I Don’T Chase the Garbage Truck Down the Street in My Bathrobe Anymore!: Organizing for the Maximum Life

By Dianne Barker

I love this book! Dianne tackles a serious problem with humor, warmth, and practical advice, using scriptural principles and hilarious personal stories.
Debora M. Coty, humorist, speaker, and author

Diannes book is an encouraging and uplifting book that helps organize our lives and homes, releasing the stuff that doesn't matter for the life that does.
Angela Breidenbach, speaker, coach, and author

Dianne shares secrets of letting go for disorganized hoarders and provides tools to create a less cluttered life. Her personal examples and humor make it an easy read.
Karen Whiting, speaker and author

I have laughed until I cried! Diannes ideas are easy to implement and woven with Gods encouraging Word.
Annetta Dellinger, speaker and author

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Dec 16, 2015
• ISBN: 9781512704587

Dianne Barker

Dianne Barker, former newspaper columnist, co-authored several bestselling books, including Twice Pardoned with Harold Morris and Living Proof with Clebe McClary. A popular speaker for women’s events, she teaches with passion about marriage, parenting, relationships, and abundant living. Dianne and her husband, James, live in Johnson City, Tennessee. www.diannebarker.com www.cabbageandkings.com

Book preview

Copyright © 2015 Dianne Barker.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, King James Version.

Scripture quotations marked NKJV are taken from The Holy bible, New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

Scripture quotations marked NIV are taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked Amplified are taken from THE AMPLIFIED BIBLE, Old Testament copyright © 1965, 1987 by the Zondervan Corporation. The Amplified New Testament copyright © 1958, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.

Scripture quotations marked Phillips are taken from The New Testament in Modern English Revised Student Edition, copyright 1972 by J.B. Phillips. Macmillan Publishing Company, New York, New York.

Cover design by Carol Seggio.

WestBow Press

A Division of Thomas Nelson & Zondervan

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.westbowpress.com

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

ISBN: 978-1-5127-0019-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5127-0458-7 (e)

WestBow Press rev. date: 12/14/2015

Contents

All My Worldly Goods I Thee Endow

I Don’t Chase the Garbage Truck

Down the Street in My Bathrobe Anymore!

Part One: Understanding the Problem

1 There’s a Rat in My House!

2 How Did Things Get in Such a Mess?

Part Two: Managing Space

3 Why Can’t I Get Organized?

4 A Basket for Everything and Everything in Its Basket

5 Spiders in Kings’ Palaces

6 If I Die Before I Wake Send Someone to Clean My Oven

7 Give Your Husband Some Space—Clean a Closet

8 Taking on Goliath—Basement Excavation Begins

Part Three: Managing Time and Paper

9 My One Discipline—Getting up Every Morning

10 Making the Most of Minutes

11 My New Best Friends—Calendar and List

12 Tsunami Warning—the Paper Flood

Part Four: Managing Family Life

13 Taming Chaos One Thing at a Time

14 My Laundry Hamper Runs Over with Love

15 Overwhelm City—So It’s Downhill after the Children?

16 My Favorite Hobby—Spending Money

17 Kitchen Patrol—Meal Planning Made Easy

Part Five: Managing Myself for the Maximum Life

18 There’s No Such Thing As Dressy Sweat Pants

19 My Life’s Lingering Fragrance

Afterword: Pursuing a Balanced Life

Appendix

Chapter Bible Studies

Recipes

Organization Helps

Organization Survey

A Few Guys Comment

About the Author

Conferences for Women of All Ages and Places

Acknowledgments

Notes

I Don’t Chase the Garbage Truck

Down the Street in My Bathrobe Anymore!

Organizing for the Maximum Life

Dianne Barker

Praise for

I Don’t Chase the Garbage Truck

I love this book! Dianne Barker tackles a serious problem with humor, warmth, and spot-on practical advice. All of us can benefit from Dianne’s experience with overcoming the tendency toward pack-ratting, even if we’re not completely on the hoarder end of the spectrum. Using scriptural principles and often hilarious personal stories, Dianne gives us reason, motivation, and a realistic plan to become more organized. We’ll no longer have to pray, If I die before I wake, send someone to clean my oven!

