winter is all about! Filling up my spaces both physically and mentally with all of the GOOD!
This brings me to Macey!
One shining example of this is a person very special to me, who lives out each day to the fullest, AND is my most favorite client, Macey Hauglund! I met Macey through my BNI Group, as her dad (Keith) is our resident Home Inspector (and a damn good one at that!). Keith gave his presentation last summer and instead of teaching us all about home inspections, he took the time to share his family with us, and specifically the story of his daughter, Macey.
Macey had moved back home with Keith as she needed 24-Hour care. Her diagnosis of ALS has left her to overcome challenges and adversities with degrading ability to move autonomously. As you can imagine, this has been extremely frustrating to her as someone who is fiercely independent and driven.
But you would not know it.
Macey’s smile is contagious. No matter the pain or what she is enduring that day, she smiles. She plays her favorite music (MOTION CITY SOUNDTRACK). She wears her favorite clothes (LULULEMON). She just genuinely cares that her surroundings are positive, the energy is good, and that we all pause to enjoy the moment.
I told Keith that I would love to organize for Macey, so that she is surrounded by the things she loves and so that her caregivers would be able to efficiently grab the items she would need on a daily basis. He said that he thought Macey would LOVE that! That’s where we started and now we’ve become great friends with TWO major things in common; 1) A die hard fandom of Motion City Soundtrack and 2) Love for Lululemon. IYKYK! 🙂
Here are the lessons that I want to share for today, and what I have learned from Macey:
1) We are in control of our surroundings (believe it or not). Our surroundings affect our attitude. Our attitudes affect our daily lives.
2) We can choose what we want to occupy our “space”.
3) Maybe its time to take a deep, hard look at that and make any adjustments you need. I am personally working on this constantly.
We recently helped move Macey from her dad’s house to her full time caregiver, Charlie’s house. This allows complete 24-Hour care for her. I’ll add some photos and a time lapse of our work with her below. It was just a great time overall and it was amazing to see her so happy in her new space.
If you can imagine, the cost of 24-Hour care is not cheap and we want to continue to provide organizing services to Macey so she can keep living her life to the fullest. To help her out, we are donating all proceeds from our upcoming Meat & Potatoes Organizing t-shirt sales to Macey’s Organizing Scholarship! We will donate all of the t-shirt proceeds to her and she can use them for her care, organizing, or any organizing products she might need.
We plan to sponsor a family or person each year who could use our organizing services. If you know of anyone who might benefit from this, do not hesitate to reach out and nominate them for next season.
And now, I’ll link below to our t-shirt store – open for two weeks – a brand new buttery soft, dye sublimation (means the logo won’t fade or peel off with washing), Meat & Potatoes Organizing t-shirt crafted by our lovely local promotional company, Laker Promotions.
ORDER MY NEW MEAT & POTATOES ORGANIZING T-SHIRT NOW!!
Finally, speaking of self-care, if you ever want to come stretch with Macey and I, we have been going to Stretchy, our local stretch gurus to keep our bodies and minds in tip-top shape! You can schedule a free demo and hang with us.
