So, you wanna know about this Kathleen O’Connor business? Alright, let me tell you. It wasn’t some big revelation from a guru on a mountaintop, nothing like that. More like stumbling over a rock that actually helped me walk straighter, if that makes any sense.
My whole setup, especially for my side hustles and personal projects, was a complete disaster. I’m talking notes everywhere, digital stuff, paper stuff, you name it. Folders within folders leading to nowhere. Felt like I was wading through junk just to find one simple idea I had last week. Total nightmare. Wasted so much damn time, just spinning my wheels.
Then, I dunno, I was probably just messing around online late one night, probably trying to avoid actual work I was supposed to be doing, and her name popped up. Kathleen O’Connor. Didn’t ring any bells for me. Sounded like someone’s aunt, to be honest, not some productivity wizard.
But I clicked on something, maybe an old forum thread or a really obscure blog post, and it was her talking about dealing with information overload. No fancy theories, no complicated software recommendations, just straight-up ‘this is what you do when you’re buried in your own crap.’ It was pretty blunt, which I appreciated.
Her main thing, or at least what I got from it, was all about being ruthless. Absolutely ruthless with what you keep and how you organize it. Sounds easy, but it ain’t. Especially if you’re a bit of a digital packrat like me, always thinking ‘I might need this someday!’
My Process Kicking In
So I thought, ‘What the heck, can’t get any worse.’ My current system, if you could even call it that, was clearly not working. First thing I did, just like she kinda hinted at in this old piece I found, was to really, and I mean really, nail down why I was keeping all this stuff. For each specific project. Not just ‘oh, this random article looks interesting.’ That ‘someday useful’ thinking is a killer, it just leads to more piles.
I spent a whole damn weekend on it. No joke. Just me and my mountains of digital garbage, plus a few actual stacks of paper. It was less ‘spring cleaning’ and more like an archaeological dig through my own bad habits and forgotten ideas. Pretty painful, actually, seeing all that wasted effort in saved files.
I sort of made my own little system based on her ideas, trying to put it into practice immediately:
- First, I made a pile for stuff I absolutely, positively needed for what I was working on right now, or in the very near future. This pile was depressingly small, let me tell you.
- Second, a pile for stuff that was genuinely ‘interesting’ but had no real home or immediate use. That went into a specific ‘read later if I’m ever truly bored enough’ folder, which, let’s be honest, rarely gets opened. But it felt better than just deleting it outright at first.
- And then the ‘why on earth did I even save this?’ pile. Hitting delete on that stuff, or archiving it deep, deep away, felt pretty good, I gotta admit. Liberating, even.
She had this line in whatever I read, something like, ‘If it doesn’t serve an active purpose, it’s just noise.’ Man, that stuck with me. I realized I’d been living with so much digital noise, it was no wonder I couldn’t think straight sometimes.
It’s not like I’m suddenly Mr. Organized now. Far from it, believe me. I still have days where things get a bit messy. But things are… clearer. I can actually find stuff when I need it. I actually get more done on my projects instead of just shuffling digital papers around. It’s a process, you know? Still messing it up sometimes, but I catch myself quicker.
So, yeah, Kathleen O’Connor. No big miracle cure. No dramatic life change overnight. Just some solid, practical advice that clicked with me when I really needed it. Funny how that happens. You just gotta be willing to actually do the work, I guess. Nobody else is gonna sort your particular mess for you, that’s for sure.
