An Introverts Guide to Spring Cleaning with Heart
This is Bek speaking. I do the odd bit of content for the gang at Open Shed. And I’d like to share with you why I think the Spring Clean with Heart campaign they’ve got running with OzHarvest is the cat’s recycled pyjamas!
Ok, let me start off by saying that if I am not armed with a keyboard, words tend to jam up in me like paper in a dot matrix printer. I find it incredibly difficult to take that leap with people where I truly connect.
It’s not that I don’t want to, I just...well, suck like an Electrolux at it.
This is why having a Spring Clean in Five Ways and the idea of spring cleaning with heart really appeals to me.
Have you seen that delightful TedX video by Susan Cain where she talks about the power of introverts? Well, 50% of you probably haven’t seen it as you’re off being social and fun. The other 50% of us were probably too shy to ask about it- so here’s the link. Thank me later.
One thing Susan talks about is how she turned up to camp with a suitcase of books because that was her idea of a great time. It is for me, too.
You electronic kids out there will probably tell me that I don’t need a suitcase anymore, that I need an i-thingie. However considering there’s no paper cut Apps available and I can’t find any “Eau de Page” to spray on my i-thingie, I still buy books.
(I’m also concerned being thwacked with a screen every night may be slightly more hazardous to my forehead. I could do without the dreams about being bitchslapped by Tron, thanks all the same.)
ANYWAY- even though I read and re-read my books over and over, I am consciously aware there are an awful lot of dead trees hanging out on my book shelves. It’s like walking into a Tim Burton nightmare for pine forests without the (darkly handsome) Johnny Depp character!
As much as I love them, each round of dusting does make me feel incredibly aware of how much paper driven knowledge and story is hanging about waiting for the chance to be read.
And I am sure there are probably a bunch of other introverts in my neighbourhood who also have the same sort of deforestation programme running in their living rooms, too.
As we’re not the kind of people to do the whole “hello, have a bunch of muffins- oh what a lovely Volvo you have...” thing over the fence because it’s usually painfully awkward and clumsy (Oh what a nice muff...I mean volv...argh! When does the lease expire again?).
So I figure popping a swap library in front of our house is as legal as we can get to “trapping” introverts and stop me from being arrested for misunderstandings in the process.
Trapping introverts for charity
A pop up swap library is basically is like a bird feeder for book worms and word nerds. You pop one of these out the front of your house with a sign that says “book swap” and some instructions, throw in half a dozen books and see if any of the word nerd species are attracted to it.
Or so my imagination told me. It works pretty efficiently in there. In truth, I haven’t tested this theory as yet.
I’m using the Spring Clean in Five Ways challenge as that sense of urgency I need to get this done. Dear reader, I am promising to take something I have had in my sketch book for ages and put it live in my front yard in Waverley.
AND- With this one little move, I am hoping to declutter, share something, connect with the locals, help others and spend time building the project, too.
How does this help Open Shed and OzHarvest?
If the gang at Open Shed are happy with the idea, I’ll be hanging some kind of Open Shed sign on there for exposure. And the whole idea of a swap library does carry the flag for collaborative consumption I guess, too.
Plus I am also undertaking a challenge with myself to list another 20 books on the Open Shed site for you to rent with all proceeds going to OzHarvest.
Oh, and also hopefully bust a few preconceptions my possession loving partner has in the process about what people will actually do if given the chance to borrow (or he assumes, steal) a book in our local neighbourhood. He’s yet to list something on Open Shed yet, so I am hoping if I lead by (slightly zany) example, he’ll be brave enough to take his own leap!
(NB: I can’t make fun of him too much. He is after all, humouring me and scrounging the wood for it as we speak! He gets points for that, right?)
How’s that for wiping off your Spring challenge in one tidy idea?
I’ll be blogging about it on Open Shed, via my own site of Unashamedly Creative and sharing the progress via Twitter, Facebook and Instagram from the safety of my keyboard.
All going to plan, I’ll have some wonderful magic to report each time.
So why don’t you join me? Pick something you feel inspired to do, and let’s get this spring clean with heart thing happening!
