Somebody help me.

I find myself always disorganized whether be it my room in my
apartment, my office at work, etc.  Any attempts to get organized
might work somewhat in the short term but always end up disorganized
in the long term.  I am a fairly intelligent individual and some would
chalk it up to being "lazy".  But I don't think it's laziness.  I'm
jealous of people who always appear to be so organized mentally - in
their appearance, in their efficient manner, their office, their
homes, their lives.

So my question is "Why am I disorganized?".  What is it about the way
I think or the way my brain works that makes getting organized
"externally" so difficult? Is it brain function, personality type,
lack of mental effort, too much intelligence (my hope is that). 
Anyway, let me know if I should clarify in any way?

Can you remember a time when you *were* "organized"?
For example, childhood, early teens, late teens, pre-traumatic event,
pre-marriage, pre-divorce, etc...  Were you always sub-optimally
organized?

Einstein would forget his socks....

Why is a great artist gifted?

I share your plight. What I find works best is STRICKLY setting aside
5 minutes everyday to orginize and do NOTHING else. Try it.

Hello bagelred-ga,

Are you familiar with the MBTI personality test? I think you might
find the concepts relevant and helpful. The description you give of
yourself leads me to believe you're a Perceiving (instead of Jugdging)
type as measured by this instrument. This means that you prefer to
leave things open ended and to think of lots of possibilities while
staying loose about schedules, rules, and keeping organized.

Here are a few links to help you explore the MBTI if you're not
already familiar with it. It's a very popular instrument and many
people have taken it at school or at work.

Good luck.

~ czh ~ 

http://cs.anu.edu.au/people/Ian.Barnes/research/slides.html
Personality Type and Software Development
Judging <---> Perceiving

According to J's, they are organised, P's are chaotic
According to P's, they are flexible, J's are rigid

http://www.triz-journal.com/archives/2002/01/a/
The Integration And Use Of Myers Briggs Profiles With A TRIZ Problem
Solving Session

The last parameter is a measure of how people run their lives. It is a
measure of how individuals apply the sensing/intuition and
thinking/feeling functions in their lives. This is evaluated as
judging (?J?) and perceiving (?P?). Judging is convergent, driving
toward closure and results. Organization, schedules, plans, and
priorities are important. A perceiving attitude is divergent, open,
flexible, and unconstrained. This person is always trying to keep
things open for new possibilities as long as possible and does not
want to miss anything.

http://www.typelogic.com/typelinks.shtml#tests
Resources and links for further exploration

Hmmmm?  I think I would be afraid to take the text and find out what
it says about me and my disorganization ... :-/

bagelred, I sympathize because I am this way too. However, even though
I am disorganized, I know exactly where everything is. It's only when
I clean up that I can't remember where things are. I don't know what
this means. I have always been this way since I was a child, and,
oddly enough, so is my mother. My mom used to blame the messiness of
the house on me, but then I left home and took my junk with me, and
the problem remained, LOL!

I also sympathize because I find trying to be neat and organized a
burden. I had a neighbour drop by once and it was embarrassing, to say
the least. My home is not a sty, but basically I'll have books on top
of chairs, clothes left in the clean clothes hamper, etc. Sometimes
this disorganization bothers me, but most of the time it doesn't. I'm
not a lazy person either, I just seem to be incapable of keeping
something neat and organized for more than a couple days!

There is a book about disorganized women. I haven't read it, but
judging by the reviews on Amazon, it's supposed to be the answer to
the problem. This book felt that disorganized women might have
ADD/ADHD, and that women express the problem differently than men. I
don't know if that's my problem :-D

I wish I could give you an answer, but alas I have none. I'll be sure
to bookmark your topic so I can check it later. Here's to hoping!

i am also very disorganised and i have ADD. do u have problems with
other things like can sit still, hold a train of though,
forgetfull,easily bored, impulsive etc??? i was diagnosed ages ago but
i find this cover most problems i have so look up www.adhd.com

Dear bagelred,
   I hear you.. As much as you are intelligent, it is possible to be
disorganized for the reason your brain works and percieves things
differently. Analyzing people's handwriting most brilliant people have
unreadable handwriting e.g. Einstein. The simple reason is their brain
works faster than they can write , hence the mismatch.
   Problem of being organized can be overcome few tips of your own,
you dont need expensive gadgets to do that, you can gradually move to
themif you need, a personal diary/assistant will help you to break
down things and attack smaller things one at a time. Once you start
attacking them.. you will start thinking the way you can better them,
just like human brain learns alphabets int the begining and later you
graduate making sentences using them, that is why few to achieve
organization, if you are not born with natural instincts for it. Use
the brain power to do it :)

good luck
/hilander
ps: "if you want to keep habbit of breaking down, do it for six weeks,
it will become habbit"- cant remember where I read from

