The Art of Delegating

In my last blog post, I wrote about how I got back into art by leveraging my ADHD tendency to get distracted. I kept the project easily accessible so I could work on it here and there "just for a minute." I use quotes there because we all know that nobody can do anything for just one minute. (You do know that, right?) In that post, I lamented that although pottery was my first choice, I couldn't set up my studio again because cleaning out the basement was a prerequisite. Never gonna happen, right?

Wrong. I'm excited to announce that I now have a pottery studio! The basement isn't 100% cleaned out (we're at maybe 20%), but there's a big enough corner for the wheel, chair, shelves, supply cabinet and wedging table. How did I accomplish this magic? Delegating, breaking it down, and letting go.

Strategy #1: Delegate. My teenage son is home all day and needs something to do (he'll thank me for this someday). Who better to take over this job for me? He grumbled about it, but he did admit that it was better than pulling weeds outside in the 98-degree heat.

Strategy #2: Break it down. It is summer, after all, so I can't work him too hard. Every day for a week, we identified just a few things for him to deal with: furniture to move, boxes to stack, equipment to put together, stuff to sell on eBay, stuff to send to the curb. This kept it manageable for both of us.

Strategy #3: Let it go. Having a second person around who has no emotional attachment to any of it (even his old Thomas the Tank Engine dish set, can you believe it?) made it possible to get rid of some things I thought I had to keep forever. "What do you need that for, Mom?" "When's the last time you used that?" Then the knife to the heart: "Do I have to put you on 'Hoarders'?" I think my son got a kick out of being the tough guy for a while. He's even thinking about organizing as a possible part time business opportunity for himself. By delegating, I helped him discover a talent he may not have had a chance to discover otherwise. And I got a pottery studio!