Having Trouble Getting Organized? Help Is in Order

BARKHAMSTED — Whether you’ve had a death in your family, a change in employment or are just a  pack rat who is sick of looking at seemingly insurmountable piles of stuff, there’s a woman in Barkhamsted who is making it her mission to reorganize your life — if you’re ready to take the first step.

Linda Pulford, owner of Farmington Valley Organizing, was recently elected marketing director for Connecticut’s Chapter of the National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO) and she’s helping dozens of clients sort through messes ranging from IRS paperwork to mountains of toys in the hope of leading them to a more peaceful, clutter-free existence.

Pulford, 58, acknowledged Monday that she hails from the corporate world, where she supervised teams of hundreds of people.

“My background is in corporate project management,†she said. “I worked for Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield and everyone in that field was very organized. When I left there, I realized there are a lot of very disorganized people in the real world, not like where I had come from.â€

Putting her entrepreneurial skills to work, Pulford founded Farmington Valley Organizing two years ago, about the same time she moved to Barkhamsted with her husband, Robert, and dog, Sam. The self-run enterprise provides individual consultation to both residential and business clients who wish to tidy up their spaces.

“I’m very organized — I’ve always been very organized,†Pulford said. “My first job was in a library and I think that really contributed to my organizational skills. Every single item in a library has a very specific place. That hasn’t changed in my personal style at home. I’m very militant about what comes into my house. Stuff does not come into my house unless I know exactly what it’s for and where it goes.â€

That’s not to say Pulford is a perfectionist.

“There are messy areas in the house, but they’re controlled,†she said. “The basement can be messy and the garage can be messy. I’m not anal about it, I’m just careful. Stuff comes into your house and you have to take care of it. You compete with it for space. I really love the sense of open space in the house. It’s your space; you have to protect it.â€

Before anyone jumps to the conclusion that there’s a mystic-hippie angle to the game, guess again. Pulford is a realist about her work, which is intended to produce tangible results. “It’s not a spiritual thing but I have gone to a couple of feng shui lectures where they talk about how clutter can block energy. At the last feng shui lecture I went to, they said, ‘Your house is like a garden and clutter is like the weeds.’â€

While the ancient Chinese practice of arranging space has deep spiritual and cosmological connotations, Pulford said the teachings make perfect sense in ordinary organizing.

“Clutter does definitely block the flow of energy in a house,†she said. “A lot of people feel better when their spaces are cleared.â€

Getting Started

So how does the process begin? “I actually work with my clients side-by-side doing hands-on decluttering, purging and reorganizing,†Pulford said. “I work with them to find out what systems are going to work for them and the way their brains work. It’s definitely not ‘one size fits all.’ I know that I can organize things but that doesn’t matter to you. I need to know how you find these things so that you can organize them. What categories do you use in your brain?â€

If it sounds surprising that the key to organization does not lie in the act of hiring someone to do it all for you, there are other revelations. Pulford says junk drawers are perfectly fine with her and piles of paperwork are not necessarily a bad thing, as long as they satisfy an important requirement — they need to make sense to you.

For instance, surveying a bookshelf at The Winsted Journal, loaded with annual budget reports, reference materials and hisorical books about Winsted area towns, Pulford said it appeared disorganized, but not inherently troublesome. “Unless you say to me, ‘That bookshelf is a problem for me,’ then it’s perfectly okay with me. It’s not about having everything look so pretty — it’s about having it function.â€

In other words, one person’s mess is another person’s logic.

“One thing I try to find out is if my client is an inny or an outy,†Pulford said, not referring to belly buttons. “Some people like to keep things inisde drawers and cupboards where people can’t see them. They might be very messy, but they’re very comfortable when things are out of sight. But a lot of people are outies who like to keep everything out where they can see it.†Neither strategy is right or wrong.

Deeper Issues

Pulford has worked with clients who were dealing with underlying emotional issues, holding on to clutter associated with childhood memories, ex-husbands and deceased family members, and she said she lets her clients decide when it’s OK to purge. In one case, she suggested therapy to a client who agreed to visit the Center for Anxiety Disorders at the Institute of Living in Hartford, where clinical studies are conducted on chronic disorganization.

Though most of the clients Pulford visits do not need clinical help — she stresses that she is not a therapist — they do have significant organizing problems. Pulford often finds herself stepping over boxes and random clutter as soon as she walks through the front door of a home. Clients are often overwhelmed by the amount of stuff they have and they don’t know where to start.

Once clients decide to organize a living space or work environment, Pulford said, they need to have a measure of patience. Home remodeling and “mission organization†television shows like “Clean Sweep†show viewers how to do entire jobs within a half-hour segment, but Pulford said the reality is the work takes much longer. “I’ve met with people who have done mission reorganization TV shows and they say the least number of hours it took was 80,†she said. “It takes a while.â€

Pulford said there is no project too big or small for Farmington Valley Organizing and that she can bring in teams of up to five people to reorganize clients’ spaces. How fast the work gets completed will depend on how willing the client is to identify piles and let some of the material go. Unwanted items are often donated to churches and shelters, while handymen and antiques dealers are often called in to collect other articles.

Pulford said there are about 60 different professional organizers in Connecticut alone and that information is available online at napoct.com. or farmingtonvalleyorganizing.com.