Debora M. Coty—humorist, speaker, award-winning author of numerous books including Too Blessed to be Stressed and Fear, Faith, and a Fistful of Chocolate

http://www.deborahcoty.com

If you think learning how to get organized might be boring, think again! I have laughed until I cried as I read I Don’t Chase the Garbage Truck Down the Street in My Bathrobe Anymore! Organizing for the Maximum Life. Every reader will connect with Dianne Barker as she honestly, and humorously, reflects upon her past organization skills and how they changed. I Don’t Chase the Garbage Truck Down the Street in My Bathrobe Anymore! has simple, easy to implement ideas that are woven with God’s encouraging Word. I was rejuvenated to take action now that I understand how our personalities reflect why we organize as we do. Whether you are the queen of clutter, the ultimate organizer, or somewhere in between, this book is for you!

Annetta Dellinger—speaker, author of thirty books

Co-author JOY-spirations for Caregivers

http://www.annettadellinger.com

Ms. Barker writes an encouraging and uplifting book to help organize our lives and homes. My productivity is going to soar with her tips, and I’m not unproductive. Recognizing the Lord did not make me to hang onto stuff is the first step in releasing the stuff that doesn’t matter for the life that does. Bravo, Dianne Barker. Busy women everywhere will love this helpmeet.

Angela Breidenbach—speaker, coach and author, A Healing Heart http://www.AngelaBreidenbach.com

With disarming transparency, tips, tools, and tactics, Dianne Barker’s newest book, I Don’t Chase the Garbage Truck down the Street in My Bathrobe Anymore! is a must-read manual for the messy. Dianne, a reformed clutterholic, explores the why behind these patterns and defines orderliness and the need to detach ourselves from stuff as a spiritual issue. This takes what could appear to be just one more book on getting organized to an entirely new level. I consider myself a neatnik, but I discovered useful new insights. For those ready to deal with the mess once and for all, this book will help you do it!

Deborah DeArmond, speaker and author, Related By Chance, Family By Choice: Transforming Mother-in-Law and Daughter-in-Law Relationships.

http://www.debdearmond.com

I’ve read the intro and first few chapters. This book is super! Dianne’s words have blessed my life. Her humor, wisdom, and love show through each word. This book will be used of the Lord to help many who struggle to be organized. It’s a tool to reach the goal of an organized life with less clutter and more joy.

Peggy Cunningham—missionary and author, Really Rare Rabbits

http://www.peggycunningham.com

Dianne shares secrets of letting go for disorganized hoarders and provides tools to change and create a more orderly and less cluttered life. Her personal examples and humor make it an easy read. The tips and systems will help those who choose to change know what to do.

Karen Whiting—award-winning author and speaker

Secrets of Success: Time.

www.karenwhiting.com

Dianne is a refreshing breath of inspiration and wisdom. She is unashamed to let us see the real Dianne and recognize ourselves in her. She does this with humor and with helpful suggestions that motivate us to become the best version of who God created us to be.

Sonya Higgs—Manager, Christian Book and Gift Shop

Greeneville, Tennessee

It was one of those nights to bed at 10:00, awake at 1:30 with no going back to sleep. I definitely needed a distraction so I got up and turned on the trusty iPad and read an email from a friend with Dianne’s sample chapters. Great! Something light to read! My impression: how can I send a copy of this book to a few relatives without their knowing where it came from? They desperately need this wisdom. Dianne has great material, and I love how she applies Scripture to daily living.

Shirley Braddock—retired nurse, joyful mother, proud grandmother

As someone who does not know the meaning of being organized, I can totally relate to this book. I laughed at the poems and enjoyed the funny way of looking at being a pack rat and hoarder. I am learning to become more focused on accomplishing things and to watch the signs of straying from my mission. This book will be great for people like me! The fun reading might actually keep me from wandering off in my reading.

Libby Dellinger—a hope-to-be-organized-soon mom

To my family—

James

Leanne and Rex

Jimmy, Katy, and Jacob

with abundant love.

You inspire me

to pursue excellence.

All My Worldly Goods I Thee Endow

W eddings make me laugh. It’s that pledge to the spouse, All my worldly goods I thee endow. If my husband had only known!

James and I are opposite personalities, meaning we act and think differently about almost everything. He likes pie. I prefer cake. He plans ahead. I take life an hour at a time. He’s practical. I’m a dreamer. He lives by decision. I live by sentiment. He throws away. I keep.

