It Is Not Just What You Eat – But Where You Eat It
Please take this quiz:
Do you have a place to sit down for a meal or is the table full of things?
Are you going through counter tops, purses, and pockets for car keys?
Is your own junk so distracting that you pick it up, put it down, leave the room and wonder what you were in there to get?
Ever call your own cell and hope that it rings so you can find it?
Ever hope that it rings in your purse so you can find that too?
Do you search for your glasses and find them on top of your head?
Do you think it might be easier to move and start over than to “have a place for everything and everything in its place?
Sometimes we laughingly call some of those “senior moments,” while we sadly acknowledge that it is not all that funny.
The average person spends a good deal of time each day looking for things that they have but they do not know where they have them. Much of that time is related to the kitchen, hunting through drawers, pantries and recipe books or digging through stacks on the kitchen counter.
There may be a connection between the state of your kitchen and the health of your brain. An article that came out this week provides us with the fuel to get motivated and find the time to become more organized.
In summary, being organized may help us avoid Alzheimer’s disease.
The Associated Press article said that “a study of the elderly shows that those who see themselves as self-disciplined, organized achievers have a lower risk for developing Alzheimer’s disease than people who are less conscientious.”
In this study, by Robert Wilson of Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, they found that those with the highest scores have a personality they call conscientiousness. This personality has an 89 percent less chance of developing Alzheimer’s. The study had people rate themselves on how well they keep their belongings neat and clean, how well they pace themselves to get things done on time, if they work hard toward goals and in they strive for excellence in all the things they do.
It is quite possible that that conscientiousness personality provides some kind of protection or necessary exercise for the brain. Other past studies have shown activities such as working puzzles with a lower risk of Alzheimer’s.
In reality, is not getting and staying organized in your kitchen like playing with a book of puzzles? As you “play,” you are deciding which of these items do not belong with the others and how to fit all the pieces into the puzzle. You are keeping track of what you need, when you need it and what needs to be done next.
This study is further motivation to get organized when we find ourselves making organizing excuses that we have too much stuff, no time to deal with this stuff and no place to put all this stuff. Getting and staying organized might truly change your quality of life.
To get started getting organized in the kitchen, here are three (3) truths you need to know for success:
Have a to-do list. You cannot get it done if you do not acknowledge it.
Use your most productive time of day. Do not save that organizing project until you are too tired.
Be good at saying no – no to too much stuff and no to pulls on your time that keep you in a whirlwind.
Author Lea Schneider, a columnist for What’s Cooking America, is a freelance writer and organizational expert whose organizing ideas have been published in many magazines including Woman’s Day, Better Homes and Gardens Kitchen and Bath Ideas, Family Circle, Parents Magazine, as well as numerous newspapers and websites. She is a member of the Association of Food Journalists.
Getting organized is all about living simpler and making things easier. The bonus is it often leads to saving money. Lea Schneider’s kitchen organizing columns tell you how to organize the many things that relate to kitchens, menus, meals, and special food events.
Check out all of Lea Schneider’s helpful home and kitchen columns at Organizing Kitchens, Pantries, Menus and Meals.
Categories:
Kitchen Organization