Happy Clean Off Your Desk Day! January 11th
By: Barry Roberts
Wow! It’s hard to believe that Clean Off Your Desk Day
(C.O.Y.D.) is upon us again. I wish it was a little later in the year. It always
seems I’ve just taken down all of the previous Holiday
decorations and now I need to put the new ones up. This year I’ll be running
strings of paper clips along the eaves and our front door will display a giant
legal pad wishing all visitors, “Happy Clean Off Your Desk Day”.
Plus, and I’m so excited about this, we found a 90” X 75” light up desk
blotter for the front lawn! (I just hope my neighbors aren’t too jealous.) The
big problem I have, and surely you are experiencing the same thing; I just
cannot find any appropriate C.O.Y.D. Day cards to mail out. Looks like I’ll be
making my own again.
Of course, the kids and grandkids will be coming over to
celebrate, which is always a big plus. We have our family tradition, as I’m sure
you do, too. We’ll clear everything off the desk so we can use it for a dinner
table. In keeping with the theme of the day, we use “paper” plates, “pencil”
cups and serve basic “staples.” Afterwards we gather round and tell stories
about C.O.Y.D. Days of the past.
Later, we gather up all of the papers and accessories to
put everything back again. All of the stacks of papers are neatly squared off
and placed in a logical order on the desktop. Pens, pencils, scissors, rulers
and rubber bands are each put in their proper compartments and the new calendar
is placed under the clear panel of the new desk blotter. With everything done
and neat as a pin the desk looks fabulous and I’m ready to get to work!
After a wonderful Clean Off Your Desk Day, I get up first
thing in the morning, ready myself and report to the office and the desk, of
which I am so very proud. I sit down, look around and cannot find anything! I
begin to panic…my ruler is no under the pile of papers, where it has been for
the last few months. I have no idea in which drawer the stapler might be and
hey, “Who threw out that doo-dad I play
with while I’m on hold?”
In just a few days of work my desk is a mess again, I’m
happy, comfortable and can find anything in about two seconds. Little by little,
I’m getting ready for next year’s gala Clean Off Your Desk Day.
Messy desks aside, there is enough in the typical
office/work setting to cause us more day-to-day stress than we need, so allow me
to make a few suggestions.
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Maintaining a sense of humor will help us through most
any stressful situation.
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Always ask yourself, “What’s funny about this?” or
“What does this remind me of that’s funny?” before letting the stress get
the better of you.
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Looking for some humor will relax you and free your
mind to find resolution to the issues causing the stress.
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Practice daily Five Minute Fun Flings; a five minute
humor break (whatever brings you joy) will help put you in a better frame of
mind to deal with the stress when it occurs.
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Imagine how your favorite TV comedy character might
deal with your stressful situation.
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Remember this: No one can make you feel bad, unless you
let them
Barry Roberts is a nationally known motivational humorist,
helping business achieve maximum profitability, productivity and efficiency by
reducing stress and developing innovative thinking strategies. He is the author
of Practice Safe Stress and co-author of The Sales Coach ll.
Barry is an avid tennis player, an awful golfer, his wife
of 39 years is still his best friend, one of his son’s is a very successful
artist and musician and the other is an Emmy winning writer!
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