My husband grumbled about my worldly goods from day one of our marriage. I saved stuff. When he could barely walk through the basement without injury, he wasn’t amused when I insisted stuff is a biblical term. The men seeking Saul, soon to be anointed the first king of Israel, found him hiding among the stuff.¹

I wanted to please my husband and struggled to keep clutter from overflowing our space. I suspected my hoarding tendency could be a spiritual issue after seeing a film called Treasures about a man dragging a refrigerator-sized box filled with his possessions. Laboring to maneuver the heavy box, he occasionally gave away a pair of worn shoes to help someone in need. The image imprinted itself in my memory, and the words of Jesus began to nag. Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.²

Jesus wasn’t encumbered with stuff. He didn’t carry with him any creature comforts, not even necessities. Would he drag a trunk of junk from town to town? I couldn’t imagine that. He traveled light and expected others to do so. When he sent the twelve disciples on mission, he said, Take nothing for the journey—no staff, no bag, no bread, no money, no extra tunic.³ Sounds like they had only the clothes on their backs. That’s stripping to essentials.

Extra clothes added to my problem—several sizes for my fluctuating weight. Jesus went for the heart. Why do you worry about clothes? He said lilies of the field grow without stressing, yet their splendor surpasses that of King Solomon. God clothes the grass of the field during its short life span, and he will clothe us, too. Being occupied with theses cares shows we have little faith. He clarified our priority.

Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.⁴

The Lord had strong words about keeping stuff. Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.⁵ Getting Jesus’ perspective loosened my grip on worldly goods. I gave away carloads of stuff and tried to organize what was left. The easy part was organizing clutter and the hard part—organizing my life.

After leaving a successful journalism career to be a stay-at-home mom, I continued writing and speaking for women’s events while giving my family priority. Trying to balance simultaneous roles—wife, mother, mentor to young wives, writer, and conference speaker—I found myself being swept along by life, grasping for a rope, and crying for help to survive the swirling current. I craved organization and prayed for it, throwing my need at Jesus’ feet. Lord, you promised, Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.6 If you help me get organized, it would be a great and unsearchable thing.

The Lord honored my desperate prayer, teaching me how to organize for the maximum life and giving me opportunities through my speaking and mentoring ministry to teach other women to be keepers at home.⁷ It’s exciting to share my success with a broader audience because seldom does someone drowning in disorganization write such a book. Being pack rats and procrastinators, we’re buried under our stuff and stalled by our good intentions. We have trouble implementing suggestions from organization experts because we aren’t organized enough to make their solutions work.

Be honest with me. When the doorbell rings, do you hide dirty pots in the oven or carry clutter to your bedroom and lock the door? Have you ever invited friends for dinner and hoped they’d cancel?

I’m here to help! If your laundry hamper is always full and your kitchen sink runs over with dirty dishes, if stacks of clutter nestle in every available space and dust bunnies swirl like tumbleweeds in a prairie windstorm, if you’ve considered offering guests a hardhat before entering the disaster zone—this book is for you. If you recently won the Organized Woman of the Year award, give copies to a dozen friends whose messy habits annoy you. But read it first to understand our struggles and appreciate our efforts to become as you are.

If you’re somewhere between those two extremes, you’ll find helpful insight, practical tools, and heartfelt encouragement to experience the maximum life. While writing I had in mind women in a place where I’ve spent much time—Overwhelm City. Are you there? You may rekindle hope as you walk a few steps through my life.

We’ll wrestle the thieves Slothfulness and Procrastination and learn strategies not only to conquer clutter and organize our home but also to manage time, finances, and even thoughts. We aren’t beating ourselves over our failures—enough of that! We’ll examine the reasons we are where we are, including over-commitment and overwhelming circumstances, as we pursue a balanced life.

In each chapter my organized friends throw a rope to the desperate, who are drowning in disorganization. Their suggestions, "The Organized in their own words," reinforce the solutions I present and offer additional ideas. You’ll notice similarities and differences in organization and cleaning styles. Don’t skip their advice, thinking you’ve read that before. Hearing the same strategy repeated will etch the principle on your heart. Each chapter has a related Bible study, a brief list of verses giving God’s viewpoint (see Appendix). I also included the organization survey used in my research—and thoughts from a few guys.

I hope the book title made you smile. I pray these pages inspire you to make changes that bring tranquility to your home, contentment to your soul, and glory to your heavenly Father.

I am the Lord, the God of all mankind. Is anything too hard for me?⁸

Ah, Sovereign Lord, you have made the heavens and the earth

by your great power and outstretched arm. Nothing is too hard for you.⁹

I Don’t Chase the Garbage Truck

Down the Street in My Bathrobe Anymore!

A familiar rumbling interrupted my lazy morning as I sipped coffee while reading yesterday’s newspaper. Since my husband prefers the pages intact, I wait until morning to