On Becoming Organized

It’s late June in Atlanta, and outside my window you can see the heat radiating off the asphalt of our parking lot. At pools all over the city people are enjoying the 90° weather, and here in my office I’ve just felt a cold shiver run down my spine.

No, I’m not sick.

No, I’m not watching those YouTube videos where people eat live Octopi. (That’s a real thing.)

In fact what has happened is far, far worse.

I, James Vore, have just placed an order… for a monthly planner.

*Dear editor, please insert every scene, of every movie, where someone shakes their fist at the sky and screams, “Nooooooooooo!”*

*What’s that, I am the editor? Oh that’s going to take forever…*

*Ok, everyone just picture one such scene.*

To understand my very real nausea you need a little background on me. Hi, I’m James and I’ve only ever met one other person who scores as highly as I do in the “Unstructured,” category of the Right Path Assessment. Her name is Meredith, and she works here too. (Seriously, how does anything get done here?)

It’s not that I don’t want structure. In fact, I HATE missing deadlines, being late, or that terrible feeling of completely missing an appointment and knowing that somewhere there is a lonely Dentist packing up his tooth-scrappy thing swearing under his breath that he is going to replace my molars with rock candy.

Now, it’s 100% plausible to me that my anxiety about these scenarios (rock candy included) fuels my fear of structure in the first place, a fear that if I’m honest I was happy to live with. That is, until I wanted to actually be an effective leader.

Look, I’m not trying to rain on anyone’s parade. I love parades; they are where I get most of my candy. (I’ve really got to schedule an appointment with my Dentist.) But the ruse is up; Leaders, it’s not cool, fresh, or hip to act so unstructured that you are out of touch with the world around you. It’s not ok that people see you as unreliable, and undependable. (But James, I’m one of those artistic leaders, being a space cadet is kind of my shtick.) Hi, how ya doing, want to know what’s made me a better Writer, Producer, and Worship Leader? Learning to be disciplined with my time. In fact, working to incorporate some sliver of structure into my routine has matured every avenue of leadership, influence, and ministry in my life.

Still reading? Well, I can only guess that you’re either on board with improving this area of your own life, or desperate to find out how my saga of disappointment, bravery, and hope with the Dentist. Either way, here’s a few steps I’ve taken to reign in my uncontrollably-unstructured inclinations.

If I can do it, you can do it.

Get a Planner:

Turns out, buying a planner doesn’t automatically add 20 pounds to your waistline and a calculator to your watch. (Easy Gary, I’m not poking fun at you, you know I think you’re the coolest.) It doesn’t mean that you never have any spontaneous fun, it doesn’t kill your creative vibe, and it doesn’t chase away the muse. Buying a planner just means that you are like me and need to be able to visualize your schedule. Neuropsychologists have a fancy reason why writing something down helps you remember it, but let’s just go with, WE ALL KNOW THIS IS TRUE. Seriously, grab a planner, want a cool one? Check out the Medium Monthly Planner that I’m currently using. Yeah, it’s pretty rad.

Use your planner:

You can’t just buy a gym membership, you have to go. You can’t just buy a planner, you need to use it. Plain and simple, keep it in your bag, with your bible, whatever you need to do to make sure you actually use the thing.

Double it with your phone:

I see you old school Nokia guy, but the rest of us have phones that have calendars built in. For goodness sake, double up on the calendar usage. I promise this will make you at the least, 38.1% more productive. Making plans with a friend? Picture a tiny penguin on your shoulder screaming, “PUT IT IN YOUR CALENDAR NOW!!” (Penguins are some of nature's most responsible creatures.) The faster you put something in your calendar (set to remind you an hour before) the higher the chance you don’t leave your Dentist stranded at the airport waiting for you to pick them up.

Marry Up (or Who You Hang Out With Matters):

Admittedly this one takes a few more steps than the others, and you have to be pretty lucky. (Guys, I suggest you serve in some kind of ministry role as I am CONVINCED that men who serve end up outkicking their coverage each and every time. I call it, The Ministry Bump.) The principle here not only applies to your spouse, but to your crowd. This isn’t one of those ditch your friends situations, but I can guarantee if you start working, serving, and generally occupying the same space as people who are committed to being reliable, you’ll start feeling the pull to abandon some of your less desirable behaviors. I have an amazing wife and leaders in my life who have modeled what it looks like to be disciplined with their time, and I’m more and more convinced it’s because they realized…

It’s about Respect and Honor:

Look, wasting your own time means dishonoring God. Recently I head Mark Batterson say, “potential is the gift God gives to us, what we do with it is our gift back.” I LOVE Netflix (Stranger Things Oh Mmmmmaaaahhhhhhhhgggggaawwwww) but I know that if I let myself binge watch all of the Flixes on the Net that I’ll never make the most of my potential, and in the same vein, never honor the gifts God has given me. If honoring and worshipping God is my life’s chief end, then being disciplined with my time isn’t an option, it’s a necessity, and if honoring the people in my life is important to me, it’s doubly as important.

Wasting someone else’s time, being late, missing appointments, leaving your Dentist holding two coffee’s at Starbucks while he looks less and less patiently at the front door, is tantamount to dishonoring them. You’ve essentially told them, “You’re not important enough for me to put in the extra effort it takes to be on-time.” Personally, I’m not ok with people feeling this way, especially not when I factor in that I want my life to reflect Christ. It sounds heavy, and there’s always grace, but let’s not be the people who take advantage of it because we are lazy, let’s save it for when we make honest mistakes.

Take baby steps, and keep taking them:

I’m still taking them. In fact, I sat down to write this and realized I had left my phone in the studio, and my tea in the microwave. The truth is that my unstructured nature will always be a part of me, it’s what makes me good in situations where the plan has gone to pot and we need solutions quickly, or in areas of life where I need to be able to relax the stress that can build in my incredible structured wife, life when my Dentist shows up at my house and we need to make a fast exit. What’s also true is that I can lean on it as a crutch, hiding my immaturity behind it and labeling it, “my wiring.”

I want you and I to become the strongest leaders we can be, the best artists we can be, the most dependable servants of Jesus that we can be, and to do that we have to be willing to adopt methods of doing things from the people in our lives who naturally get this, and hopefully they’ll learn a few things from us. (Like avoiding murderous Dentists.)