I originally wrote this post on why I became a professional organizer in 2013. Five years later, it still rings true. I will add that one other thing that keeps me going as a PO is the opportunity to help my fellow organizers hone their skills and earn income by working on my teams. I feel so fortunate to still enjoy my work after 13 years in business. If you’ve ever wondered what a PO gets out of her work—which to some people looks decidedly unglamorous—read on.
Often when I meet folks who learn what I do for a living, they’re keen on learning how I became a professional organizer. I explain the training I took and how I went about starting my business. (That’s all detailed in my blog post, Are you interested in becoming a professional organizer?)
But seldom am I asked why I became a PO, rather than how. I thought I’d spend a little time today exploring that question.
In my observation, there are two sorts of folks who become professional organizers:
I fall into that second camp. As I’ve mentioned over and over, I’m a naturally messy person. I’m pretty organized in my space and I’m definitely organized inside my head, but I’m a bit messy and unruly. I sought solutions for my time management and clutter issues throughout my life and I learned a lot. I felt it was time to start sharing.
When I first contemplated starting my business, I was a freelance writer. I’d been writing about pets for ten years and had written hundreds of articles on various aspects of pet care. I’d had seven books published (most of which are no longer available) and contributed to several others. I was working on my last book, an ill-fated venture called Jane Goodall’s Return to Gombe co-written with the famed primatologist. The process of that book about killed me (and was never published) and I knew that in order to get through writing that manuscript I had to know it was going to be my last book. So I started looking for other things to do.
As I considered becoming a PO, I thought of several very important things that being a professional organizer would offer that being a freelance writer was not delivering:
That was very appealing and a big part of why I became a PO. But why do I keep doing it, now that I’m in my eighth fourteenth year of business?
Those initial three reasons did prove to be powerful rewarding. In addition, here are some other things I’ve found to be very rewarding:
Being a professional organizer is life-changing work for me. And its results can be life changing for my clients. It is easily the most rewarding work I’ve done in a career that’s spanned more than three decades. And as long as it continues to be this rewarding, I’ll keep doing it.
Tagged with: becoming a po, becoming a professional organizer, commitment, compassion, order catalyst, starting an organizing business, worth repeating
Inspiring work
Andrew Agar September 27, 2018 06:10 AM