Wednesday, 7th of April 2010 at 10:45:07 AM 
I've only ever done this metaphorically, I swear.
Don’t: Then forget about the switched-around schedule and forget to post on your designated day, dumbass. Ahem.
Do: Clean out closets, donate excess to charity, take this as an opportunity to change habits.
Don’t: Forget to mail something important to a client that somehow became stuck to the bottom of a pile of unrelated stuff on your desk, dumbass.
Do: Recognize that improvement is a process, and probably a non-linear one at that.
Don’t: Sit around marinating in a delightful stew of unpleasant feelings when not all goals are met and/or things aren’t going exactly as you’d wish.
Do: Take (some) pride in your successes.
Don’t: Lose all hope when faced with failures.
Do: Enlist the help of your family to accomplish reasonable goals, and both anticipate and expect cooperation.
Don’t: Gnash your teeth or otherwise despair when the course of familial cooperation does not run smooth. Rome wasn’t built in a day, nor were tweens (or husbands) perfected in a few weeks.
Do: Aim high.
Don’t: Get discouraged.
Do: Use successes as an example to yourself of what you can accomplish when you really put your mind to it.
Don’t: View failures as a metaphor for all your shortcomings.
In case it’s not clear, I can lose pounds, I can organize the crap out of my closets and commit to packing greener lunches, but today I am busy trying to wish a possibly untenable set of circumstances into existence and greatly frustrated by the process. Sometimes I want what I can’t have. Sometimes I can have what I want but it takes a lot more work than I originally thought. Not knowing which of those situations I’m facing right now is making me SUPER-CRANKY, and as is my way when I am like this, I feel strongly that everything I have accomplished up to this point matters not at all because of this ONE thing I haven’t yet figured out how to do.
Which brings me to my last point:
Do: Keep working at getting better in both big and little ways.
Don’t: Panic, even in the face of failure (real or imagined).
Back to my process, wherever it may take me. Order shall be mine. One way or another. It’s not about having everything perfect, it’s about getting better. And I will be better, dammit.
(Next time I am just sticking to cleaning my closets. Hmph.)
One of my FAVORITE lines from “Steel Magnolias”. . .”I am pleasant. . .dammit.”
Excellent post.
I am still working on the fact that it’s never “all done” forever.
This was a great challenge to follow. I sent my daughter over so she can feel better about trying to wrangle some sense of order in her life. We are all trying to do better at whatever matters most to us. It helps to know we’re not the only one.