I also have major organization problems, although I love to catagorize
everything and be neat and tidy, I just can't maintain it, sometimes
but often not, and unless things get drastically out of hand, I'm
happy with some amount of disorganization in my life. Perhaps the
Myers-Briggs test will help you understand the situation a little, but
I'm leaning toward the ADHD interpretation. Of coure you can only tell
for sure if this is the case if you go and see a specialist, there are
surveys that you and your relatives/close friends, etc. take to
evaluate you and then they try and figure out what to do. There are
differnt types also, there is ADD which has predominatly attentivness
problems and then also ADHD which also has hyperactivity, and
impusivness is also thrown in there for good measure I guess. The
thing is that even if you have ADD or ADHD, that is not a bad thing,
this is very important to understand! It is not a hinderance except
when you are forced to perform in situations that you cannot cope
with. Inattentivness, disorganization, hyperactivity, etc will be
deterimental to your success if you cannot recognize it and use your
own coping mechanisms. Most people with ADD don't know this is how
their brain works until quite late in life (i.e. adulthood) (Note that
lately it appears that the number of people being diagnosed with
ADD/ADHD is increaseing and concerns that children who are just
happy-crazy-off-the-wall-children, like kids should be, are being
misdiagnosed, but that is another issue). So these people, through
their whole lives have built up techniques to deal with how their
brain works, be it inattentivness, disorganization, forgetfullness,
etc. These are coping mechanisms so that ADD / ADHD folk can get
through situations where they are not at their best, because, well
simply, they have to. So I would recommend that you take stock of your
situation and see: "well, I'm disorganized, but what have I done to
compensate for that?" Like the commentator that said how she knows
where everything is, that is a coping strategy and so she doesn't have
to force herself to rewire her brain, she just has to learn how to
function with what she's got in the noggin. Another example, I have a
friend who is very much ADHD and just cannot be on time for anything.
His strategy is to set all the clocks in his house at different times.
When he gets up he's already 30 minutes late (bedside clock) when he
gets out of the shower he is 20 minutes late (bathroom clock), when
he's in the kitchen he's 10 mintues late (oven clock) and when he's
out the door he's 5 minutes early (cell phone clock). That's just an
example of how he deals with how his brain functions, you have to
identify how you can work with what you have to succeed where you need
to.

hope this helps.h

I think you are all nuts.  You should quit trying to be organized and
start trying to enjoy being what you are.  Your frustration lies not
with trying to find your keys, but trying to go somewhere at an
appointed time.  And really, you probably are organized, but your
"organization" doesn't look like everyone else's.

In Germany there are two sayings:

Ordnung ist das halbe Leben.  
Organization is half of life (or maybe 50% of everyhting).

Wer Ordnung hält, ist zu faul zu suchen.  
Anyone who is orderly is just too lazy to look for things.

From personal experience:

--I am often disorganized when my personal space is
threatened/invaded. I have a fairly good visual memory, so I can find
things in a messy pile easily, but on some level, I feel as if a
snooper will not. Also, I will be able to tell if said messy pile has
been rearranged. So, are you more disorganized around others? Freud
said that such disorganization, like obesity, can also be aggression
towards others. (I am clearly taking a different view that it is
defensive.)

--Are you aftraid your thoughts are disorganized? I am guessing this
from the statements in your question that suggest that you are fairly
intelligent. You probably are intelligent, but like some of the others
above have commented, have emotional or behavioral obstacles. You
should use an organizational system based not on someone else's
thoughts, therefore, but your own, as strange as they may be.
Organization/classification/systems are ultimately personal decisions
and you should use your own creativity. The Myers-Briggs test
suggested by czh-ga will help determine if you are creative or
analytical and to what extent you systemtize your thoughts according
to the conventions of others.

--Lastly, what kind of systems or organization do you like? Look into
the systems of organization in essays, pieces of art, novels, movies,
television shows, speeches, etc. to notice what type of organizer you
are. Perhaps you have problems because you have been trying to use a
system of sequence (for example, on your desk, arranging things in the
order in which you do them) when you are more inclined towards a
system of cause and effect (e.g. using a smaller sized laundry basket
so that the effect will be to do laundry on a more optimal schedule).
You organized your question as "problem-solution" (i.e. I am
disorganized, therefore, I will seek out the cause, which will
hopefully solve this problem).

--There is a good book: Getting Things Done, by David Allen.

Just my opinion, not really based on much research.

could be a psycological disorder.

i've been diagnosed as bipolar with borderline personality disorder.
i'm pretty intelligent, but have a hard time structurizing thoughts.
my room is like my life, a mess. i'd clean it but i'd rather spend my
time shopping or thrill seeking if i can even get out of bed. "normal"
stress freaks me out and i get panicky. i've been labeled as just
lazy, but theres more to it than people can see because they don't
comprehend that somebodys brain can be broken. but thats just me.
bipolar and borderline personality have a relationship to epilepsy.