The Virtues of Being Lazy

I know, I know, probably half of you are cringing at the very thought that laziness could be anything other than evil incarnate, but I posit that it’s actually a magical key towards easy and organized living. Why? Because if we’re not organized, then we’re either the type who is always doing too much, or we suffer from trying to make organizing harder than it has to be, or we’re just so exhausted we don’t have the energy to do anything but throw the mail on the dining room table and collapse in front of the television when we get home. The answer? Lazy solutions. Sure you can call them easy or simple, but lazy is more fun. It’s summertime, tailormade for lazy days, so it’s time to give lazy the positive spin it’s always deserved. 

So for those of you who suspect that you’ve got the “lazy” gene, the hardest part is accepting who you are and embrace all that’s good about it or you’ll never be organized, you’ll just keep trying and apologizing for the mess. As a loud and proud lazy Organic Freedom Pixie (NFP), it doesn’t mean I can’t and haven’t been organized in my life, but it was only when my Classic Freedom (SFJ) sister and I came up with what I think of as “lazy” organizational solutions that both our lives became easier. Yeah you heard that right. Hard for her to accept too. For those of you who bristle at the suggestion that you even KNOW how to be lazy — Classics (SJs), Organic Structures (NFJs), Smart Structures (SFJs), Funs (SPs) — and you’re still disorganized? Then you must be tired and in need of lazy solutions, the kind you can easily do as you’re headed for the couch. I know it’s scary to think this way, but just think of lazy as being easy and simple ways to get and stay organized. For the rest of us, just know that embracing laziness is the key to making organizing and thus life, easier. As it should be, of course. Here are our top three lazy solutions that work for all types:

1. Bins. Yes all kinds. Bins for shoes in the front hall, attractive bins or baskets for incoming mail, kid’s artwork, kid’s toys, etc. Use attractive and matching containers around your home to create homes for the continual onslaught of stuff in our modern age. If you’re an Organic (NF) or Smart (NT) Pixie, make sure your bins are see-through.

2. Hooks. Clothes all over the floor, jewelry in a jumbled mess at the bottom of a big closed box? Then you need more hooks. Backs of doors, on the inside walls of your closet if you’ve got deep ones — wherever there’s a wall you don’t mind the look of what you’re going to hang there, then go ahead and get out that drill.

3. Labels. Yeah even for lazy types, if you’re living in a multi-person household, this might not seem lazy as it does take a lot of work to install, but once this arduous task is done, the results allow for lazy sailing. It allows you not have to think about where to put the wine glasses when you’re emptying the dishwasher, and if it really annoys you when people put things back in the wrong place, it saves you from having a conversation, or worse a big blow out fight over cutlery.

For those who lazy comes easy, embrace your inner lazy and you’ll find even more easy solutions. For those who think lazy is a seven deadly? Then you’re doing too much and need to find “lazy” solutions because if you’re not tired then we suspect you’re some kind of alien robotic race that has secretly taken over the world without the rest of us knowing!